Women's Leadership Conference

Coinciding with Women's History Month, this conference is designed to give participants the opportunity to explore their passions for leadership.
Women's Leadership Conference

Leading Change: Flourish Forward

March 29th, 2024 | 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Peabody Auditorium at Georgia College

We think about flourishing as thriving, prospering, and living a good life with purpose. Flourishing leaders exemplify a dynamic commitment to growth, resilience, and making a positive impact. In the spirit of “Flourish Forward,” our conference theme celebrates the continuous journey of individuals who not only strive to serve as leaders in their everyday lives, but also inspire others to blossom in their own leadership.

“Flourish Forward” embodies a dedication to nurturing personal potential, fostering a collaborative culture, and cultivating a sustainable impact that reaches well beyond the individual. As a flourishing leader, you have the opportunity to pay it forward, extending the benefits of your growth to empower others.

Our exploration of the transformative power of flourishing leadership also places a special emphasis on wellness, acknowledging its pivotal role in maintaining effective leadership. Flourishing leaders recognize that true flourishing extends beyond success in a single aspect of life; they embrace a holistic concept of well-being.

Join us at the 6th annual Leading Change Women’s Leadership Conference as we Flourish Forward and explore how this idea of leadership can shape lives, organizations, and communities for a brighter, more purposeful future.

A collaboration among the Women's Center & LGBTQ+ ProgramsAlumni AssociationJ. Whitney Bunting College of Business, The Office of Inclusive Excellence, Office of Community Engagement & Service

Register for Conference

Registration opens February 1st

The conference is designed to give participants the opportunity to explore their passions for leadership.

The conference incorporates students, staff, alumni, faculty, and community members as speakers and presenters in order to give our participants access to a wide variety of experience and knowledge. This will be a way to build a diverse network of women who are creating positive change in their communities.

Sponsorship Opportunities

We are thrilled to extend an invitation for local organizations to help sponsor our upcoming Women's Leadership Conference. Committing to sponsor the conference will not only contribute to the success of this year’s conference, but also showcase your organization's commitment to women's leadership and empowerment! Linked below is a detailed PDF outlining the various sponsorship opportunities available, offering a closer look at the significant exposure and benefits associated with partnering with us. For questions regarding sponsorships, email us at womensleadershipconference@gcsu.edu

Sponsorship Opportunities 

2024 Conference Details

This year’s conference will be in-person on Friday, March 29th, from 10-5 on the campus of Georgia College & State University.

Coinciding with Women’s History Month, the Women’s Leadership Conference gives participants the opportunity to explore their leadership. The conference incorporates students, staff, alumni, faculty and community members as speakers and presenters in order to give our participants access to a wide variety of experience and knowledge.

The content engages our participants in critical thought around their role as a leader to create meaningful change. Some topics we hope to see addressed include: living authentically, prioritizing what matters, leading innovatively or creatively, exploring your passion, making time for deep work, living intentionally, setting boundaries, and enhancing your quality of life through a focus on well-being, mental health, and wellness.  

Program

9:30-10 

Check-in and Network 

10-10:50  

Opening Session 

11-11:50 

Breakout Session 1

12-12:25 

Lunch  

12:25-1:40 

Keynote & Q&A 

Dr. Patrice Buckner Jackson 

1:40-1:50 

Wellness Moment 

2-2:50 

Breakout Session 2

2:50-3:30 

Networking Break & Wellness Moment 

3:30-4:20 

Breakout Session 3

4:30-5:00 

Closing Session

Theme

Flourish Forward

“Flourish Forward” embodies a dedication to nurturing personal potential, fostering a collaborative culture, and cultivating a sustainable impact that reaches well beyond the individual. As a flourishing leader, you have the opportunity to pay it forward, extending the benefits of your growth to empower others.

Location

All Registration Types

Check-in and welcome will be at Georgia College in Peabody Auditorium.

Address. 200 West Montgomery Street Milledgeville, GA 31061

Parking. Non-GCSU attendees will be able to park for the day in the Peabody lot. Guest parking passes will be available at the check-in table on the day of the conference.

Past Women's Leadership Conferences

2023 Conference

Leading Change: Do Less, Be More

March 24th, 2023 | 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Peabody Auditorium at Georgia College

In a world that seems uncertain, where individuals and organizations continue to process this “new normal” we live in and explore future possibilities, it can often feel like we’re being asked to do more with less. What would it look like if instead we flipped this sentiment on its head and considered what we could do, who we could be, what we could achieve, if we focused on prioritizing doing the things that really matter to us? These are the questions behind this year’s Georgia College Women’s Leadership Conference theme Leading Change: Do Less, Be More 

With this year’s conference, we’re zeroing in on the things that allow for us to be more - more creative, more authentic, more aligned with our goals, more [insert whatever it is that you’re striving for here].

View Conference Program

Keynote

Dr. Belle Wheelan

Be More Connected

Dr. Belle Wheelan currently serves as President of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges and is the first African American and the first woman to serve in this capacity. Her career spans over 40 years and includes the roles of faculty member, chief student services officer, campus provost, college president and Secretary of Education. In several of those roles she was the first African American and/or woman to serve in those capacities.

2022 Conference

Leading Change: Navigating the Road to Resiliency

March 25th, 2022 | 10:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Peabody Auditorium at Georgia College

“Like tiny seeds with potent power to push through tough ground and become mighty trees, we hold innate reserves of unimaginable strength. We are resilient.” - Catherine DeVrye

As we move into our 4th annual Women’s Leadership Conference, we have been reflecting on all the events of the last two years. Our Conference in 2020 was one of the last in-person events at Georgia College before we moved into the shut-down; last year our conference was 100% virtual as the world continued to battle the novel coronavirus. Covid-19 is still present, is still evolving, is still looming, but vaccinations are now widely available for all ages, which is a blessing as they seem to be effective against the various strains that have emerged. 

Our campus, our nation, the world is tired. The ever-present danger that Covid is has caused a level of anxiety, depression, and exhaustion that has deeply impacted people’s lives - personally and professionally. There has been a mass exodus of employees from various industries as people grapple with rising costs of living, stagnant wages, and lack of resources such as healthcare and childcare. Employees and employers alike have had to reimagine what work looks like. These changes are ongoing and require us to collectively dig deep to care for ourselves and each other.

Our hope is that this conference provides a place of respite, a place to refocus, a place to learn new skills, or a place to think about leadership in a new way.

View Conference Program

 Access The Attendee Hub

Collaborative Keynote

Navigating the Road to Resiliency

Emcee: Genie Snyder Chamberlin, EdD | Founder/Principal | Genieus Team | SnyderRemarks

Keynote Speakers:

Cathy Cox, JD, President | Georgia College

Candace Doby, MA, Speaker/Author/Coach | Candace Doby | The Courage Hotline

Ebony Glover, PhD, Associate Professor, Neuroscience | Kennesaw State University

 

2021 Conference

Leading Change: Passion to Action

Friday, March 12, 202 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.

Virtual

Coinciding with Women’s History Month, this conference is designed to give participants the opportunity to explore their passions for leadership. What draws them in? What drives them to make a difference? And then, how can they leverage that passion and turn it into action? The conference incorporates students, staff, alumni, faculty, and community members as speakers and presenters in order to give our participants access to a wide variety of experience and knowledge. The content engages our participants in critical thought around their role as a leader to create meaningful change.

View Conference Program

Keynote

Helen Kim Ho

Following Your Passion

Helen Kim Ho is an attorney and activist.  Helen is the Founding Partner of HKH Law LLC in Duluth, Georgia, where she handles business and employment litigation matters with a specialty in civil rights.   Helen is passionate about helping women- and minority-owned businesses thrive, and fighting for the rights of employees who have been discriminated against in the workplace. 

Helen began her 21-year career as an attorney for international law firms in Manhattan and Houston, but after several years of practice, heeded an inner calling and made the leap into the nonprofit sector.  Her next 12 years in the public interest space culminated in her founding Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Atlanta (formerly AALAC), the first civil rights group dedicated to Asian immigrants and refugees in the Southeast.  Helen founded her nonprofit after successfully organizing dozens of immigrant- and refugee-led groups to take collective action against a proposed English-only driver license bill that violated the 14th Amendment, leading to the bill’s defeat during the 2010 legislative session and in three subsequent sessions.   Helen also developed a nationally recognized voter engagement program that helped to register 10,000 new immigrant voters, a regional candidate training program that helped several candidates win office, and then took the nonprofit national after successfully negotiating her group’s inclusion into a collaborative with four of the oldest Asian civil rights groups in the country. Helen stepped down from her founding executive director role at the end of 2015 to take a year-long sabbatical before founding her law practice.  

A sought-out speaker and contributor on issues of racism, southern politics, and diversity in the workplace, Helen’s work has been covered by the AJC, New York Times, the New Republic, Democracy Now, NPR, Huffington Post, and more.   Helen remains active in her community through grassroots activism and advisory board service for groups including the Alliance Theatre and Atlanta Magazine.  She lives in Gwinnett County with her daughter and bulldog and hikes the trails and mountains of Georgia whenever she gets the chance.

2020 Conference

Leading Change: A World of Opportunity

Friday, March 6, 2020 11:30 a.m. - 6:00 p.m.

As our students prepare for continued service, engagement with, and commitment to their communities outside of Georgia College, it is imperative that we challenge their ways of thinking to be based more in global perspectives. This conference is designed to give students the opportunity to explore diverse outlets for sustained leadership efforts, learn new skills to lead and collaborate within diverse communities, and understand the unique privilege that impacts their global footprint.

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Keynote

DR. JUANITA JOHNSON-BAILEY

Lessons on Gender and Power in Leadership: A Global Perspective

Juanita Johnson-Bailey holds the Josiah Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professorship at the University of Georgia and is the recipient of the Eleanor Roosevelt Award from the American Association of University Women. In 2018 she was bestowed the title of University Professor, which is awarded to faculty at the University of Georgia who have had a significant impact in addition to fulfilling their normal academic responsibilities.  In 2018, she also received the Career Achievement Award from American Association of Adult and Continuing Education.

She has worked at UGA for twenty-four years and currently holds an administrative appointment as the Director of the Institute for Women’s Studies at UGA.  She is the author of Sistahs in College: Making a Way Out of No Way, which received the Phillip E. Frandson Award for Literature in Continuing Higher Education and the Sadie T. Mossell Alexander Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Black Women’s Studies. Dr. Johnson-Bailey is a member of the International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame, a Houle Scholar, and a Lilly Teaching Fellow. She has lectured nationally and internationally and her most recent book is a co-edited text, the Handbook on Race and Racism in Adult and Higher Education: A Dialogue (Sheared, Johnson-Bailey, Colin, Peterson, & Brookfield).

Johnson-Bailey specializes in researching race and gender in educational and workplace settings. She has made significant contributions to the literature in adult education and women’s studies, with over 100 publications, which includes articles in: Harvard Educational Review, Teachers College Record, Journal of Negro Education, Journal of Higher Education, The Handbook of Adult and Continuing Education, SAGE Encyclopedia of Qualitative Research Methods, Handbook of Mentoring and Coaching for Education, and the Handbook of Transformative Learning Theory.

2019 Conference

Leading Change

Friday, March 1, 2019 9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.

The theme for the inaugural conference is Leading Change. In the midst of increased political and social division, we seek to equip collegiate women with the knowledge, skills, and abilities to effectively lead change at personal, relational, and societal levels.  This conference is designed to give students the opportunity to explore their own leadership style, discover ways to be a leader across various contexts, and learn new skills to lead within their communities.

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Keynote

Chimi Boyd-Keyes, M.A.

Chimi Boyd-Keyes is a successful entrepreneur and much sought-after consultant, speaker, trainer, and grant writer. She is passionate about creating programs and initiatives that develop leaders and promote an equitable, inclusive environment. As a seasoned Higher Education professional for 18 years, Chimi has worked extensively on women’s and gender issues and topics relating to other marginalized populations. She has directed two university Women’s Centers, one at a historically black university (HBCU) and one at a predominantly white university (PWI).