Girls Write Now Awards
HONORING
WO M E N W H O
W R ITE TH E WO R LD
HONORING
DAW N L . DAV I S
R O B E R TA K A P L A N
G LO R I A S T E I N E M
EMCEE
TA N Z I N A V E G A
Tuesday, June 3, 2014
F R O M 6 P M TO 9 P M
The Bowery Hotel
About Girls Write Now
Founded in 1998, Girls Write Now is New York’s first and only writing and
mentoring program for teen girls. The mission of Girls Write Now is to
provide guidance, support, and opportunities for at-risk and underserved
girls from New York City’s public high schools to develop their creative,
independent voices, explore careers in professional writing, and learn how
to make healthy school, career, and life choices.
Over the past 16 years, Girls Write Now has served nearly 5,000
marginalized teen girls, building a record of achievement and innovation
recognized twice by the White House, by the New York Times, the
MacArthur Foundation’s Hive Learning Network, and evidenced by the
hundreds of Scholastic Art & Writing Awards our girls have earned. Girls
Write Now has a successful college readiness program with 100% of our
mentees graduating high school and going on to college. Our girls bring with
them portfolios, awards, scholarships, new skills, and a sense of confidence.
2014 Girls Write Now Awards
In today’s changing landscape, Girls Write Now is paving the way for the
next generation of women writers, one girl at a time. Every year, the girls
we mentor join a supportive community where they discover their voices
and embrace the fearlessness to share their stories. Just like the women we
are honoring at the 2014 Girls Write Now Awards, our girls are breaking
through boundaries, both in life and in writing, to realize their promise and
the possibilities of change. Tonight, we celebrate the girls and women who
inspire us as they write the world.
2014 Girls Write Now Awards
EMCEES:
TA N Z I N A V E G A
N AT I O N A L C O R R E S P O N D E N T, T H E N E W Y O R K T I M E S
T U H FA B E G U M
G I R L S W R I T E N OW M E N T E E
GROUNDBREAKER HONOREE:
D AW N L . D AV I S
V P & P U B L I S H E R , 3 7 I N K A N I M P R I N T O F AT R I A /S I M O N & S C H U S T E R
Introduction by Kamy Wicoff, Girls Write Now Board Chair
TRAILBLAZER HONOREE:
R O B E R TA K A P L A N
PA R T N E R , PA U L , W E I S S , W H A R TO N & G A R R I S O N L L P
Introduction by Julie Salamon, Girls Write Now Mentor
SPECIAL VIDEO PREMIERE:
“ M A L A L A”
Song written by Suzzy Roche and Girls Write Now Mentees
EXECUTIVE REMARKS:
M AYA N U S S B A U M
G I R L S W R I T E N OW F O U N D E R A N D E X E C U T I V E D I R E C TO R
GAMECHANGER HONOREE:
G LO R I A ST E I N E M
A U T H O R , AC T I V I S T, & F E M I N I S T
Introduction by Gloria Jacobs and Ellen Sweet,
Girls Write Now Board Members
HONOREES
GROUNDBREAKER HONOREE
DAWN L. DAVIS
VP & PUBLISHER, 37 INK AN
I M P R I N T O F AT R I A /S I M O N &
SCHUSTER
Dawn L. Davis joined Simon & Schuster in 2013 as the Vice President and
Publisher of 37 INK, an imprint within the Atria Publishing Group. 37 INK
draws on Ms. Davis’s strengths as an editor and publisher, with a list that
encompasses the best in literary fiction, narrative nonfiction, journalism,
memoirs and pop culture, and drawn from a wide range of authors of all
backgrounds. 37 INK’s first book was the New York Times bestseller, The
Butler: A Witness to History, by Wil Haygood. This spring she published
Dear Leader: Poet, Spy, Escapee - A Look Inside North Korea, by Jang Jinsung, to critical acclaim.
Ms. Davis came to the Atria Publishing Group from Harper Collins, where
she had been for twelve years, first as Editorial Director of Amistad/
Executive Editor of HarperCollins and most recently as Publisher of Amistad.
During her time at Amistad, she published numerous well-known, highlyacclaimed bestselling authors including Edward P. Jones, author of The
Known World, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Critics Circle
and IMPAC Awards for Fiction, and the story collection All Aunt Hagar’s
Children, a finalist for the PEN/Faulkner Award; Steve Harvey, author of
the bestsellers Straight Talk, No Chaser and Act Like A Lady, Think Like
A Man, which launched a #1 box office film and talk show; Chris Gardner,
whose life story The Pursuit Of Happyness was the inspiration for the
popular motion picture starring Will Smith; Attica Locke, author of Black
Water Rising, a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize and the Orange
Prize, and Dolen Perkins-Valdez, author of the New York Times bestselling
novel,Wench. Prior to Amistad, Ms. Davis held editorial positions at Vintage
Books and the New Press.
TRAILBLAZER HONOREE
ROBERTA KAPLAN
PA R T N E R , PA U L , W E I S S ,
W H A R TO N & G A R R I S O N L L P
Roberta (Robbie) Kaplan, a partner in the Litigation Department of Paul, Weiss
LLP, has been described as a “powerhouse corporate litigator” and “pressure
junkie” who “thrives on looking at the big picture” whether “in the gay-marriage
legal fight or high-profile corporate scandals.” Robbie has been selected as one
of “The 100 Most Influential Lawyers” and one of the top “40 Under 40” lawyers
in the United States, as well as a 2013 Litigator of the Year by The American
Lawyer and 2013 “Lawyer of the Year” by Above The Law.
Robbie successfully argued before the United States Supreme Court on behalf of
Edith Windsor in the landmark case of United States v. Windsor. In Windsor,
the nation’s highest court issued a landmark ruling that a key provision of the
Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) violated the U.S. Constitution by barring
legally married same-sex couples from enjoying the wide-ranging benefits
of marriage conferred under federal law. The consequences of the Windsor
decision have been both rapid and profound. At least 16 courts throughout the
United States, including courts in New Jersey, Ohio, New Mexico, Kentucky,
Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia, have relied explicitly on Windsor to extend rights
to gay people.
Robbie’s representation of Edie Windsor was chronicled by Ariel Levy in her
piece in the September 30, 2013 issue of the the New Yorker entitled “A Perfect
Wife.” Robbie was also recently profiled in a documentary produced by the PBS
“MAKERS” series.
Robbie’s work has been honored by many organizations, including the National
Organization for Women, the Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Foundation, the
American Constitution Society, Stanford Law School, Columbia Law School, and
the Family Equality Council. She is to receive an honorary doctorate this year
from Johns Hopkins University. However, Robbie is probably most proud of the
fact that a character was named after her in Terrence McNally’s latest Broadway
production, “Mothers & Sons.”
GAMECHANGER HONOREE
G LO R I A ST E I N E M
F E M I N I S T, AC T I V I S T & A U T H O R
Gloria Steinem is a writer, lecturer, editor, and feminist activist. She travels in
this and other countries as an organizer and lecturer and is a frequent media
spokeswoman on issues of equality. She is particularly interested in the shared
origins of sex and race caste systems, gender roles and child abuse as roots of
violence, non-violent conflict resolution, the cultures of indigenous peoples, and
organizing across boundaries for peace and justice.
In 1972, she co-founded Ms. Magazine, and remained one of its editors for
fifteen years. She continues to serve as a consulting editor for Ms., and was
instrumental in the magazine’s move to be published by the Feminist Majority
Foundation. In 1968, she helped to found New York Magazine, where she was
a political columnist and wrote feature articles. As a freelance writer, she was
published in Esquire, the New York Times Magazine, Glamour, as well as
publications in other countries.
Her books include the bestsellers Revolution from Within: A Book of SelfEsteem, Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, Moving Beyond Words, and
Marilyn: Norma Jean, on the life of Marilyn Monroe. Her writing also appears
in many anthologies and textbooks, and she was an editor of The Reader’s
Companion to U.S. Women’s History.
Ms. Steinem helped to found the Women’s Action Alliance, a pioneering
national information center that specialized in nonsexist, multiracial children’s
education, and the National Women’s Political Caucus, a group that continues
to work to advance the numbers of pro-equality women in elected and appointed
office at a national and state level. She was president and co-founder of Voters
for Choice, a pro-choice political action committee for twenty-five years, then
with the Planned Parenthood Action Fund when it merged with VFC for the
2004 elections. She was also co-founder and serves on the board of Choice USA,
a national organization that supports young pro-choice leadership and works
to preserve comprehensive sex education in schools. She was the founding
president of the Ms. Foundation for Women, a national multi-racial, multi-issue
fund that supports grassroots projects to empower women and girls, and also a
founder of its Take Our Daughters to Work Day, a first national day devoted to
girls that has now become an institution here and in other countries. She was
a member of the Beyond Racism Initiative, a three-year effort on the part of
activists and experts from South Africa, Brazil and the United States to compare
the racial patterns of those three countries and to learn cross-nationally. Now,
she is working with the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College on a project to
document the grassroots origins of the U.S. women’s movement.
As a writer, Ms. Steinem has received the Penney-Missouri Journalism Award,
the Front Page and Clarion awards, National Magazine awards, an Emmy
Citation for excellence in television writing, the Women’s Sports Journalism
Award, the Lifetime Achievement in Journalism Award from the Society of
Professional Journalists, the Society of Writers Award from the United Nations,
and most recently, the University of Missouri School of Journalism Award for
Distinguished Service in Journalism. She is also on the Creative Advisory Council
for Hedgebrook writer’s retreat.
Ms. Steinem graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Smith College in 1956, and then
spent two years in India on a Chester Bowles Fellowship. She wrote for Indian
publications, and was influenced by Gandhian activism. She also received the
first Doctorate of Human Justice awarded by Simmons College, the Bill of Rights
Award from the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, the
National Gay Rights Advocates Award, the Liberty award of the Lambda Legal
Defense and Education Fund, the Ceres Medal from the United Nations, and a
number of honorary degrees. Parenting Magazine selected her for its Lifetime
Achievement Award in 1995 for her work in promoting girls’ self-esteem,and
Biography Magazine listed her as one of the 25 most influential women in
America. In 1993, she was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in
Seneca Falls, New York. She has been the subject of three biographical television
documentaries, including HBO’s “Gloria: In Her Own Words”.
In 1993, her concern with child abuse led her to co-produce and narrate an
Emmy Award winning TV documentary for HBO, “Multiple Personalities: The
Search for Deadly Memories.” With Rosilyn Heller, she also co-produced an
original 1993 TV movie for Lifetime, “Better Off Dead,” which examined the
parallel forces that both oppose abortion and support the death penalty.
She lives in New York City, and is at work on a book about her more than thirty
years on the road as a feminist organizer, due out in 2015.
MENTEE AND MENTOR PERFORMERS
C H E N E L L E AG N E W
Chenelle is a high school junior and a
second year Girls Write Now mentee.
Chenelle has won the Scholastic Art
& Writing Award Honorable Mention
in Poetry. “My mentor teaches me
something new every time we meet
that always leaves an impact on me
and makes me mindful of other things
in my surroundings.”
T U H FA B E G U M
Tuhfa is a high school senior and a
third year Girls Write Now mentee.
She received a full scholarship to New
York University where she will begin
this fall. In the Scholastic Art & Writing
Awards, Tuhfah has won a National
Silver Medal in Memoir, and three
silver keys in Senior Portfolio, Memoir,
and Humor.
M A R Y PAT K A N E
Mary Pat is a second year mentor at
Girls Write Now. She is a writer and
a teaching artist. Mary Pat has been
published and recognized by the
Brooklyn Herald, the Christian Science
Monitor, and the Philadelphia Daily
News.
MENNEN GORDON
Mennen is a high school junior and a
third year Girls Write Now mentee.
“My mentor and I read a beautiful
poem, where the narrator was fixated
on these tiny sheep in a test tube,
and what to do with them. Natasha
said we should pick something; what
would be in our test tube? I drew a
short comic about a galaxy in a bell
jar, and after we did it again, about a
rock. Natasha and I always wind up
writing something amazing whenever
we meet, even if it just looks like
scribble on a page or a lightly drawn
comic.”
M A R I A H DWY E R
Mariah is a high school senior and a
first year Girls Write Now mentee.
“Something that I learned from my
mentor, Meg, is that everything
comes in due time. In life, we are
handed obstacles and it’s up to us
to work through them toward what
we want. Along with that comes not
always knowing what we want - and
that can be okay. Sometimes, detours
happen for a reason and you can’t
lose faith.”
2 0 1 4 G I R L S W R I T E N O W AWA R D S
SPONSORS
CHAMPION $10,000
C R E ATO R S $ 5 , 0 0 0
SUPPORTERS $2,500
SPECIAL THANKS
INDIVIDUAL SPONSOR
H O S T CO M M I T T E E
Hammer Family Foundation
Unyi Agba
Karen S. Ali
Amy Berkower | Writers House
Gretchen Crary | February Media
Lee Clifford | Altruette
Joanne Edgar
Amy Ferris
Rebecca Gradinger
Gloria Jacobs
Justine Lelchuk & Ben Block
Suzanne Braun Levine
Mindy Liss
Nancy K. Miller
Martha Nelson
Susan Oehrig
Hope Pordy | Spivak Lipton LLP
Chelsea Rao
JillEllyn Riley
Ellen Sweet
Maddy Zollo
CHAIRS
Erica Mui
Corporate Engagement Chair
Erica Silberman
Artistic Production Chair
Kamy Wicoff
Board Chair
Lisa Chai
Sang Lee | SJL Attorney Search
VICE-CHAIRS
Marci Alboher
Sandra Bang
Tamra Davis and Mike Diamond
Maya Nussbaum
Founder & Executive Director
H O N O R A RY CO M M I T T E E
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Abigail E. Disney
Jennifer Egan
Robin Morgan
Francine Prose
Zadie Smith
Meg Wolitzer
SPECIAL THANKS
CO N T R I B U TO R S
Alex Anthony Salon
Arnot-Roberts Winery
BCC Life Coaching
Bergino Baseball Clubhouse
| Jay Goldberg
Bill Carter
Birchbox
BOLLYX
Caroline K. Lane-Steins Associates
Cole Haan
Continental Furniture
Dave Shuff
Elie Tahari
Elizabeth Arden
FIGS
Flaca Jewelery
Genua & Mulligan Printing Corp.
GIRLS
Lia Sophia
Meg Cassidy
Michael Skurnik Wines
Moet
Momofuku Milk Bar
Ms. Magazine
New York Writers Workshop
Onefinestay
Out of Print
People StyleWatch
Princeton Atelier
Rent The Runway
Rouge NY
Sarah Lewis
Simon & Schuster
Suzzy Roche
The Zox Brothers
SPECIAL THANKS
B OA R D O F D I R E C TO R S
S TA F F
Maya Nussbaum
Maya Nussbaum
Founder & Executive Director
Kamy Wicoff
Board Chair
Chelsea Rao
Vice Chair
Justine Lelchuk
Treasurer
Nancy K. Miller
Secretary
Marci Alboher
Unyi Agba
Sandra Bang
Gloria Jacobs
Sang Lee
Erica Mui
Ellen Sweet
Founder & Executive Director
Molly MacDermot
Communications Advisor
Michelle Paul
Director of Development
Tracy Steele
Director of Operations
Tara Bracco
Grant Writer
Emily Coppel
Digital Media Program Manager
Lilia Epstein-Katz
Administrative Coordinator
Rebecca Haverson
Writing & Mentoring Program
Manager
Sarah Hubschaman
Program Coordinator
Aarti Monteiro
Program Coordinator
Ruby Slippers Fundraising
Event Consultants
INTERNS
Sasha Bogoslowsky
Megan Malloy
Emely Paulino
Emily Turner
Natalia Vargas Caba
Congratulations to our Honorees:
Dawn L. Davis
Roberta Kaplan
Gloria Steinem
You have paved the way for the next
generation of women writers
by breaking through boundaries
in writing and in life. You are mentors to
all of us and to our girls.
On behalf of the Girls Write Now
Board of Directors:
Unyi Agba, Marci Alboher, Sandra
Bang, Gloria Jacobs, Sang Lee, Justine
Lelchuk, Nancy K. Miller, Erica Mui, Maya
Nussbaum, Chelsea Rao, Ellen Sweet,
and Kamy Wicoff
Congratulations
to the young writers served by
GIRLS WRITE NOW
and
to my editor and friend
DAWN L. DAVIS
who always pursues the 5Cs
CHRIS GARDNER
CEO OF HAPPYNESS
Gloria,
you are
FAN-F#*&ING-TASTIC!!
Love,
Abby Disney
Congratulations to
Girls Write Now
on their 15th Anniversary
and to our editor, publisher and friend,
Dawn Davis
for this recognition of her commitment to her craft.
Her DC family of writers, Dolen, Edward, Lonnae, Kevin, and Wil.
Simon & Schuster and Atria Books salute
on their 15th Anniversary
and the young writers it supports year after year.
And congratulations to our own
Dawn L. Davis, publisher of 37 INK,
for her longstanding commitment to her authors.
FROM OUR HONOREES
“The courageous young women of Girls Write Now know
perfectly well the power of the written word to move hearts
and influence minds. (...Their...) writing is powerful,
resilient, and above all, true.”
DAW N L . DAV I S
“Jewish tradition teaches that in the beginning, the world itself
was created with the word. And there can be no question about
the power of words to transform the world in myriad ways,
both good and bad. By teaching these young women to
powerfully articulate their own voices through the written
word, Girls Write Now is participating in the great human
endeavor of transforming and, in this case, repairing the
broken world in which we live.”
R O B E R TA K A P L A N
“To write is to bring an inner voice into the outer world, to
believe that our thoughts are worth entering the thinking of
others, and to make real what has never existed in quite the
same way before. What could be a better path to self-valuing
than that? In giving young women in the five boroughs this
biggest of all gifts, Girls Write Now is giving the rest of us the
gift of those girls.”
G LO R I A S T E I N E M
GIRLS WRITE NOW
247 West 37 Street, Suite 1800
New York, NY 10018
212.336.9330
I N F O @ G I R L S W R I T E N OW.O R G
W W W.G I R L S W R I T E N OW.O R G
@ G I R L S W R I T E N OW