PathWays PA Policy Blog

On April 10, we "celebrate" Equal Pay Day, the date when women's earnings catch up with men's earnings from the previous year. And, in an era where mothers are increasingly the breadwinners in a family, we need equal pay now more than ever. 42% of families rely on mothers to earn at least half of their families' wages . An additional 22% are considered "co-breadwinners," which means they bring in at least a quarter of the money seen by a family in a given year. When these mothers - or anyone - is underpaid, the entire family suffers. In 2015, the National Women's Law Center calculated that the wage gap amounts to annual loss of $10,876 for women . That adds up to five months of groceries, three months of rent and utilities, three months of child care payments, four months of health insurance, four months of student loans, and seven tanks of gas. Women and their families aren't the only people who lose out due to the wage gap. People of co...

You can't afford to miss Womenomics 2018! Join us as we bring together business, government, and civic representatives to promote the needs of women. For more information, please visit the WOMENomics website at  https://womenomics.weebly.com .

The Department of Labor Women's Bureau will be hosting a webinar focused on Promising Employer Practices for Recruiting and Retaining Women in Construction next Wednesday (July 19th, 2017) at 2:00pm. Despite public and private efforts to increase the share of women in construction trades, women remain significantly underrepresented. As of a 2016 study, women make up only 3% of workers in construction and extraction occupations. Increasing the participation of women in high-wage, high-skill nontraditional fields such as construction are incredibly important to their economic security. This webinar hosted by the Women's Bureau will include a peer learning forum featuring advice from experienced contractors who have been successful in recruiting and retaining women in construction fields. Featured panelists will offer practical advice and applied learning to showcase promising approaches for recruiting and retaining women on job sites. The panelists who will be featured in t...

From our friends at the Pennsylvania Conference for Women : Can you really draw your way to success? Heather Willems, co-founder of ImageThink and co-author of Draw Your Big Idea will prove you can in this 30-minute teleclass where she explains the secret power of visuals for achieving your goals in the workplace. Willems will offer techniques to harness your creativity and master success using nothing more than your basic drawing skills. Learn how to clarify complex ideas, spark creativity, solve problems and propel your productivity to the next level—all from picking up a pen. Join us on Tuesday, July 26th at 1 pm Eastern for this call-in event . The day of the call, follow along and share your own highlights on Twitter using @PennWomen and #PennWomen . Heather Willems, co-founder of ImageThink, has a passion for making connections. Whether she is developing client relationships, leading workshops, or speaking about visual thinking, she loves supporting people’s personal ...

We Won’t Wait is a national movement of women taking our families’ concerns from the kitchen table to the voting booth, and transforming our communities one conversation at a time. We Won’t Wait represents and advocates for women of color, low-income women, and immigrant women across the issues that impact our lives and seeks to shine a light on the intersection of those issues — from immigration to paid leave, from mass incarceration to voting rights. — to ensure that our voices are the ones setting the agenda and defining the narrative. If you're done waiting for your concerns to take precedence, sign the pledge saying you will: Call for a comprehensive economic agenda that spells real change for you and your family Engage your community to encourage others to vote so our voices are heard. Commit to making sure the issues that matter to you stay at the top of the agenda after the November election. Sign the pledge today!

From our friends at CWW In a collaborative effort, the Center for Innovation in Worker Organizing and the Center for Women and Work at the Rutgers University School of Labor and Employment Relations is pleased to announce a two-day Gender Justice media training workshop. The training will be held in New Brunswick at the Rutgers University Inn and Conference Center on Feb. 24 - 25th, 2015 and will be conducted by the AFL-CIO, AFSCME, Jobs With Justice, and the Scholars Strategy Network. Women faculty, union leaders and members and community leaders are invited to participate. The two-day training will equip participants to participate in the public discourse on a range of state and local labor issues.  Day One of the training will focus on building a new narrative about women and work. Day Two will hone in on writing that narrative as an op-ed. In partnership with other groups, we will actively seek opportunities for the trainees to place op-eds connected to a specific campa...

The Health of State Democracies , a Center for American Progress Action Fund report ranking all 50 states and our nation's capitol across 22 factors categorized in 'accessibility of the ballot', 'representation in state government', and 'influence in the political system', was released today. According to the report, Pennsylvania is 43rd out of 51 . Said another way, Pennsylvania ranks among the bottom 10 states. The report determined that access to voting in Pennsylvania was an F (44th place). Among other notable findings, Pennsylvania does not allow online voter registration, nor can 16-17 year olds preregister to vote and be automatically added to the voting rolls when they reach voting age - an implementation measure that was shown to increase young voter turnout by 8-13 percent ages. Pennsylvania was given a C for representation in state government. In addition to districts that have been drawn to favor political parties, the report found t...

The Equity in Interscholastic Athletics Disclosure Act , passed in 2012 with strong bipartisan support, created a working gender-equity law that requires public secondary schools (grades 7-12) in Pennsylvania to report basic information about their school-sponsored athletic programs once a year. These reports have revealed that Pennsylvania school districts are shortchanging their female students by failing to provide them with sufficient athletic opportunities in proportion to the percentage of female students enrolled. According to Women's Law Project, gender gaps in athletic participation are as big as 18.72% . This law causes the state and communities to face the facts of gender discrimination, data that is otherwise easy to cover up with social constructs. If passed, HB 1112, which came up for a vote in the Education Committee today and was re-committed to the House Rules Committee , could threaten the gender equity law. HB 1112 specifies that the Department of Education s...

On April 30th, 2014, Congressman Jerry McNerney (CA-09) introduced the Getting into Researching, Learning and Studying of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (GIRLS STEM) Act, a bill that would establish a program at the U.S. Department of Education to ensure that more female students have access to and participate in STEM education and training. This program would provide grants to local educational agencies that develop plans to encourage young women to study STEM, educate parents about STEM opportunities for their children, provide training and mentoring opportunities for students, and prepare secondary students for college STEM programs. "When women succeed, we all succeed. With more women in STEM jobs, we'll help grow our economy and make sure we're competitive with the rest of the world," said Congressman McNerney, who is a mathematician and wind energy engineer himself. Women hold less than a quarter of STEM related jobs despite the fact that...

The American Association of University Women (AAUW) has released the 2015 edition of their guide , "The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap." Since the 1970s, when women's annual earnings were only 57% of men's annual earnings for full-time workers, the gender pay gap has narrowed, due in part to women's advances in education and workforce participation. Still, in 2013 women were only making 78% of men's earnings and, in the past decade, the pay gap has barely budged. After accounting for college major, occupation, economic sector, hours worked, months unemployed since graduation, GPA, type of undergraduate institution, institution selectivity, age, geographical region, and marital status, AAUW found that only one year after graduation there was a 7% difference in the earnings of male and female college graduates that could not be explained . This gap only increases with time and age. Women also experience other barriers in the workforce, such as the...

Pennsylvania's House of Representatives may consider a bill that would amend the Public Welfare Code and reinstate a lifetime ban against accessing public assistance for most people with felony drug convictions. This legislation casts too wide of a net and has unintended consequences. While House Bill 222 is intended to target large-scale drug traffickers, survivors of domestic violence and human trafficking who have been convicted of drug charges as a result of their abuser's control over them, or those charged with possession with intent to deliver small amounts of drugs, would also be affected. The benefits that these survivors (and their children) would need in order to break free from the control of their abusers would be denied - including Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) and food stamps. People currently experiencing domestic abuse most often cite financial instability as the reason for their decision to stay with or return to their abuser. Therefore, ...

The Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) highlighted some important statistics  on the relationship between paid sick leave and preventive health care. Since the Affordable Care Act (ACA) took effect in 2010, health care access has opened up to numerous Americans, including low-income earners who were previously uninsured and women seeking preventive care . Unfortunately, too many Americans simply do not have the time to actually receive these services. More than 40 million workers in the U.S. (39 percent) have no paid sick days and nearly 95 million workers (87 percent) have no paid family leave. 80 percent of low-wage workers earning $15,000 or less per year have no paid sick days. Work protections such as paid sick leave and paid family and medical leave are crucial for preventive health care, which in turn is key for healthy and safe lives. Routine health checkups and screenings can help prevent or detect early on diseases and other health problems, but a 2015 study ...

In honor of the 25th anniversary of the Friends of the Delaware County Women’s Commission and the 30th anniversary of the Women’s Commission, women college students are invited to apply for the organizations’ Rising Star scholarship award of $1,500.  The scholarship is open to a full or part-time undergraduate student either attending a two or four year college in Delaware County or residing in the county. The application requires candidates to provide a college transcript, a resume which includes work, community service and leadership experience, letter of reference from a faculty member or employer, and a personal essay of 500 words or less. The topic is Pay Equity and the opportunities available to her that might not have existed in the past. The awardee will be recognized at the annual dinner of the Friends on June 4th at the Springfield Country Club, and the scholarship funds will be sent directly to her college or university account.  Applications should be sen...

From our friends at the National Partnership for Women & Families: Nearly every member of Congress uses Twitter (and most candidates do too). That is why the National Partnership for Women & Families has created this new tool and website – www.WEtweet.org – which offers an easy way to find and tweet at elected officials and those running for office. Visit www.WEtweet.org , pick the issue that matters most to you, enter your zip code, and then send tweets directed at your members of Congress and candidates.  Please join on us on Wednesday, October 22nd, on what we’re calling “WEtweet Wednesday,” in an exciting day of action! Together we can send a clear message to those who seek to represent us: Women matter. Women’s equality matters. #WEmatter. Check out the site and see how easy it is to tweet your support for fair pay, paid family and medical leave, paid sick days and other issues that matter to women and families. We hope you will share this exciting new to...

On Wednesday, September 17, from 10 am - 1 pm, you can take part in free health screenings, gather educational materials, and learn the latest about preventative health at the 4th Annual Women and Families Wellness Event. The event will take place at the Delaware County Government Center, which is located at 201 Front Street in Media. Please share this information and join us there! Interested in PathWays PA blog posts on similar topics? 5/29/14 - Support Health Care for Military Women and Military Families 3/18/14 - Upcoming Public Webinars on the Affordable Healthcare Law! 5/22/13 - Make Sure You Know-Women's Preventative Health Services Have NO Co-Pay!

On September 3, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter signed legislation ensuring that mothers working in the city will now have access to reasonable accommodation when it comes to expressing breast milk. The bill, which takes effect immediately, means that mothers must have access to unpaid break time or be able to use paid time in order to express milk. They must also have access to a safe, sanitary place to do so - and that place cannot be a bathroom. The new legislation is part of the Fair Practices Ordinance, which is enforced by the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations. To learn more, please visit their website , or call 215-686-4670. Interested in PathWays PA blog posts on similar topics? 5/29/14 - Support Health Care for Military Women and Military Families 4/25/14 -Ask the Senate to Co-sponsor the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act! 4/3/14 - Philadelphia Pregnancy Accommodations Law is Going Into Effect 

From our friends at the National Partnership for Women and Families  Join the growing list of partners planning to call on the president and Congress to support the Family And Medical Insurance Leave Act (FAMILY Act)! You'll find templates for many of the suggested activities listed below! You could: Ask your affiliates/partners/chapters/members/leaders to call or email their members of Congress Join a FAMILY Act tweet storm on Thursday, June 19th, from 3:00 - 4:00 p.m. EDT (For more information, contact Sadie Kliner at skliner@nationalpartnership.org .) Share infographics on your social media sites and ask followers to contact their legislators Support USAction's postcard deliveries here in D.C. and in key districts via social media or on the ground (For more information, contact Christine Sloane at csloane@nationalpartnership.org or Patty Snee at psnee@usaction.org .) Join the National Partnership on the Hill on Wednesday, June 18th, and Friday, June 20th, or h...

From our friends at the National Women's Law Center Women in the military and women in military families serve and sacrifice for our country every day. It only makes sense that we should give them the support they deserve in return, especially when it comes to important health benefits. Unlike most women with private insurance plans - which must cover breastfeeding supplies and counseling - military women and military families lack comprehensive insurance coverage of the same supplies and support under the Department of Defense's TRICARE health care program. In fact, TRICARE only covers a breast pump in extreme circumstances for most women. But a bill currently before Congress would make sure all military women and military families have better coverage of breastfeeding supplies and education.  Breastfeeding benefits both mothers and children, reducing the risk of breast and ovarian cancer in women and asthma, obesity, Type 2 Diabetes, and leukemia in children. Women w...

From our friends at the National Partnership for Women and Families. No one should have to choose between staying employed and staying safe. Join the National Partnership for Women & Families (@NPWF), Half in Ten (@halfinten), Futures Without Violence (@WithoutViolence), Legal Momentum (@LegalMomentum), National Alliance to End Sexual Violence (@endsxlviolence) and National Network to End Domestic Violence (@nnedv) for a tweet chat on Today, May 15th at 2:00 pm about the intersection of economic security and domestic violence and sexual assault. Hashtag #SafeWomenSucceed. Sample tweets below: No one should have to choose bw staying employed & staying safe. Let's talk about DV/SA & economic security 5/15 @ 2pmET #SafeWomenSucceed Join the discussion about domestic & sexual violence & economic security 5/15 @ 2pmET #SafeWomenSucceed #talkpoverty #paidsickdays

PathWays PA is excited to announce that we will be partnering with the U. S. Department of Labor Women's Bureau, The Free Library of Philadelphia and the EEOC for a discussion on women and the workplace. The event will take place this Monday, May 5, from 2:00PM-4:00PM in room 108 of the Philadelphia Free Library Parkway Central Branch located at 1901 Vine Street . Topics to be discussed include: Equal Pay Paid Leave Compensation/Wages Negotiation Register for the event by calling the Women's Bureau at 215-861-4864 or sign up online . All attendees will receive a negotiation checklist to take home with them. PathWays PA actively advocates for equal protections in the workplace, equal pay and paid leave on the local, state and national levels.