In February, a student asked Women’s Center Director Lysa Salsbury why the Women’s Center didn’t change its name to something more inclusive.
Salsbury said the question inspired her to think back 30 years ago, to a group of women who helped establish the Women’s Center in the first place.
“I thought about all the sacrifices those women made to ensure that the University of Idaho was a safe, equitable community for all people,” Salsbury said. “They demonstrated courage in the face of opposition and obstacles to their work. And yet, even with the tremendous amount of progress made, there are still barriers to fair and equal treatment, and there are still people continuing their work.”
The Women’s Center honored those who continued the work of gender activism at UI at the Virginia Wolf Distinguished Service Awards Wednesday. The awards recognize a student, faculty member and community member selected by a committee of previous recipients each year. The committee chooses the recipients based on their demonstration of commitment to gender activism, and promoting an equitable community for all.
“There are many people who work tirelessly year-round for women’s rights, often going unnoticed and unrecognized until March comes around,” said Yolanda Bisbee, the executive director of tribal relations at UI. “This is a time to say thank you to those people.”
The Virginia Wolf Awards were named in honor of Virginia Wolf. She was a physical education professor and social activist at UI from 1964 to 1982, working to address the issues affecting women on campus at the time.
She was also part of the UI Women’s Caucus, an activist group that helped launch the Conciliation Agreement. The agreement addressed women’s issues on campus through actions such as hiring of an affirmative action officer, a high school relations program to recruit female students and permanent funding for a director of the Women’s Center.
Kay Keskinen, Wolf’s long-time friend and colleague, said Wolf was one of the only faculty members willing to sign the complaint.
“Ginny’s strength came from being a coach, and it gave her the ability to inspire, encourage and challenge people,” Keskinen said.
Madeleine Scyphers, a UI student, received an award for her activism in promoting gender equality for the LGBT community on campus. Maggie Rehm, Scypher’s friend and a UI professor, said Scyphers helped establish bathroom access policies so students could use the bathroom of their identified gender.
She said Scyphers also set up gender clothing exchanges for transgender students, served on many activism groups like the GSA and led a vigil in remembrance of transgender people who were victims to gender-based violence.
“Her voice is always a voice of kindness and hope,” Rehm said.
Rehm said Scyphers shared her experience being a transgender woman during the Women’s Center’s production of “The Vagina Monologues” in February. This left a profound impact on transgender students at UI and in the Moscow community, she said.
“With the LGBT community, there’s often a layer of uneasiness and the feeling of being an outsider in that,” Rehm said. “Madeleine’s performance was an antidote to that, providing a good representation of transgender women, and showing that womanhood is not defined by a vagina.”
Scyphers said she is still cannot believe she won the award.
“With a lot of the things I do, I just did them because I knew they needed to be done,” Scyphers said. “This has been really validating, that I’m recognized, as a trans woman, for doing activism for women’s rights.”
UI President Chuck Staben said gender activism is key in creating a safe community at UI.
“It’s great to see how many different people can contribute to the excellence of this institution,” Staben said. “We lose if we don’t include all the people here with us tonight.”
What was Salsbury’s response to the student back in February who asked why the Women’s Center wouldn’t adopt a more inclusive name?
“We will be keeping the title of the Women’s Center until gender-based injustice doesn’t exist anymore, honoring those who made those sacrifices years ago,” Salsbury said.
Taryn Hadfield can be contacted at [email protected]