Every month, the Pink & Black team is asked to share their response to one question.
This month, they were asked to share a female leader they admire. Here’s what some of them had to say:
Kara Goucher has always inspired me as a runner, both for her incredible talent and her honesty.
She is a gritty competitor at distances ranging from the 5,000 meters to the marathon. When races don’t go her way, she always shares her disappointment in a painfully honest way that is so often missing from those in the spotlight. More than that, though, her resilience in the face of those tough races inspires me to always get up stronger. She also follows her moral compass–she recently left Nike to sign with Oiselle and Skechers, two lesser known brands, because she believes in their missions. Elite runners depend on those sponsorships in a way that other professional athletes don’t, and for Kara to leave the dependability of Nike behind shows that she is willing to take personal risks for the betterment of the whole sport.- Alexis Teevens
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is a female leader I look up to with great admiration. She manages to fight for women’s rights whether it be by making her way into the highest court in this country (at 60 years old I might add) and being founding member of The Women’s Rights Project at the American Civil Liberties Union. She has stood strong and faced discrimination throughout her career, often times due to her gender. She was turned down for a clerkship at Harvard in the early 1960s simply because she was female. While caring for her newborn daughter and caring for her husband who had cancer, she still managed to make the Harvard Law Review. She is a true example of how far women can and should go in this country. Did I mention she confessed to being slightly wine-tipsy at the most recent State of the Union address? What’s not to love?
- Rebecca Walter
Ever since I was in high school, Lisa Ling has been an inspiration to me as a writer and journalist. She’s one of the reasons I became so interested in reporting. She’s opinionated, strong spirited, and isn’t afraid to dig deep to uncover the truth and talk about social issues in the world that are still a problem in this day and age. She’s one of the most prominent Asian American female reporters today and as an aspiring journalist coming from a Filipino-American background, it always made me proud since there aren’t a lot of us out there.
- Saleah Blancaflor
Who is a famous female leader you admire and why? Share your response in the comments or on social media with #PABshares.