Did you wear a pink hat? Stay home? Help a girl make sense? Reactions to the post-inaugural marches were as varied as womankind

After pretty much everyone I knew marked #45’s inauguration by marching in St. Paul, I reached out to a list of women I know who all write about education to start a dialogue about our varied perspectives and our shared passion–equity for kids. I had no idea the reaction it would get. Hard truths, spoken word? We’ve got it.

After a long series of emails, we decided to edit the best parts of the conversation into a blog post to share. My colleague Kerry-Ann Royes in Florida–helpful context: Jamaican by birth–hosted the effort at her blog Faces of Education, which is hyperlinked below. My friend Vesia Hawkins in Nashville has added to the project by making a short, shareable video. The woman in the photo above on the right is my friend Maureen Kelleher; the moppet next to her is her daughter.

It’s our collective hope you’ll want to contribute by commenting. Read on, and you’ll know why I love this group.

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Fellow women writers, education advocates and mama bears: I didn’t go to the Women’s March the day after the presidential election–I’m too much of a journalist at heart to participate in protests–but I followed all of your Facebook posts and tweets as closely as if I’d been there.

I was astonished to realize that in the incredible diversity of opinions we had about the event and about the need to keep showing up for children. Some of you took your children to introduce them to a kind of civic activism that fuels you. Some of you support our kids just as fiercely, yet did not find the same meaning in the march.

I’m moved, in the wake of the largest peaceful protest in U.S. history, to open a dialogue. What does it mean to be, raise and educate women in the age of Trump? Let’s share with each other and then with our readers. I’ll kick it off:

Schools are full of girls learning to be women. They are full of women trying to have an impact on the dreams of the girls coming up behind them. This is no trifling thing. Did you know that when I was a schoolgirl there literally was no such thing as a woman’s athletic shoe? We wore smaller men’s shoes. My mother could not get a credit card or buy a house. I could go on. Continue reading →