On December 14, 2012, twenty first graders and six educators were gunned down inside Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown CT. In the wake of such horror: survivors, families, first responders, and friends have in President Obama’s words on the 10th Remembrance “taken unimaginable sorrow and turned it into righteous cause.” One exceptional model of that activism, formed just weeks after the tragedy is the Sandy Hook Promise. January 14th, 2023, marked its 10th anniversary. In this episode, we take a look back and a look forward on gun violence in our schools with Sandy Hook Promise Co-Founder and CEO, Nicole Hockley.

Indra Nooyi served as CEO and chairman of PepsiCo from 2006 to 2019. Her prescient strategic thinking, insight into consumer behavior, and wisdom on managing a vast, global workforce make her one of the world's most sought-after advisors to entrepreneurs, companies, and governments. She is also a revered role model for women and immigrants, and celebrated for her empowering messages on inclusivity. Indra has been awarded the Padma Bhushan, India's third-highest civilian honor, and the U.S. State Department's award for Outstanding American by Choice. She recently wrote My Life in Full: Work, Family and Our Future which offers a firsthand view of her legendary career and the sacrifices it so often demanded.

In this very special episode of "A Conversation Between" we Stand with Ukraine with our special guest, CWHF Inductee, Author, and Journalist Anne Garrels. Garrels was NPR's senior foreign correspondent for over 25 years focusing on Russia and the former Soviet republics. She has received numerous awards including the "Courage in Journalism Award from the International Women's Media Foundation and is the author of "Putin Country -- a Journey into the Real Russia.” Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, she and two friends immediately set up the NGO www.Assist-Ukraine.org

In this episode, we celebrate Women’s History Month and sit down with Holly Hotchner, President & CEO, National Women’s History Museum, Washington, D.C. With extensive experience in building museums—structurally and programmatically—Hotchner brings a wealth of leadership and knowledge to the National Women’s History Museum as it enters an exciting next chapter: a physical presence in D.C. that complements its long history of virtual programming.

In this episode we celebrate Black History Month and sit down with Dr. Michele H. Johnson, premier researcher and practicing physician with 43 years field experience to discuss Health and Wellness. In 2014, she became Yale School of Medicine’s first female, and African-American full professor: engaging and enlightening medical students in the intricacies of radiology, biomedical imaging, and neurosurgery while serving as Director of Interventional Neuroradiology at Yale.

In this multi-denominational episode of A Conversation Between we sit down with Sister Miriam Therese Winter, Professor of liturgy, worship, spirituality and feminist studies at Hartford International University, formerly the Hartford Seminary, and Rabbi Donna Berman, Executive Director of the Charter Oak Cultural Center to talk about the winter solstice and the “Light” of the Holiday Season; emanating from external and internal forces of spirituality. Topics of conversation included, The Winter Solstice – Spiritual and Cultural Traditions, The Reason for the Season, Embracing Feminine Light and Energy.

In this episode of A Conversation Between we speak with journalist, TV producer, and author Janice Kaplan about gratitude. Janice is the author of many popular books including the New York Times bestseller The Gratitude Diaries and her newest book, The Genius of Women. Janice was the editor-in-chief of Parade magazine and the executive producer of more than 30 primetime network television specials. She has appeared frequently on TV shows including Today and Good Morning America and she hosts the daily podcast The Gratitude Diaries on iHeartMedia. Topics of Conversation Included: Gratitude is Attitude, The Grateful Body & Brain, A Grateful Lifestyle

In this very special edition of "A Conversation Between" our Founding President, Geena Clonan sat down with our 2021 Leaders for Social Justice Inductees: Teresa C. Younger, CEO and President of the Ms. Foundation, and Kica Matos, VP of Initiatives at the Vera Institue of Justice, to discuss some of the most pressing issues in Social Justice and explore possible new roadways towards a better society and nation!

Episode 22 was a conversation with Anna Doroghazi, the Associate State Director for Advocacy and Outreach at AARP Connecticut to discuss Elder Care.

Topics of Conversation included: AARP, Standing on the Issues, Women’s Burdens & Ageism, and Connecticut’s Problems & Promise.

Join us for our next “A Conversation Between” and meet some of our 2021 Leaders for Social Justice Spotlight Recipients. They are an incredible group of Connecticut Women who are fighting for justice on issues that impact all of our lives. We are honored to have:

Enola Aird, Founder and President of Community Healing Network

Pat Baker, Founding Leader of the Connecticut Health Foundation

Callie Heilmann, Founder, President, and Co-Director of Bridgeport Generation Now

Marilyn Ondrasik, Activist for social and economic justice

Rabbi Donna Berman Executive Director of the Charter Oak Cultural Center

Episode 20 | A celebration of Fatherhood: Nature and Nurture

July 22, 2021

Episode 20 focuses on Fatherhood and is our bookend conversation to Episode 19, which celebrated Moms. This conversation between fathers featuring Connecticut's 10th District Senator Gary Winfield, and James Worthy, National Consultant, Family Advocate, Business Developer, and Trainer. Topics of Conversation included: Fatherhood From the Beginning, Fatherhood’s Evolution and Revolution, and Fatherhood Today and Tomorrow.

Episode 19 | Motherhood Misadventures and Adventures in the Pandemic

May 23, 2021

Episode 19 was the first time that our webinar featured three guests and more importantly three Moms. This was a conversation for, with, and about Moms that featured General Counsel to Connecticut’s Lieutenant Governor, Cherie Phoenix-Sharpe, an intern at Public Allies of Connecticut working with Health Equity Solutions and a post-graduate student at SCSU in the Women and Gender Studies Program, Nina Dudley and Executive Director of the Permanent Commission on the Status of Women, Tina Courpas. Topics of conversation included Connecticut’s Women in the Pandemic Pandemic Mom, Pandemic Moms – Triple Burdens, Day In and Day Out, Help is on the Way...or is It?

Episode 18 | This HIstoric Pandemic Shesession: Part 2

April 29, 2021

In episode 18, Founding President Geena Clonan spoke with Jennifer Bernhardt Steadman, Ph.D., the Executive Director of the Aurora Women and Girls Foundation about a recent study completed by the Aurora Women and Girls Foundation entitles Essential Equity - Women, Covid-19 and Rebuilding Connecticut. Topics of conversation included The Data and What To Do With It, What the Pandemic Revealed and Needed Workplace Changes.

Episode 17 | This HIstoric Pandemic Shesession: Part 1

April 22, 2021

In episode 17, Founding President Geena Clonan spoke with Michelle Riordan-Nold, Executive Director of the CT Data Collaborative Michelle about "This Historic Pandemic Shesession” (not the but this as it is the first time in history that women are affected more than men). They specifically reviewed the data that was collected by her organization in regards to women in Covid 19.  Topics of conversation included the pandemics' disproportionate impact on women and girls, the workplace realities one year in, the second shift - homework like never before, and what the data says about gender and racial equity.

Episode 16 | women’s History Month: The Power of our story

March 10, 2021

In episode 16, Founding President Geena Clonan spoke with Elizabeth Lesser co-founder of the Mega Institute and author of several bestselling books, including Cassandra Speaks: When Women are the Storytellers, the Human Story Changes; Broken Open: How Difficult Times Can Help Us Grow and Marrow: Love, Loss & What Matters Most. The conversation included topics such as HerStory in History, Hero Myths - Heroine Realities, The Imposter Syndrome, and The Transformative Power of Gender Equity.

Episode 15 | sports in a pandemic world

December 10, 2020

In Episode 15, CWHF Founding President Geena Clonan spoke with 1995 CWHF Inductee Dr. Donna Lopiano, who is recognized as one of the foremost national experts on gender equity in sport. The Conversation included topics such as the status of youth and amateur sports, changes being made to collegiate sports, unique COVID challenges being face by female athletes, and the strength of those standing on the sideline, from parents to coaches and the fans of the game.

Episode 14 | College 2020 - A Brave New World

November 19, 2020

In Episode 14, CWHF Founding Presidet Geena Clonan talks with Bayan Galal, 2019 Eileen Kraus Scholarship Award recipient and currently a double major in Molecular Biology and Global Affairs at Yale University on topics including, managing public health regulations and guidelines on campus, medical and global health studies in a pandemic, students and pandemic advocacy, and COVID environment coping mechanisms.

Episode 13 | Connecticut Pandemic Brief

October 15, 2020

In Episode 13, CWHF Founding President Geena Clonan talks with Deidre S. Gifford, MD, MPH, Commissioner, Connecticut Department of Social Services on topics including Connecticut’s response to the Coronavirus update, back to school – positive & negative public health impacts, women and the crisis burden, and looking ahead to the seasonal challenges.

"I think taking steps ourselves, empowering ourselves is an important thing to think about. There is a lot that we can do to keep ourselves and our families and our communities safe and, sometimes, I think it feels like everything is just happening to us and we forget that we do have a fair amount of agency here. So, you know, we have learned a lot of things, but one thing that we have learned that’s pretty clear is that we can keep ourselves safe and be out in the world. The mask is enormously important, the physical distancing is enormously important, limiting being in crowded areas is enormously important. If you do those things, you can get some normal-ish types of experiences and I think it’s important for people to do that, to get out and walk around…Take those safety steps, take them very, very seriously, but then try to have some sense of normalcy and I think that will help." - Commissioner Deidre Gifford

Episode 12 | Women Who Run: The People and the Process

September 10, 2020

In Episode 12, CWHF Founding President Geena Clonan talks with Patricia Russo, Executive Director for The Campaign School at Yale about the history of women in politics, the highs and lows of American women in office, the political process and the pandemic, and the notion that “the future is female.”

"Women come in assuming when they run that they’re going to be treated fairly, and we just disavow them of that. It’s not fair. If you’re looking for fair, go somewhere else…What I know is that women bring their experience, right, their personal experience as a leader whenever they run for office…We are much more, as a gender, much more collaborative in our leadership style, much more able to check our egos at the door for the greater good, because we go into the “business of politics” for very different reasons than men. We just want to change the world. We just want to make things better for our community. We just want to make things better for our kids, right? That’s all we want. So, it’s a very different lens...and it’s a very different perspective." – Patricia Russo

"Do something. There’s so much you can do from the comfort of your own couch. The League of Women Voters is always looking for help. Candidates, every US House and Senate race is up …Google who is running in your community and support them. There are phone calls you can make, there are postcards you can write to your friends and neighbors. We can all do one thing." – Patricia Russo

Episode 11 | Connecticut Classrooms and the Coronavirus: Conditions, Concerns and Challenges 

August 13, 2020

In episode 11, Founding President Geena Clonan and Dr. Miguel Cardona, Connecticut’s Commissioner of Education, discuss how students, teachers, and families are moving forward together during the Pandemic.

“The children of Connecticut are resilient and they’re ready to move forward. One thing that I’ve learned as an educator about children is never underestimate them. They’re going to adapt and sometimes they’re going to teach us lessons about adapting, about persevering. So, while they’re questioning a lot, they’re also prepared to be listened to.” – Dr. Miguel Cardona

Episode 10 | America’s Policing Crisis: Reforms and Remedies

July 23, 2020

In this week’s episode, CWHF Vice Chair Desiree Wolfe sat down with Dr. Monica Bell to discuss the history of policing in America, as well as the various efforts, past and present, to reform the police force and ways that citizens can be involved in the change.

“What we should be doing at the state level is...reviewing budgets and seeing where we can invest in public safety in ways that are not just amplifying the police force...what I’d like to see Connecticut do and what I think Connecticut does better than some other states is start from the question of not ‘what do we do with the police?’ but ask instead, ‘what to do we do to build safe communities?’ Especially in places like Bridgeport, Hartford, New Haven, etc. where we have serious dreadful inequality and public safety issues. The reason we have those public safety issues is not because we need more police; it’s because we need less inequality.” – Dr. Monica Bell

Episode 9 | LGBTQ+ Legal Rights, Where are we Now?

July 9, 2020

In this episode, CWHF Inductee and LGBTQ Activist Anne Stanback spoke with Founding President Geena Clonan on the history of LGBTQ rights in the US and in Connecticut, where we are now, and ways that allies can help.

“…Where I think most of the gaps in Connecticut are right now is that we’ve focused on legal or formal equality, but there’s a term called ‘lived equality.’ A lot of that comes about in terms of the intersections of multiple forms of discrimination, where race and immigration status and poverty and HIV status…when those get overlaid with sexual orientation and gender identity, you see a lot of other areas of need. It’s queer youth and queer People of Color, particularly transgender youth and adults of Color, who are much more likely to be homeless, to have food insecurity, to be unemployed or underemployed than the rest of the population. It’s racism and classism in our movement and society that has resulted in those things…I would say that fortunately we are all starting to pay more attention to that.” –Anne Stanback

Episode 8 | Protest, Policing and the pandemic Part 2

June 18, 2020

In part two of our conversation with Siobhan Carter-David, Ph.D., Associate Professor of History at Southern Connecticut State University, we continue exploring through a historical lens these three social issues and the critical questions they bring to light.

"People like myself and yourself, we are people who have chosen this fight. I’m a historian, I’ve chosen this. We’re the kinds of people who might be open to having these kinds of conversations. But every woman and every Black person is not open to that all of the time. It can be very traumatic to have to constantly engage with these issues when you might not necessarily feel like it or be up to it. We live this experience as Black people every day, so to have to talk about it when people feel ready to is not always the opportune time for us. I think that in some ways it takes the onus off of white people to have a conversation...” – Dr. Carter-David on the roles of Black people and the responsibilities of white people in white anti-racist education.

Episode 7 | Protest, Policing and the pandemic Part 1

June 11, 2020

In part one of this two-part series, CWHF Founding President Geena Clonan and Dr. Siobhan Carter-David, Associate Professor of History at Southern Connecticut State University explore protest and policing through a historical lens and discuss the critical questions this explorations brings to light.

“There’s nothing more that individual Black folks can do. It’s up to white people to eradicate racism. It’s our problem because it’s something that impacts us but it’s not our fault…There’s nothing I can do…I pay my taxes, I’m a great citizen, I’m a good neighbor, I’m raising citizens of this country who are going to grow up to contribute to it, and that’s all I have to do. I can’t do anything else to make anyone see my humanity.” – Dr. Carter-David

Episode 5 | Connecticut’s Response to covid-19

May 14, 2020

In this episode, CWHF Founding President Geena Clonan sits down with Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz to discuss Connecticut’s response to COVID-19. Geena and Lt. Gov. Bysiewicz review Connecticut’s response to-date, the economic impacts of the Pandemic, aid packages for businesses, individuals, and families, COVID-19 and antibody testing and contact tracing, and what we can expect as the next steps moving forward.

“The Pandemic has caused an economic catastrophe for this state, families are stressed…about 20% of our workers are unemployed. Unfortunately, this pandemic has hit women the hardest. [We have] started to see nearly 60% of the unemployed people are women workers. They are in the fields of retail, social service, the hospitality industry…these are people who are now left jobless and these are many of our lowest-wage workers. At the same time, we know that women are on the front lines as warriors in this battle against COVID-19 because they are our nurses, our grocery store and pharmacy clerks, delivery drivers, and Postal workers. All of these essential workers, which we always appreciate, we appreciate even more now.” – Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz

Episode 4 | Domestic Abuse: The Shadow Pandemic

May 7, 2020

In this episode, CWHF Executive Director Sarah Smith Lubarsky speaks with Karen Jarmoc, CEO of the Connecticut Coalition Against Domestic Violence (CCADV), about how domestic violence is affected by the Pandemic, social distancing, and stay-at-home orders. Karen and Sarah also discussed resources like CTSafeConnect, how advocacy has changed during the Pandemic, and how to stay safe, stay connected, and get help. Karen shared that, due to Connecticut State Statutes, all domestic violence resources are completely confidential and, during this time, online restraining orders are now available. If you or a loved one needs help, please reach out to CCADV or visit the additional resources linked here.

“CTSafeConnect, which is the domestic violence resource and hub, all of the 18 domestic violence organizations'...localized lines feed into CTSafeConnect, [is] seeing a 100% increase from March to April. That’s enormous and that’s a lot of people reaching out to talk to a counselor. What’s really critical about that resource is that victims are connected to a domestic violence organization and a certified advocate right in their community.” – Karen Jarmoc

Episode 3 | Emotional WEll-being and the pandemic

April 30, 2020

In this episode, CWHF Executive Director Sarah Smith Lubarsky talks with Joanne Martin MFT, LPC, about emotional well-being during this challenging time, who might be especially vulnerable to emotional distress, and how to manage feelings of anxiety, loss of control, and grief.

“We as women put so much pressure on ourselves to do it all, to be a perfect mom, a perfect wife, to have the cleanest house…all of us at some level, we fall short. During this time, and in general, we should give ourselves a break. Our kids will be fine if they don’t have a bath every day, they’ll be fine if we fall back on homeschooling…when we put all this pressure on ourselves, we’re taking away from that core of what our spirit is, which is to be connected to people and to love people.”  — Joanne Martin

Episode 2 | Older adults and the pandemic

April 23, 2020

In this episode, Dr. Helen Smits debunks the idea that COVID-19 is a “disease of older people” and shares how older people can take precautions, how assisted living and nursing home facilities can protect their residents, and how families can support their older loved ones during this pandemic.

“The more staff knows about someone’s past life, the better they can connect and that’s something you can really put your heart into in trying to make life good for the relative that you can no longer visit.” —Dr. Helen Smits

Episode 1 | Women and the Pandemic

April 16, 2020

In this episode, Dr. Carolyn Mazure, creator and director of Women’s Health Research at Yale, gives a brief overview of COVID-19 and discusses gender-based differences in the effects and prevalence of COVID-19, the various efforts being made by local, national, and international entities, and some ideas for moving forward during this challenging time.

“One way we can [bring some sense of control into your life]…is to create your own personal structure. Think about what are the things that are personally rewarding to you? What are the things that you can do on a daily basis? Whether you’re stuck at home or you feel stuck at home, what can you do to make that a more rewarding experience?” —Dr. Carolyn Mazure