The Women's Place says farewell to Dr. Rachel Bowen

After participating in the President and Provost’s Leadership Institute, I was looking for leadership opportunities beyond what was available on my campus. I was a university senator and was chairing the Senate Diversity Committee, which had introduced me to the array of resources and initiatives to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion. Yet some of those opportunities were limited to Columbus campus. At the same time, my scholarship had moved in the direction of a greater focus on gendered politics, so the announcement of the faculty fellow position at The Women’s Place appealed to me as bringing together these different threads of my work.

When I started at The Women’s Place, I was finishing up data collection on a project exploring the effects of different kinds of support for survivors of gender-based violence in Central America. That research kept bringing me back to two ideas: first, that my research methods and findings could be fruitfully extended to the U.S. context and, second, that women in the United States would benefit from greater exposure to and consideration of international ideas and experiences of women’s rights.

My time at The Women’s Place really brought those connections home to me. Especially in the context of a global pandemic that sent us home ten weeks after I joined The Women’s Place, and the impact of pre-existing inadequacy in support for caregivers, among other things, was made much more visible. I feel fortunate to have been in a position in 2020-2021 in which I could use my research skills to support advocacy for policy improvements. I anticipate that my next projects will continue with these overlaps of gender equity, international human rights, and real-world impact of policy decisions.

I feel like I did a little of everything, but my two big projects across my time at TWP were facilitating the PPLI program and leading the Advocates & Allies for Gender Equity initiative. I am proud of transitioning the PPLI to a virtual format for the 2019-2020 cohort and creating a space for those leaders to continue growing and supporting each other through the challenges of the first year of COVID-19. I led a similar transition for the Advocates & Allies program.

In addition, I executed an evaluation of the Advocates & Allies program. In summer 2020, I took over as principal investigator for the National Science Foundation grant that had funded the initiative, and I was able to hire Mariana Miguelez as a graduate assistant to help in that evaluation. I look forward to publishing the results of this work. I am glad to be able to provide a clear direction for continuing to expand and revise Advocates & Allies.

Oh my goodness, I learned so much! I created a list of skills I had been able to develop and it was over a page long. I learned a tremendous amount about the work of the Office of Diversity and Inclusion (ODI) and the efforts of many other people across the university to make Ohio State a more welcoming place to work and study. I was able to take some time to read, listen, watch, and participate in offerings to deepen my knowledge of inclusion and justice, especially as relates to the practical context of translating these ideas into policies and practices. I also learned many intangibles from seeing how other people at TWP, in ODI, and more broadly navigate this work. Working at TWP gave me real insight into the ways in which people in staff roles can accomplish great changes and improvements. Perhaps more than anything, I learned how much I value constant learning and skill development as a part of my work life.

In PPLI, participants learn about their strengths and how to employ them and build on them. As a participant, I was sometimes skeptical that some of my strengths were really that helpful. How could “intellection” be a leadership strength when I felt like I was in my head too much? Working at TWP gave me a practical context to really see how my strengths benefited our team, especially in team efforts. PPLI also helped me feel confident in my contributions to the university as a woman and as a faculty member from a regional campus. In PPLI, I felt like the sphere in which I saw my work as relevant expanded.

Go for it. Put in the application. Talk to people about the kinds of opportunities you are interested in. Take on roles and projects that will help you build new skills and introduce you to different aspects of university work. Be confident in your strengths and your ability to learn.