The University Committee for the Advancement of Women and Gender Equity (UCW) is an active committee across Iowa State’s campus that works to advance gender equity within the university community.

According to their website, some of UCW’s main goals are, “increasing gender equity in leadership positions, eliminating barriers and addressing organizational structures and policies that act as impediments to gender equity, and working to improve the climate on campus with regard to gender equity for all students, staff and faculty.”

Melissa Miller, chair on the executive committee, says UCW is a part of the office for the vice president of diversity and inclusion that looks at and advocates for policies and procedures at Iowa State that affect those on campus who identify as women. 

UCW has representatives from all the major groups on campus, including researchers, undergraduate students, graduate students, faculty and staff and more.

Miller joined UCW in 2013 after working for the university for a year already. Miller said she had just come back from maternity leave when she noticed an advertisement for UCW in the Iowa State newsletter and figured it was the perfect opportunity to meet people across the university while also partaking in something she was passionate about: gender equity. 

UCW benefits women across campus in everyday ways that are small but make a positive impact. For example, in 2006, free feminine hygiene products became available in bathrooms across campus thanks to actions taken by UCW.

UCW also advocates for women in executive positions around campus.

“We advocated during the strategic planning process several years ago and we noticed there was nobody on the committee that identified as a woman. We brought that up to them at the time and they did add a woman to the strategic planning committee,” Miller said. 

Miller said UCW also worked with other groups at Iowa State to advocate for lactation spaces on campus. They also work with numerous childcare task forces and the status of women report, which looks at institutional data that looks at retention, employment and enrollment rates broken down by sex. 

“Every five years we have issued a report to the administration on what it looks like for women at Iowa State. This year we have decided instead of issuing a paper report every five years we are going to create an online dashboard that has this information available for everyone, not just the administration,” Miller said.

This will be beneficial to the Iowa State community as a whole because retention rates for students, faculty and staff that identify as women will be openly accessible for anyone to view. This is particularly helpful to those who are interested in becoming a student or faculty and staff member at Iowa State.

UCW has also partaken in sponsoring workshops on campus along with other women-focused groups from the university. One workshop UCW helped sponsor was on the pay gap, how to advocate against it and how to negotiate for rightful, higher pay. UCW and contributing groups try to make these workshops as low-cost and accessible as possible. 

While UCW has many women on their side already, Miller made it clear that they are also looking to expand diversity within their group. In particular, UCW is looking for more undergraduate representatives at the moment. Whether it be welcoming more people of color, those in the LGBTQ+ community, the group is always searching and hoping for more diversity within the group. 

“If we’re really going to look at gender equity we need to have a diverse representation […] we can’t have this without intersectionality,” Miller said.