By Jennifer Ragusa
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writer
In early January on Towson University’s campus, participants in the Professional Leadership Program for Women start their first session of the year. This session starts out with the life’s journey exercise, in which women are instructed to draw three examples, situations or events they’ve experienced that have value to them.
The exercise allows participants to learn more about and connect with each other. It also helps them determine what their core values are and how they align with their work. The annual program, designed by business and education leaders, aims to help women who are “committed to increasing their capacity for leadership and influence.”
There is a growing push to get women into leadership positions — not only on college campuses, but in the workforce in general. According to the Center for American Progress, since 1988, women have outnumbered men on college campuses, earning more than 57 percent of undergraduate degrees and 59 percent of all master’s degrees. Women also account for approximately 52 percent of the college-educated workforce. Yet women are still under-represented at the management level in many industries.
Towson is unusual in that it has a female president, Kim Schatzel, and a female provost, Melanie Perreault.

Perreault, who runs academic affairs on campus, has been provost since February. One of her initiatives is to get more women into leadership roles on campus. Perreault said that she never thought she would be a top administrator. She was a history professor for many years and then became a department chair.
“It really solidified for me the idea that when you go into administration, you can do for students and then later on for faculty, [things] that you can’t do when you are a faculty member,” Perreault said.
Perreault said that at many institutions, the percentage of female faculty is growing. According to Perreault, the challenge is that historically, whenever women dominate a field, the prestige of that position and the average salary drops.
“As a historian I am dedicated to the idea that if we learn these lessons we can avoid them, but I guess we shall see,” Perreault said.
According to Perreault, studies show that in any business, when there is gender diversity and other types of diversity, those businesses do better and there are more diverse ideas represented.
“Having women’s voices at the table and just really all different voices allows us to think differently and maybe get the best for the students overall,” Perreault said.
The Professional Leadership Program for Women is one way to help cultivate more female leaders on and off campus. It is available to mid- and executive-level women in the workforce. Held on Towson’s campus, the program consists of eight full-day sessions and seven in-class sessions starting in January and ending in May. Topics covered include executive presence, networking, mentoring, and navigating through organizational systems and culture.

Bailey Susic, the program director, said that it is her job to recruit, find speakers, deal with sponsorships, work on content development and put together logistics.
“The whole idea about this program, before I was even at Towson, the president at the time wanted to create a program where women could build on their leadership skills, and create a community of female leaders who worked together and wanted to motivate and empower and push one another,” Susic said.
Susic said that being a leader is all about inspiring, coaching and mentoring a group of people. This is something that one rarely learns when entering the work force. Most workplace training is learning to manage and perform tasks.
Susic said she loves getting to meet women from all different industries, continuing to have relationships with them afterwards and help them move in their career.
“It’s all about working together to build a powerful group that are going to be change makers for the younger generation,” Susic said.
Young women working on undergraduate degrees also aspire to gain the leadership qualities needed to take the next steps into their professional life. For this reason, Towson’s Women in Business organization was created.

Lauren Goodwyn is a senior at Towson University majoring in business administration with a concentration in project management and business analysis. Goodwyn is also co-founder of Women in Business alongside Tori Prestianni.
Women in Business is a new organization under the direction of the business school at Towson, holding bi-weekly meetings on campus. Goodwyn said that it was created to promote diversity in the workplace and female leadership by providing the resources needed to excel in the business field.
Goodwyn said that she has been able to gain and maintain professional relationships with guest speakers that have come to talk at meetings, and has also been motivated to grow and develop this group so it can remain a part of Towson for years to come.
“I think whether it comes to hosting events, networking, or gaining insight on successful women’s careers, we want students at Towson to feel that they are ready to take on life after college,” Goodwyn said.