When Inter-Community Council representative Danielle Strollo '07 realized that the community she was expected to represent -- women on campus -- was 10 times the size of the communities that other representatives were responsible for, she realized she couldn't do it on her own.
Using the Pan-Asian Council as a model, Strollo attempted to create an organization of women from different experiences and communities on campus. As part of this attempt, she e-mailed current and emerging campus leaders inviting them to a retreat held at Dean of the College Dan Nelson's house on Saturday to meet and organize.
"We decided to try to create a more unified women's network," Strollo said.
Strollo invited as facilitators for the discussion Center for Women and Gender Assistant Director Megan Fallon, CWG Director Xenia Markowitt, River/Maxwell-Channing Cox Community Director Natalie Moses, and Amy Newcomb, assistant director of the Collis Center and Student Activities.
The goal of the workshop was to create a council of various women's voices, instead of employing the same over-worked and stressed few that seem to be involved in everything, Strollo said.
"I think it was beneficial because it introduced people to each other, and gave them faces and names and a Blitz list," said Kate Robb '08, a member of Alpha Xi Delta sorority.
Robb said that because the campus often feels "over-programmed" with events, a network such as the one Strollo is proposing would allow students to condense into larger, better planned events, with increased turnout.
The highlight of the workshop for Robb was a talk given by Martha Hennessy '76, who spoke about her experiences and the problems that women faced when she graduated from Dartmouth in the first co-ed class, which matriculated in 1972.
Strollo said that many people constantly speak of diversifying their organizations but do not have the network to do so.
"And a lot of people want to diversify," Strollo said. "But if you don't know anyone in those communities, how can you do that?"
The attendance of the event, however, fell short of what had been hoped for. Robb said that the event triggered a heavy turnout from the Greek community, but wished that a wider range of campus would have participated.
"Not that many did come from the minority communities and I was kind of disappointed," Strollo said. "That was a shortfall of the workshop.
Attendees Adria Buchanan '08 from the Women of Color Collective and Lena Martinez-Watts '08 from Latino organization Lambda Upsilon Lambda were two of the handful of minority community representatives.
"Sororities have a potential to do something great for women on campus, and I personally don't think they are doing that," Strollo said.
She said that sororities have the power to become the center of social and intellectual spaces for women. She suggested they do this by hosting events for minority communities in their spaces.
She added that the coalition will take the Greek system and its goals into account as well as those of non-Greek organizations, especially minority communities.
CWG sponsored the event, with the ICC loaning administrative support.
Strollo expects Kate Breeding '08, next year's CWG intern, to continue the coalition.
She said they hope to host a task force meeting in order to further develop the layout and structure of the organization.
"It's my last term here, and this is what I would like my legacy to be," she said.