Kate Bennett and Carly Puch attended the Let’s Talk Poverty Conference at St. Cloud Technical and Community College with the help of gifts from alumni and friends to the St. Cloud State University Foundation in support of the Women’s Center Fund.
Conversations about class, wage disparities and poverty are happening across campus, but practical conversations about ensuring that people have the resources they need are largely absent, Bennett said. After attending the conference and learning about resources in the community, the women returned to the Women’s Center with the goal of educating the Center staff and engaging the campus community in conversations about socio-economic class and poverty.
Bennett brought the message about poverty to the broader campus with a discussion about the intersections of poverty, gender and other identities in the Women’s Center’s fall 2016 Women on Wednesday speaker series. Both Puch and Bennett are pursuing their master’s degree in social responsibility.