Beginning Oct. 9 at 7 p.m., PBS stations KNME, Ch.5.1 (Albuquerque/Santa Fe), KENW, Ch.3 (Portales) KRWG, Ch.22 (Las Cruces) along with public radio stations KANW (89.1 FM) and KUNM (89.9 FM) will be simulcasting all Congressional District Debates.
For more information on the simulcast visit: http://www.newmexicopbs.org/election-2014/debates/
As you view the debates, complete the Election 2014 aauwnmcongressdebatecard
Did you watch the NM Race for Governor candidate forum? In your opinion, who won?
If you missed it, you can watch the entire forum here: www.kob.com/article/stories/S3568130.shtml
Ken Burns’ seven-part documentary weaves the stories of Theodore, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, three members of one of the most prominent and influential families in American politics. Meryl Streep portrays Eleanor Roosevelt in readings from her personal letters and writings. Airs on PBS stations. Repeats each night at 9 PM.
This documentary helps youth, parents and educators understand the potential dangers associated with use of the internet and social media; from stalking and cyber-bullying to sext-ing and future employment issues. Chris Schueler is producer/director.
Your pocketbook may feel thin, especially the day before payday — but imagine what it would feel like if you hadn’t gotten a raise in over five years. Your rent keeps rising, food and gas cost more and more, but you take home the same pay you made in 2009. That’s what life is like for the nation’s minimum wage workers, who’ve made the same hourly wage of $7.25 for the last five years. Worse, there’s no raise in sight.
This stagnation hits women particularly hard, since we’re the majority of all employees being paid minimum wage. The average minimum wage worker is 33 years old, and most work full time. Yet even when women work full time — that’s year round, no holidays, no vacation — their minimum-wage income remains below the federal poverty line. It’s a stressful and difficult life, and it leaves millions of Americans scrambling just to stay afloat. Many are forced to rely on public assistance programs to make ends meet, even though they’re working full time. These same workers are also often without any paid sick days or family leave, let alone vacation.
This is why we need to raise the minimum wage. In addition to directly benefiting women and their families, increasing the federal minimum wage will also help shrink the persistent gender pay gap. A recent White House report found that “increasing the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour and indexing it to inflation could close about 5 percent of the gender wage gap.” That’s more than the pay gap has shrunk in over a decade. That’s more pay in the pockets of millions of women, which means more consumer spending fueling business growth and new jobs. It’d be a big step forward.
An increased minimum wage and closing the gender wage gap aren’t just matters of fairness; they’re the key to America’s families making ends meet. Forty percent of households with children include a mother who is either the sole or primary earner for her family, and if she isn’t being paid adequately or fairly, those families suffer.
Too many Americans are having way too much trouble making ends meet despite a full-time job. That’s why we need to urge Congress to raise the minimum wage. Take action and tell Congress to raise the wage and shrink the pay gap!
July 15, 2014
Time: 8 p.m. ET
Location: Conference call and webinar (You just need to register.)
Cost: Free to members 
Federal courts are sometimes the last, best hope for women who have experienced discrimination in education, employment, or health care. This year the U.S. Supreme Court considered a number of cases with the potential to significantly affect the rights of women and girls. Now that the court is wrapping up its term, join AAUW’s Legal Advocacy Fund staff on July 15 to hear highlights of the court’s most important cases, including those discussed in last October’s Supreme Court preview call.
You wouldn’t expect an NBA/WNBA practice court on a Sunday morning to be filled with the sound of basketballs swooshing through the net or the sound of feet pounding on freshly shined wood.
An even more unlikely scenario? All of that noise and activity coming from nearly 100 girls, ages 8 to 18, instead of professional basketball players.
Yet that’s exactly what happened on Sunday as part of AAUW’s kick-off to the 42nd anniversary of Title IX, the law that opened the door for greater athletic participation by girls, among other gains in the field of education. Sunday’s activity featured an obstacle course simulating the real-life barriers girls still face in gaining the same athletic opportunities as their male peers – whether the barrier is fair scheduling for games, comparable equipment and facilities, or the overall number of athletic participation opportunities available to boys and girls.
Although we’ve made great progress with 42 years of Title IX, today’s athletes need your help to break down a significant barrier that still remains: a lack of information.
Unlike colleges, high schools are not required to release data on equity in sports, making it difficult for parents, students, and high schools to determine if boys and girls have equal access to athletic opportunities. The High School Data Transparency Act (H.R. 455/S. 217) would address this gap by requiring high schools to report basic data on the number of female and male students in their athletic programs and the expenditures made for their sports teams.
TAKE ACTION: Urge your elected officials to co-sponsor the High School Data Transparency Act (H.R. 455/S. 217).
The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Waite Clayton (recommended by Sheila Portillo, branch president). 
When 5 young mothers first meet in a neighborhood park in the late 1960s, their conversations center on marriage, raising children, and a shared love of books. Then one evening, as they gather to watch the Miss America Pageant, Linda admits that she aspires to write a novel and the Wednesday Sisters Writing Society is born. In the process of filling journals, they explore the changing world around them: the Vietnam War, the race to the moon, the women’s movement, and AAUW. The friends also support each other through life changes—infidelity, longing, illness, failure, and success. The Wednesday Sisters show us the power of dreaming big.
Secret Daughter by Shilpi Somaya Gowda Somer’s life is everything she imagined it would be—she’s newly married and has started her career as a physician in San Francisco—until she makes the devastating discovery she never will be able to have children. 
The same year in India, a poor mother makes the heartbreaking choice to save her newborn daughter’s life by giving her away. It is a decision that will haunt Kavita for the rest of her life, and cause a ripple effect that travels across the world and back again.
Asha, adopted out of a Mumbai orphanage, is the child that binds the destinies of these two women. We follow both families, invisibly connected until Asha’s journey of self-discovery leads her back to India.
State of Wonder by Ann Patchett Dr. Marina Singh, a research scientist with a Minnesota pharmaceutical company, is sent to the Amazon to find her former mentor, Dr. Annick Swenson, who seems to have disappeared while working on a new drug. No one knows where Dr. Swenson is, and the last person sent to find her died before completing his mission. Plagued by trepidation, Marina embarks on an odyssey in hopes of finding answers. 
Now in her seventies, the uncompromising Dr. Swenson dominates her research team and the natives with the force of an imperial ruler. But while she is as threatening as anything the jungle has to offer, the greatest sacrifices are those Dr. Swenson asks of herself, and will ultimately ask of Marina, who finds she is still unable to live up to her teacher’s expectations.
Watch Unsung Heroes: The Story of America’s Female Patriots on PBS stations Thursday May 29 at 7-9 p.m. Mountain time.
More women serve in the armed forces than at any other time in our nation’s history. This courageous heritage can be traced back to the Revolution where women like Molly Pitcher and Sarah Shattuck donned men’s clothes and took up arms against the British. And though none had the right to vote, hundreds of women participated in the Civil War as nurses, spies, and soldiers.
At the heart of this two-part, two-hour documentary are 19 firsthand accounts of the women who lived the story. Meet Ann Dunwoody, General, U.S. Army (ret), the first woman to serve as a four-star general, and Michelle Howard, Admiral U.S. Navy, the first female Navy four-star admiral.
This documentary honors these women whose service has been heroic; their sacrifices profound and their enormous accomplishments largely ignored.
