TBA
NYS Convention Director

Linda Hallman is now in her third year as chief executive officer at AAUW. She has more than 20 years of executive-level association and foundation leadership experience in the Washington, D.C. area. Highlights of her extensive nonprofit experience include her leadership positions with the National Alliance for Health Information Technology (NAHIT), the American Medical Women's Association (AMWA) and AMWA Foundation, the American Horticultural Society (AHS), and the American College of Health Care Administrators (ACHCA). Linda is also a Veteran, having served for nine years in the United States Army as soprano soloist with the U.S. Army Band and Chorus at Fort Myer, Virginia. She has a bachelor's degree in music from Indiana University and a master's degree in organizational management from George Washington University. Linda has acquired extensive continuing professional development, including ASAE's Certified Association Executive credential, and is affiliated with relevant organizations for professionals in the field.

We are delighted to once again have the privilege of hearing Claire Schuster at the LAF luncheon on Saturday. Claire spoke at the convention a couple of years ago and we were moved by her story. She began working at Berea College in 1995 as an Assistant Professor. In Spring 2001, she was awarded tenure, and in the spring of 2002, she was promoted to the rank of Associate Professor. During the course of her employment she became aware of salary discrimination and subsequently filed a complaint alleging sex discrimination in pay under the Kentucky Civil Rights Act. She became an LAF Litigant and has continued her suit against Berea College. Recently she was granted a new trial by the Kentucky Supreme Court but the Madison County Court of Appeals ruled on a motion submitted by Berea College and has denied her a new trial. Claire is preparing to respond. Read the history of this case, along with updates on the national website.

The Public Policy Panel on Saturday will consist of:

• Carolyn Kamlet – Executive Director, Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Committee. Carolyn Kamlet is currently the Executive Director of the Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Committee. She was a senior policy advisor to Senator David Paterson in the Senate Minority Leader's Office and to Senator Eric Schneiderman in his district office. As a pro-choice activist, Carolyn was Political Director of New York ChoicePac. A native Coloradoan and graduate of Colorado State University, Carolyn held domestic policy positions in the offices of Governor Roy Romer and Senator Gary Hart, and she managed one of Congresswoman Patricia Schroeder's re-election campaigns. As Program Director for the Women's Campaign Research Fund in Washington, D.C. she recruited and trained women candidates across many states and levels of office.

• Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice is the chief law enforcement official for one of the nation’s largest and safest counties.  Now in her second term in office, Rice has enacted numerous law enforcement initiatives and programs to serve the county’s diverse population of 1.3 million residents.
  She has lead a nationally recognized fight against drunk driving; modernized the office to fight modern crime; been in the forefront of the fight against the rising presence of heroin; beefed up the resources used in the investigation of sexual predators preying on children using the Internet and boasts a 100% conviction rate; has moved to aggressively root out corruption in our schools and local governments; has revamped bureaus dedicated to the protection of children and the elderly and to the prosecution of domestic violence; added specialized resources to the investigation of identity theft rings, consumer frauds and Medicaid frauds Prior to becoming the first woman in Long Island’s history to be elected district attorney, Rice served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney under Attorney General Janet Reno in the U.S Department of Justice’s Philadelphia office.  During her more than five years as a federal prosecutor, Rice prosecuted cases of corporate fraud, deadbeat parents and public corruption, as well as federal drug and gun cases. Rice began her career as a prosecutor in the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office, and was promoted to the office’s elite Homicide Bureau.. Kathleen Rice is a graduate of Catholic University of America and Touro Law School.

At the EF Gala Saturday evening, the featured speaker will be Marion Wrenn. Ms Wrenn has a 2009-10 Publication Grant at New York University for her project - "Inventing Warriors: U.S. Philanthropies, American Journalism, and the Reorientation of Foreign Journalists after World War II". In her historical overview of the post-World War II U.S. initiative to reorient international journalists to the American model of a “free and democratic press,” she studies the institutional relationships between major foundations, the journalism profession, and the state. Her work sheds light on American journalism’s institutional history as well as the potential directions for the future of news and news production.

The International Luncheon on Sunday will feature Gina Torry, Coordinator, NGO Working Group on Women, Peace, and Security, UNIFEM. She previously worked in the Gender Unit, Global Policy Section of the Division of Policy and Planning at the United Nations Children's Fund and coordinated UNICEF's participation at the Beijing 49th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women. She obtained her B.A. from the American University of Paris with the aid of a scholarship from her local branch of AAUW, and went on to get her M.S. in Gender and Development Studies with a concentration in International Human Rights Law and Sociology of Development from the London School of Economics.

On Sunday we will also hear about Girl Scout/AAUW partnership work from

• Kerry Connolly - Ms Connolly, CEO of Girl Scouts of Northeastern New York, Inc, a new merger of 4 former councils, has a background in human relations and business restructuring. She has worked at Bryant University, Brown University, and Liberty Mutual Insurance, and owned Touchstone Advisors, a business management company serving small to medium size business owners, nonprofits, and charter schools.

• Betsy Forkas, a Girl Scout since third grade, has been a member of AAUW for 40 years. She has served the organization as President of the Schenectady Branch and represents AAUW on the Steering Committee of Schenectady's Working Group on Girls. In addition she has served as AAUW-NYS Public Policy Chair and as a member of the national AAUW Public Policy Committee.

  
  Other speakers will be listed here as we confirm arrangements.