Women take part in breaking barriers symposium
October 12, 2016
CONCORD- A celebration of women, mothers and career professionals was the goal of the Women’s Symposium hosted by Congressman Richard Hudson last week.
The second annual symposium, entitled “Breaking Barriers- Empowering Dreams” was held at the Hilton Garden Inn on Monday, Oct. 3. Women from all strokes of life gathered to hear keynote speaker NASCAR K&N driver Julia Landauer and participate in a variety of breakout sessions.
“We are hosting this event today to celebrate the tremendously positive impact that women make in the workforce and our families all across society,” Hudson said in his greeting. “I don’t think we take enough time to stop and talk about the challenges you face.”
Hudson said many of the professionals he works with are women and his wife also juggles having a career while being a new mother.
“I’ve seen women go through what I go through, and now with my son I’ve seen my wife have to go through the same stresses yet she has much more of the challenges of the family on top of it,” Hudson said.
Addressing the recent issues of unrest with law enforcement, Hudson also said that women are an important part of this conversation and finding a solution.
He shared a story about a recent interaction he had with an African American woman. This older woman told him that years ago she was pulled over for speeding by an officer with the Highway Patrol.
Hudson said the woman told him she looked at the white officer and said “I’m not afraid of you because I know what I did; I know that I was speeding. But I’m afraid of you because you are white.”
“When she said that, the power of those words. I’ll never understand fully the feeling she felt when that officer walked up to that car, but I can tell you it’s real and we’ve got to deal with that,” Hudson said. “On the other hand we’ve got law enforcement officers every day who kiss their children and wives and husbands goodbye and go risk their lives. Every time they pull a car over they are risking their lives to keep us safe and we’ve got to find a balance there.”
He added that he believes listening to each other is the first step in addressing this and other issues. He told the women in attendance that males need their help with listening.
“This is something we all have got to solve, all of us together,” Hudson said. “I just hope we can continue to have this dialogue and discussion and we can continue to work on these issues.”
Then it was time for Hudson to introduce two-time championship winning racecar driver Landauer.
Originally from New York City Landauer made history at age 14 as the youngest and first female champion in the Skip Barber Racing Series. She has explored and won in all types of racing from go karts, to formula cars to stock cars. In 2015, she became the first female NASCAR Track Champion in her division at Motor Mile Speedway.
She is now competing for Bill McAnally Racing in the NASCAR K&N Pro Series West, which is NASCAR’s first televised series. She just got her season-best result of second place, tying for the record for the highest finishing female in the series.
Landauer was also the only woman chosen for the NASCAR Next program, which highlights and supports 11 up-and-coming NASCAR stars and she competed on Season 26 of Survivor.
During her presentation, Landauer discussed being a female in a male-dominated sport and why she chose to compete. Her talk was entitled, “Can nice girls win races?”
Landauer said as a woman in racing she has a lot of spotlight on her which can be great when she performs well, but also negative when she makes a mistake.
“NASCAR is definitely still an all-boys club so it can be tough as a woman and a New Yorker,” Landauer said. “I work on being as authentic as I can and accepting other’s views.”
Beginning to compete at age 10, Landauer said she loved the sport and thought it was cool to work with adults and manhandle a machine. But she quickly realized that women are looked at differently and there are certain characteristics they are expected to have.
She said some of those expectations are women shouldn’t be aggressive; women should always be pretty; women are fragile and women feel the need to justify their positions. She also said that some people believe there is only room for one woman in NASCAR.
“We are at a time where we have a lot more women’s groups but we are still fighting. It hurts when I get a job on a racing team and people assume I would just be at the back,” she said. “We need to teach our girls to take risks so they can learn to fall down and get back up. We are protecting our girls more than our boys and I think long-term it’s hurting them.”
Landauer told her audience they needed to break the rules. They needed to challenge young girls and let them be whatever they want to be.
She finished with what it’s like to be a female racecar driver.
“It’s awesome. It’s so cool to put my heart and soul into something,” she said. “It’s very empowering, terrifying and scary. I love proving that women can do it.”
After Landauer’s presentation, the women in attendance were given the opportunity to select break-out sessions. Those sessions included “Opioid & Heroin Epidemic in Our Community and Schools Panelists,” “Protecting Your Family From Online Threats: Identity Theft, Online Security and IRS Scams” and “Women in Non-Traditional Careers.”
Issues:Economy and Jobs