Adele’s Circle members meet in Stamp Student Union in early November. The alumnae organization seeks to empower female students to realize their full potential with confidence.
The Rev. Beth Platz, chaplain emerita at this university, became the first female pastor ordained in the Lutheran Church in America in the university’s Memorial Chapel in 1970.
A product of a women’s college, Platz grew up in an environment dominated by the thought: “Of course women can do this.” That empowered view opens doors for women, she said, and she hopes to help foster that thought at this university as part of Adele’s Circle of Women, a new alumnae group dedicated to female empowerment.
“It was funny because I was really secure, but no one else knew,” Platz said. “People would come up and ask me, ‘When you get married, you have to leave the ministry, right?’ And I would just ask them, you know, ‘Is your pastor married? Why would I have to leave?’ They all just needed to work it out.”
Adele’s Circle seeks to inspire and inform female students at the university through storytelling, mentoring and connection. The group is still in its formative stages, holding meetings with alumnae and planning outreach to the student body, but members said they hope to host their first event before the end of the school year.
The group has been a dream of Stamp Student Union Director Marsha Guenzler-Stevens’ for a long time, and it is finally coming to fruition. It’s time for the “old farts,” as she put it, to take some time to invest in young women.
At its core, the group of alumnae seeks to empower female students. Guenzler-Stevens cited research that college women nationally graduate with higher GPAs than their male counterparts but have drastically lower self-confidence.
“I read that and just knew something had to change,” Guenzler-Stevens said. “If women are best developed and nurtured with relationships, if they do best in groups — whether it’s family or friend groups — then that’s the best environment for them to get an education in as well.”
A similar alumnae group, the Committee to Unite Women Leaders, existed at this university but faded in the late ’90s. It also consisted of faculty, staff and student leadership and provided a variety of events for the university community.
In the future, Adele’s Circle plans to expand its numbers from about a dozen to nearly 100 alumnae, Guenzler-Stevens said, and will be somewhat selective, looking for women successful in their fields. They hope to potentially reach out to hundreds of students through planned events and mentor partnerships.
Sophomore elementary education major Caroline Weber said she would be interested in joining the group and she sees their initiative to lead by example as potentially very beneficial to the female population at this university.
“There’s definitely a need to make female students more confident. It’s easy to see women entering and leaving school that are very smart, get good grades and have high potential but just don’t recognize it,” Weber said. “We definitely need to show young women they have the power to do what they want, and I think leading through stories and by example is an effective way of doing that.”
Guenzler-Stevens teaches a women’s leadership class during the spring semester and said she sees students appreciate the “power of the story.” The hallmark event the group plans to host by the end of the school year will prominently feature such storytelling.
“Usually in class, a panel will come in to talk to students, and I really see students appreciate the journey that the women have taken to get to their career,” Guenzler-Stevens said. “A lot of times, they see themselves in the story. Their paths won’t all be linear, there’ll be bumps and missteps. Seeing that reflected really helps reinforce that, helps them to be strong throughout.”
Melissa Kalas, a 2010 graduate of the university who now works at Lockheed Martin, described the importance of seeing a female professional’s life in chapters, to show students that things don’t always make sense at the time, but they all contribute to a larger picture.
“If we introduce women at the pinnacle of their careers, who are doing awesome things and making a difference, but then show how they’ve taken steps in their lives and that not everything has come easily, I just think that would make the biggest difference,” Kalas said. “Students could really appreciate and relate to that and hopefully gain something from it at the end of the day.”
