Perspectives Magazine: USU Center for Women & Gender 2017-2018

Page 8

Leadership

Chaco Doors

Perspectives on Leadership A Brief Sketch By: Dr. Ann M. Berghout Austin

As a junior in high school, I was a delegate to State. I will always be grateful for this benevolent gift of providence. At Girls State, I about my responsibility to promote social Withlearned forethought justice and earned a scholarship to Utah State and intentionality, we University at the same time. Maureen Hearns Utah Girls

pass through awaiting

doorways to new spaces in which to create a new awareness.

Chaco Doors Maureen Hearns

With forethought and intentionality, we pass through awaiting doorways to new spaces in which to create a new awareness.

My family’s challenge involved both parents and all sisters working hard to help my profoundly deaf and multiple-handicapped sibling develop in a generative way. This experience helped cement my interest in social problems and social policy, and the USU scholarship suggested to me that I could really enact my dream. I entered university with the goal of becoming a UNICEF physician who could work with others to make the world a more just and equitable place for women and children. I was entranced by the UNICEF physicians interviewed on TV, their sweaty faces bristling with concern for others. “That will be me,” I thought. Growing up, I spent most of every summer on my grandfather’s ranch in southern Idaho where I helped with his egg and dairy business. I also worked for other ranchers for hourly wages from 25 to 75 cents an hour. During the summer of 1965, inspired by the work of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., I rushed through my chores every day so I could be in the house to watch the evening news. I was concerned about Dr. King’s work and, toward the end of the summer, I decided I would hitch a ride to Logan, Utah on the milk truck. I planned to use part of my summer money to ride the Greyhound bus to the Salt Lake City airport and use the rest to fly south to help Dr. King. But my parents found out and told me that such an escapade would brand me as a runaway, and no university would allow a runaway to study at their school. Of course, this wasn’t true, but I believed them, and that ended that. In the spring of 1967, I was awarded a Kennecott scholarship along with several

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