Alison Trope is a professor over at USC Annenberg, and I think she, more than anybody else, captures how I feel personally as a woman working at USC. Maybe all universities are like this, but in the now 12 years I’ve worked at USC, I’ve never felt–not once–that I mattered to the higher ups. Marlon Boarnet and David Sloane, my two department/program chairs, have been wonderful. And it’s not me wanting external validation. It’s different. It’s like…this place has always been so hardened against recognizing and making women visible. Certain, select women, fine, as long as they don’t object or make waves.

That’s why Professor Trope’s Over It project makes my heart sing.

She has map of campus entitled “USC Reimagined.” Go look at it!! When I look at it, I feel like I’m here, with all these women, making all this difference, instead of being an outsider, tolerated rather than included.