State Rep. Margaret Rotundo. Photograph by Phyllis Graber Jensen/Bates College.

In observance of National Women’s History Month, Bates College presents six female political and educational leaders from Maine in a discussion of the challenges and achievements that have marked their careers at 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 28, in Chase Lounge, 56 Campus Ave.

Titled “Women and Public Leadership,” the panel is open to the public at no cost. It is part of a series of National Women’s History Month Events presented at Bates by the student organizations Women of Color and the Women’s Advocacy Group.

For more information, please contact Office of Intercultural Education program coordinator Megan Taft at 207-786-8376.

Moderated by Janet Waldron, vice president of administration and finance at the University of Maine, the panel consists of state Sen. Margaret Craven, D-Lewiston; Jill Duson, former mayor of Portland; former state Rep. Julie O’Brien, R-Augusta; state Rep. Peggy Rotundo, D-Lewiston; and former president of the Women’s Campaign School at Yale University, Martha Sterling-Golden. The discussion will offer a chance for the panelists to reflect on their achievements and the challenges they have faced as women leaders.

Janet Waldron

Waldron has held her present position at the University of Maine since 2003. Under her leadership, the campus has increased efficiencies; strengthened its environmental, safety and risk programs; renovated its dining and auxiliary services; improved its community relationships; and maintained a balanced budget despite economic challenges. Waldron is also an adjunct faculty member at the university.

Prior to joining University of Maine senior management, Waldron served the state of Maine for more than a decade, most recently as commissioner of administrative and financial services. She holds a bachelor of arts degree from the University of New Hampshire and worked toward a graduate master’s degree at Dartmouth College.

Craven was born into an impoverished family of 11 in Ireland. Her father worked odd jobs and her mother was a housewife. Craven came to the U.S. in the 1963 at the age of 17. After moving to Maine, she earned a high school diploma, bachelor’s and master’s degrees and began work with the disabled and senior citizens.

Elected as a Maine state representative in 2002, Craven was elected to the Senate in 2008 and re-elected in 2010. In addition to her political work, Craven is a respite coordinator and group home administrator.

State Sen. Margaret Craven.

Compliance manager for the Maine Human Rights Commission, Duson is in her fourth term as a Portland city councilor, during which tenure she served two terms as mayor. A former director of the Maine Bureau of Rehabilitation Services, Duson has pursued both a successful professional career and a calling to community service.

A Pennsylvania native, she earned a bachelor of arts degree in political science and literature from Antioch College and a doctorate in law from the University of Pennsylvania School of Law.

A longtime advocate in elderly issues and rights, in 1987 Duson began 15 years of specialized work in government/regulatory relations, corporate philanthropy and internal organizational development with Maine’s two largest public utility companies.

O’Brien is the founder of the Children’s Discovery Museum in Augusta and served as its executive director for many years. She served in the Legislature for eight years, holding positions on the standing committees of Criminal Justice and Public Safety, Health and Human Services and Appropriations and Financial Affairs.

Portland City Councilor Jill Duson. Photograph by Natalie Conn/The Forecaster.

In 2005, after leaving the Legislature, O’Brien became executive director of the Maine Republican Party, a position she held for three years. Among numerous community service roles, she has most recently served as president of the Maine chapter of the National Association for the Mentally Ill.

In 2000 Rotundo was elected to the Maine State Senate, serving until 2008, when she was elected into the Maine House of Representatives. During her tenure in the Senate, she served as the chair of the Appropriations and the State and Local Government committees; and served on the committees of Education and Cultural Affairs, Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry, Bills in the Second Reading and Senate Ethics.

As representative, Rotundo has sponsored legislation that has created greater public access to government information; a cleaner environment; greater educational opportunities; and better services for veterans and the elderly. She helped found the Center for Service-Learning at Bates in 1995, now called the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, which facilitates service opportunities for Bates students in Lewiston and Auburn. She is director of special initiatives at the center.

Martha Sterling-Golden

Sterling-Golden is a past president of the Women’s Campaign School at Yale University, a selective global leadership program sponsored in part by the Yale Law School every summer in New Haven. A 1995 alumna of WCSY, she was elected to the board of directors in 2005, then president of the school in 2006, serving one term before stepping down in 2008.

With 17 years in the nonprofit sector in development and board service, Sterling-Golden brings experience in triage and major organizational change in environmental, cultural and global leadership environments. She is a past elected representative to the Maine Democratic State Committee. A native of the Upper Kennebec Valley region, she was a working folk and rock musician for a decade before becoming a responsible member of society.

The program will include works by Giuseppe Piton, Randall Thompson, Franz Liszt, Franz Schubert, William Dawson and others.

Founded in 1881, Spelman College has maintained a reputation for choral excellence for more than 50 years. The Spelman College Choir, also called the Glee Club, has traveled throughout the country. Recently the choir performed with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and world-renowned singer Jessye Norman for a birthday celebration for the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

An academic partnership has been established between Spelman, Morehouse and Bates, providing a domestic exchange program for students and faculty. This alliance brings together members of three unique institutions to teach, study and participate in meaningful discourse at each of the campuses.

The talk is the first in a series of events sponsored by the Bates College Multicultural Center to celebrate International Women’s History Month and is co-sponsored by the women’s studies program, the Women’s Action Coalition and OUTFRONT. The public is invited to attend the talk and all other events free of charge.

A past president of the National Women’s Studies Association (1993–94) and board member of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies at the City University of New York Graduate Center (1991–95), Ng also served on the board of the American Association of University Women Educational Foundation from 1989-94. She was a Mellon Fellow at the Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies from 1984-85 and a Rockefeller Fellow at Hunter College from 1990-91.

Rep. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) and Senator Orin Hatch (R-Utah) co-sponsored a 1981 joint congressional resolution proclaiming the week of March 8 as National Women’s History Week. The National Women’s History Project helped expand the celebration in 1986 to the entire month of March. Beginning in 1987, National Women’s History Month resolutions have been approved with broad bipartisan support in Congress and signed by the president.

Other events scheduled at Bates in celebration of International Women’s History Month include:

The Spelman College Choir performs under the direction of conductor Kevin Johnson, with accompanist Andrea Aiken, at 7 p.m. Thursday, March 15, in the Bates College Chapel on College Street. The concert is co-sponsored by the music department.

Jothi Raghaven and her classical Indian dance ensemble present SRISHTI, a synthesis of Indian dance, music and poetry. The multimedia work will explore the nuanced imaging of the universe at 7 p.m. Saturday, March 17, in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall, 75 Russell St. The event is co-sponsored by the International Club and the Bates Hindu Awareness Group.

The documentary film Objects of Hate, Objects of Desire, an exploration of the history and the racial and political dynamics of collecting old images of African Americans, will be screened at 7 p.m. Wednesday, March 21, in Chase Hall Lounge, 56 Campus Ave. The film will be followed by a discussion led by Leslie Hill, associate professor of political science; Joanna Lee, director of affirmative action; and John McClendon, assistant professor of American cultural and African American studies.

Leslea Newman, noted author of Heather Has Two Mommies, reads from her work, which addresses being a lesbian and being Jewish, at 7 p.m. Monday, March 26, in the Edmund S. Muskie Archives, 70 Campus Ave. Included is her award winning story,  A Letter to Harvey Milk, recently read by Carl Reiner on National Public Radio’s series Jewish Stories from the Old World to the New. The talk is co-sponsored by women’s studies, the Women’s Action Coalition and OUTfront.