About Us

Women of the Mountains is a coalition of faculty, staff, and student clubs at Utah Valley University and the wider community.

Objectives

The intended outcome of the conference is to raise awareness, to mobilize support from institutions within the U.S. mountain states and global mountain entities, and to assist in the sustainable development of the mountain communities of the world, particularly as it applies to women and children.

Women and Children's Issues

The issues addressed by the program are broadly, but not exclusively, catalogued into six topics:

• Transmitting Family Values, Heritage & Culture: The role of women in the sustaining of family values, heritage and culture in mountain communities. Modern challenges to traditional family values, generational communication of culture and similar issues in the region.

• Health of Women & Children: Challenges of high rates of disease and mortality for mothers and children in mountain communities. New threats in the mountains: HIV/AIDS, sexually transmitted diseases and other women's health issues. Dealing with the problems of malnutrition, mutilation, abuse and the aftermath of terrorism.

• Education of Women & Children: Women's and children's education in highlands. Development of political, legislative and technological framework for the betterment of quality and availability of education. Practical implementation of the framework for the mountain communities. Technology, including use of modern ICT and distance education in remote regions.

• Economic Issues of Women & Children: Economic development in local communities. Family and gender policies of the regions. Women's rights to property: issues of equal gender access. Environmental issues and poverty. Also, micro-credit issues and drug production / trafficking.

• Human Trafficking and Exploitation: Migration in the mountain areas and mistreatment of women and children. Measures for fighting human trafficking and sexual exploitation in mountain areas.

• Leadership for Women: Women in leadership roles in contemporary mountain regions. Developing women's leadership capacities, women leadership in entrepreneurial development and governance.