Business Women's Week Oct. 20-24
By Becky Barclay
Published in News on September 30, 2014 1:46 PM
Wayne County will celebrate women in the workplace Monday through Friday, Oct. 20-24. And a Career Woman of the Year will be selected.
The events are being sponsored by the Wayne-Duplin Chapter of the Business and Professional Women of North Carolina.
Chapter president Barbara Bozeman said the award is an opportunity to recognize women in the workplace in this area for their contributions to the community and other women in the community.
The award has been given by the BPW since the early 1960s, Mrs. Bozeman said. Last year's recipient was Rhonda Jessup with the University of Mount Olive faculty.
There are 18 BPW clubs in North Carolina and each selects a Career Woman of the Year, who then compete against each other on the state level.
The nominees are judged on how they elevate the standards for women in business and the professions, how they bring a spirit of cooperation among business and professional women, how they have promoted the interests of business and professional women and how they have extended opportunities to women through education along the lines of industrial, scientific and vocational activities.
"You don't have to be a member of the BPW to be nominated for the award," Mrs. Bozeman said. "The nominee has to be a woman who is working. Someone can nominate her or she can nominate herself.
"Ideal candidates are those who help contribute to the local community as well as people within their area of expertise. Very often, when people see career woman or BPW, they think you have to be an attorney or doctor or you have to be a larger degreed professional. If you're a working woman, you're a professional. It doesn't matter if you own your own business or if you're working for someone else. Everybody in the working community is a professional."
The deadline for entering is Oct. 1. You can go online and fill out the form or print it out and mail it in.
The local winner will receive a year's membership in the Wayne-Duplin group.
The local award will be presented at the Nov. 6 meeting of the Wayne-Duplin BPW and the state award will be presented at the BPW Women's Empowerment event in January.
National Business Women's Week will be celebrated Oct. 20-24.
The local BPW will have a kickoff reception Oct. 21 from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at Wayne Community College. The speaker will be Roberta Madden from Black Mountain, co-director of Ratify ERA-NC.
"The equal rights amendment has never been ratified, and our state is one of the states that is a holdup state," Mrs. Bozeman said. "So many people don't know that.
The chapter will receive a proclamation Oct. 20 from the city at the city council meeting. Oct. 22 in Kenansville, there will be a lunchtime networking session.
The chapter has also set up a Facebook page for National Business Women's Week so local businesses and organizations can post what they are doing to recognize the women in their workplace or group.