Donna Shalala, president of the Clinton Foundation and former University of Wisconsin-Madison chancellor, and Zimbabwe humanitarian Tererai Trent headline a public slate of speakers for the 2016 Summit on Women, Gender and Well-Being April 14-16 at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The summit focuses on the junction of women, gender and social justice.
Shalala, recipient of the Nelson Mandela Award for Human Rights and former U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, will consider the status of women and well-being in Wisconsin and the world during a talk on Saturday, April 16.
Trent, who has been called Oprah Winfrey’s favorite guest, champions a new future for women and girls around the world in her presentation Friday, April 15.
“She’s my favorite because she symbolizes everything I believe The Oprah Show stands for,” Winfrey said. “Her story encapsulates the essence of every lesson we’ve shared over the past 25 years.”
Gifted with natural charisma that inspires people from all walks of life, Dr. Trent’s compelling story motivates people to fight for their own dreams, as well as the dreams of others. Dr. Trent’s new picture book, The Girl Who Buried Her Dreams in a Can (Viking Books), is based on her story of perseverance.
Currently an adjunct professor in Monitoring & Evaluation in Global Health at Drexel University, School of Public Health, Dr. Trent is a senior consultant with more than 18 years of international experience in program and policy evaluation, and has worked on five continents for major humanitarian organizations. As a fellow at the Center of AIDS Prevention Studies (CAPS) at UC San Francisco, Dr. Trent conducted research on HIV prevention in Sub Saharan Africa with a special focus on women and girls.
The conference will be shared internationally through a free live stream, thanks to support from the UW-Madison Division of Continuing Studies.
The summit is hosted by the UW Women’s and Gender Studies Consortium and the UW-Madison 4W (Women and Well-being in Wisconsin and the World) Initiative. 4W is convened by the Global Health Institute, the School of Human Ecology and the Department of Gender and Women’s Studies.
All talks are at the Alumni Lounge in the Pyle Center, 702 Langdon St., except for Trent’s talk, which will take place in room 1306 of the Health Sciences Learning Center, 750 Highland Ave.
