Some female students at UB will soon come face to face with "Women Below 30," a new outreach initiative for the Erie County Commission on the Status of Women.
Wb30 is a research project that hopes to gain further understanding of issues affecting female residents of Erie County who are in their twenties, coordinators said.
"I like to think of the commission as a resident advisor in a college dorm," said Elizabeth Bailey, a Wb30 coordinator. "It exists to facilitate action and change on behalf of women."
Erie County officials are only just starting to focus attention on issues affecting younger women, Bailey said.
"The commission had focused more on issues affecting women in their late thirties and above, perhaps because the over-30 age group makes up the majority of the massive network within which the commission functions," Bailey said. "The issue of addressing this younger population is becoming more pressing."
One mission of the project is to introduce the county commission to the 21-30 year old population with a kickoff of college campus presentations, advertisements in local newspapers and announcements on public radio.
Wb30 plans to begin presentations in December 2004 both on and off campus.
Clotilde Dedecker, Wb30's executive director, has already presented on several local campuses including Niagara University and said she is looking into coming to UB in the near future.
"I believe that the three strategies -- presentations, media, and e-mail -- combined with good old fashioned word of mouth will work together to effectively introduce the Commission to this population," Bailey said.
Wb30 directors said they are planning on running focus groups in order to identify the most prominent issues for the female population in Erie County.
Focus groups are moderated discussions in which about 10 people offer personal opinions in a neutral location like a community center or library and listen to other women, like themselves, an opportunity not usually offered to members of this population, Bailey said.
"We will need 250 women who are of the ages of 21-30 and residents of Erie County," Bailey said.
But some female UB students say they would not be much help to the survey because they are isolated from the concerns of the rest of Erie County's female population.
"Even though I am supposed to be one of the affected women in Erie County, I am so secluded from everything at UB that I don't think I would be of much help in the Wb30 survey," said Erica Novak, a sophomore undecided major.
