Ruth Z. Sweetser
President, AAUW Association
Ruth Sweetser was elected president of the 100,000-member AAUW in 2005. As member and twice chair of the national AAUW College/University Relations Committee from 1998 to 2003, she increased institutional membership by 25 percent. In 2003 she was elected to the AAUW Board of Directors.
She was president of the 7,500-member AAUW of Illinois Inc. from 1995 to 1998. She was a key driver in the establishment of its 501(c)(3) Gender Equity Fund and serves on the fund’s board of directors. In this role she conceived of and implemented the fund’s IT Empowerment for Women and Girls Initiative (itempowerment.iit.edu) and its Get Ready for IT module for young women.
Sweetser has been a member of the Gender Equity Advisory Committee of the Illinois State Board of Education since 1996. Appointed to the Commission on the Status of Women in Illinois in 1997, she chaired its Education and Training Working Group.
Professionally, Sweetser is the director, professional learning and business relations, in the Graduate College at the Illinois Institute of Technology. In this position she works to strengthen relations between the university and business and industry. She develops programs to meet needs of industry; represents the university in areas of education and professional development, training and work force preparation, and research collaboration; and manages relationships with companies.
Since 1990, she has presented more than 200 keynote speeches, workshops, staff development programs, and presentations on educational equity. She has received numerous awards and is listed in Who’s Who in American Education, Who’s Who in America, and Who’s Who in Technology.
Sweetser has a bachelor’s degree from Hope College and a master’s degree from the University of Chicago, where she was a Ford Foundation Fellow. With a major in German language and literature, she is fluent in German and knows “French for survival.”
Read "A Passion for Education and Equity," an alumni article from News From Hope College.
