Celebrating A New Kind of “Calendar Girl”

Women for Change, which is dedicated to education, support, and dialogue around issues of the representation of women, body image, and sexuality, will be unveiling its largest calendar ever, featuring 45 women who are students, staff, faculty, and alumnae of the University of Hartford, along with community friends. The theme of this year’s calendar is “Free to…” where women’s images and voices feature what they feel free to be, do live, etc. 

This year, Women for Change’s community partner is CT Girlcott (www.ctgirlcott.org), whose mission is to raise consciousness and money for women and girls locally and globally.  The cost of the calendar is $10.  Members of the Girlcott committee are featured in the calendar and include women leaders from the Charter Oak Cultural Center, the Greater Hartford Region YWCA, the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center, the Women’s Education and Leadership Fund, and the CT Humanities.

For the last four years, Women for Change have been producing a calendar that combats the stereotypical images of women and offers a new view.  Previous calendars have gained local and national attention. 

The “unveiling” of the calendar celebrates a new kind of calendar girl allowing us to experience alternative and diverse images of women that combat the narrow view of women that we see every day.  Stories range from “free to…break the ‘disabled’ stereotype” to “free to…embrace my sexuality”. 

Part of Women for Change’s mission is support of other women.  To that end, 10 percent of the proceeds of the calendar sales will be donated to CT Girlcott (www.ctgirlcott.org) whose mission is raise consciousness about the pressures on women regarding beauty and raise money for women and girls locally and globally.  In addition, though Donna Haghighat who created Shoptimize.org (a company that supports women owned businesses), Women for Change will be selling Lusso bags. Lusso bags were made by survivors of sex trafficked women in India (they are paid a fair wage for their work and a portion goes back to stop human trafficking).

Come support women who have literally struggled with their own freedom in ways that most of us will never know—(https://shoptimize.org/blog/bags-that-boost-economic-recovery-of-sex-trafficking-survivors).

For more information, contact Mala Matacin, founder and faculty sponsor of Women for Change and co-chair and associate professor of Psychology and Gender Studies at the University of Hartford, at 860.768.4541 or matacin@hartford.edu.