CINCINNATI — An area university is recognizing women activists and innovators this Women’s History Month and one activist is hoping what she’s doing will inspire change.
What happened to Dana Bisignani as a student is the part of the reason she decided she was going to do something about it.
“I wound up, within the first few months I was on campus, dating someone who I thought was amazing but turned out to be incredibly abusive,” said Bisignani. “I thought, if I can save other people from having this experience and I want them to know it doesn’t always look like what you’ve been told.”
Bisignani became an activist, protesting for women’s rights, but then something else happened.
“My mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and she had a much longer battle than they anticipated, but she wound up passing from breast cancer,” she said.
She said it was her mother’s dying wish to see her finish college, so she did.
“They wanted me to succeed in college. They had worked really hard to get me there, and so I wanted to succeed for them,” said Bisignani.
She earned advanced degrees and then combined her education and passion for women’s rights.
She went back to a different university, the University of Cincinnati. She became the director and helped develop the women’s center on UC’s campus.
“I also wanted to be the person that I didn’t have when I was a student,“ said Bisignani.
She’s now part of the team helping organize a series of events on UCs campus that give women a voice during Women’s History Month.
“If you love your community enough and you see the problems, then you want to fix them and everybody’s got to come to the table in order for them to be fixed,” said Bisignani.
It’s all an effort that she hopes will inspire more women to speak out.
The University of Cincinnati will be holding discussions on racism, human and reproductive rights during this Women’s History Month.
The next event is March 22. For more details, dates and times on all of UC’s women’s history month events, click here.
