AAUW Long Beach has a long and prestigious history. We celebrated *100 Years* in 2020!
1920 – 1940:
The small group of college-educated women who had formed the College Women’s Club of Long Beach in 1911 became affiliated with the Association of Collegiate Alumnae, forbear of AAUW, in 1920. Given that this was the same year that the 20th Amendment extended voting rights to all American women, the Branch joined with the League of Women Voters to establish a school for voters. During these early years they also created a Toy Loan Library, an Inter-Club Legislature, a city-wide Creative Arts Festival, and a Community Arts Survey. The Branch’s focus on education emerged early—in the 1920s members were holding Scholarship Teas and raising money for scholarships.
1941 – 1945:
During World War II, the Branch set up a Speakers Bureau in connection with consumer research, worked with the YWCA in finding rooms for defense workers, bought $5000 in War Bonds, and, with American Women’s Volunteer Service, established, helped furnish, and staffed a Servicewomen’s Club.
1945 – 1970:
In the post-war years, AAUW-Long Beach conducted a survey of recreational facilities that resulted in supervised playgrounds, updated the Arts Survey of Long Beach, and did a study of juvenile problems in Lakewood, resulting in supervised recreation in Pan-American Park. Members began a Braille Transcribing Section that produced hundreds of books for blind students.
1970 – 1995:
In cooperation with other organizations, the Branch was instrumental in developing and presenting the first of the popular Literary Women’s Conferences. Among other contributions to the local community, members published Choosing Childcare: a Directory of Child Care Facilities in Long Beach. The group successfully raised money for three named EF fellowships during these years.
1995 – 2005:
These past ten years have seen an explosion of new activities by the Branch: an outstanding program where members have mentored over fifty middle- and high-school girls at risk of not achieving their potential; support of Tech Trek scholarships for twenty-one local girls; provision of reading tutors for Constellation Middle School; and a Math-Science workshop for middle-school girls. At the same time, the Branch has completed another named fellowship and has consistently been one of the leading California donors to the Legal Advocacy Fund.
2005-2025
These years were very active for the Branch: continued support of Tech Trek camperships, enabling the attendance of 118 rising 8th-graders since inception of the program in 1998 – with a 25th-year special event in 2023; over a three-year period conducted 32 AAUW Work and Start Smart workshops to teach more than 500 women (and men) how to best negotiate pay and benefits; oversaw annual STEM Career Conferences for Long Beach Unified School District (LBUSD) Title I middle-school girls through 2024, with 3,331 ultimate attendees; in 2021, published a 6-year study in concert with LBUSD, entitled Energizing Potential, which verified the efficacy of the half-day STEM Career Conference; in 2014 established, and then annually raised scholarship funds of up to $1,000 and $2,500 per student, at Long Beach City College and California State University Long Beach (CSULB), respectively, with $82,500 presented to 47 students by 2025; in 2009, created a comprehensive Investment Policy to ensure the branch’s financial security; completed two more AAUW Research and Projects Endowments. In 2014, the branch presented the documentary “Feminist Stories from Women’s Liberation” by director Jennifer Lee at the Art Theater, attended by 10 other LB women’s groups; was awarded the Friend of Education Award for Community Service by the Teachers Association of Long Beach. The branch collaborated with the Women’s Intercultural Network to advocate for the 2016 ratification by the LB City Council to be a CEDAW city; celebrated its own 100th anniversary in August 2020, by standing as suffragettes on Ocean Blvd. with the Centennial Circle of Women, in recognition of the 100th year since the 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote; was recognized in 2022 by LB Mayor Robert Garcia as well as the Long Beach City College Board of Trustees for its implementation and 50-year advocacy of Title IX; was an active member of the CSULB President’s Commission on the Status of Women and advocated for the LB Commission on the Status of Women and Girls, finally established in 2023.