Marquette's fifth annual Women's Leadership Conference will take place Saturday, featuring keynote speaker Awista Ayub, founder of the Afghan Youth Sports Exchange.,”

In an increasingly competitive job market, it is important for women to learn the leadership skills they will need to excel in their careers.

Marquette's fifth annual Women's Leadership Conference will take place Saturday, featuring keynote speaker Awista Ayub, founder of the Afghan Youth Sports Exchange.

Jamie Wu, a senior in the College of Communication and chair of the conference planning committee, said the 2007 Women's Leadership Conference is the first to be planned entirely by students.

"It's a day that is about women's empowerment and leadership," Wu said.

Kelly Neumann, Coordinator for Residence Life Programs and adviser of the conference's student planning committee, has been working with the program for several years.

"This year, we had a lot of students who were excited to be part of the committee, so we were able to switch direction," Neumann said.

According to Assistant Director of Student Programs Mary Ferwerda, the Panhellenic Association and then-Greek adviser Monica Beebe started the conference five years ago to "bring women together to talk about leadership and mentoring opportunities.

"Overall, we hope that women will be able to identify leadership talents and use them in the Marquette community and otherwise," Ferwerda said.

Jon Dooley, assistant dean of student development, was Beebe's adviser at the time of the conversations that led to the inception of the conference.

"It started as we were looking at leadership programs for students," Dooley said. "The Panhellenic council said women on campus were interested in learning more about women's leadership."

According to Wu, the theme of the conference changes from year to year. This year's theme is "The Voice of Women."

"(The conference) has taken a different form every year," Ferwerda said. "We try to listen to feedback from students."

This year's conference will be held on Saturday at 9:30 a.m. in the Alumni Memorial Union ballrooms. Ayub will speak from 12:15 until 12:45 p.m., with a reception to follow.

In addition to Ayub's speech, 17 other successful women from the Milwaukee and Marquette communities will be speaking during the three 40-minute sessions of the conference.

Wu said the ultimate aim of the conference is education.

"The overarching goal is to understand and know resources available to students in terms of leadership and not just women," she said. "The conference is empowering and resourceful and will allow networking and leadership development."

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