Women's Leadership Conference at UPB

The University of Pittsburgh at Bradford hosted more than 140 high school and college students at a women’s leadership conference Friday to talk about “Lessons of Self-Leadership.”

Lisa B. Marshall (pictured), host and creator of the Internet radio program “The Public Speaker,” gave the keynote address to students from Allegany-Limestone (N.Y.) Central School, Bradford Area High School, Jamestown (N.Y.) Community College, Otto-Eldred Junior Senior High School, Oswayo Valley High School, Pitt-Bradford, Scio (N.Y.) Central School, Sheffield Area Middle-High School, Smethport Area Junior/Senior High School and Warren Area High School.

Marshall spoke to the students about “Lessons of Self-Leadership,” telling them to “pay attention to your internal dialogue and put things in perspective.” She also exhorted practice as a means to success and learning all that one can.

After listening to Marshall’s talk, students broke into smaller groups to work with Pitt-Bradford staff and faculty members to create a “lessons learned document” to help young women benefit from the experiences of others.

“(Marshall) was very engaging and really reached out to the participants,” said James L. Baldwin, assistant dean of academic affairs and founder of the conference. “I think the participants were very engaged in the presentation and subsequent discussions.”

“The Public Speaker” is one of the Top 200 podcasts on iTunes with more than 175,000 downloads each month.

Marshall is also the author of three blogs, “The Art of Speaking Science,” “The Art of Speaking Business” and “The Public Speaker: Quick and Dirty Tips for Improving Communication Skills,” which led to her writing the audio book “The Public Speaker’s Guide to Ace Your Interview: 6 Steps to Get the Job You Want.”

This is the second women’s leadership conference Pitt-Bradford has hosted. Baldwin said he started the conference after reading several articles that stated there was a strong correlation between leadership skills, success and career choices and the number of purposeful contacts that young women have with other professional women.

“I spoke with several of my colleagues,” Baldwin explained, “and we agreed that it would be a very good idea to develop a conference to which we would invite young women in high school and college to discuss topics such as aspirations, goals, empowerment, access, overcoming fears and other self-defeating behaviors, leadership, communication and networking. I am so pleased with this year’s response.”