Leader of Vanguard center goes to Baghdad to help make women university leaders in Iraq

Sandra Morgan wants women to be leaders at universities — even if it means she has to travel across the globe to help them achieve it.

Morgan, director of Vanguard University’s Global Center for Women and Justice, returned last week from Baghdad, where she led three days of training seminars for 23 faculty members in leadership positions at universities throughout Iraq.

The training focused on empowering women for leadership roles and identifying their strengths in the workplace.

“When women ask for more than they traditionally had in leadership roles, it’ll naturally create resistance,” Morgan said. “So building and strengthening their approach to push back … is an important aspect.”

Though it’s “a big deal” that more women are department chairs and deans of schools, Morgan said, there still aren’t enough women in higher-level positions.

Her efforts to change that at Iraqi universities began after she collaborated with IREX, a Washington, D.C.-based international nonprofit, to get a U.S. State Department grant to work with the Iraqi Ministry of Higher Education.

As part of the project, six Iraqi scholars visited Vanguard, a private Christian university in Costa Mesa, last year to hear Vanguard faculty and staff share research and resources to help develop a working group in the Ministry of Higher Education, consisting of males and females, to create networks and work together inside academia.

It was a successful visit, Morgan said, but since it’s easier for one person to travel than a group, Fouad Kasim Mohammad, the ministry’s deputy for scientific research affairs, invited her to visit Baghdad.

The goal is to have a representative of the working group at 35 universities in Iraq. About 12 more are needed to reach that number, Morgan said.

The next step in developing the working group is securing additional funding, she said.

“I have a lot of commitment to this because I believe women are significant stakeholders in peacemaking,” Morgan said. “When women are at the table, there are more durable peace initiatives because women look at this different and their participation is an important aspect of durable peace.”

Mohammad said via email that Morgan’s workshops were “very fruitful” for Iraqi women.

“She is a very understanding person and very simple and aware of the cultural difference to the extent that the attendees … did not feel that she was a stranger,” Mohammad said.

Some women wished the training lasted longer so they could keep practicing their English, he said.

Morgan traveled to Kurdistan in 2009 to speak at conferences and universities as part of a women’s rights delegation. On a separate trip, she completed a British Council grant project with Iraq’s University of Duhok to try to increase courses in women’s studies.

Vanguard University President Michael Beals said Morgan’s partnership with the Iraqi Ministry of Education is inspiring and a “prime example of collaboration the university tries to promote.”

“For Morgan to be invited back again and be part of developing Iraqi women for leadership in education shows we’re on the right track as a university,” he said.

It also helps create opportunities to understand cultures from all over the world that are “critically important” to the growth of faculty and students, Beals said.

During the training sessions Morgan led in Baghdad, she discussed professional development for women in leadership, along with conflict management and strategic planning to continue developing the network of educators.

Professional development improves women’s ability to create space for other women, Morgan said.

For instance, she said, conflict can arise when women trying to move forward aren’t sensitive to other women.

And there are issues with patriarchy when men don’t expect women to take over leadership roles, Morgan said.

She also has scholars take stock of their strengths. Considering everyone’s strengths, she said, changes how people communicate and helps them respect the different strengths on the team.

“The enthusiasm from these women that they had new tools was absolutely inspiring for me to watch,” Morgan said. “At first they looked a little perplexed, because it takes time to go through the whole process.”

She often found herself customizing her use of metaphors by using the kitchen as the setting instead of a baseball field — the focus of much of the training material that had been developed by men.

Men were “very interested” during training programs and were polite at the Ministry of Higher Education compound, Morgan said. But in different settings she heard men making statements resistant to women holding leadership positions.

Morgan said she’s hopeful for the future and looks forward to when women being leaders is normal in Iraq.

“This is the reality for the women who live there,” she said. “They’ll be swimming upstream for decades, and I’m honored to have a small piece in their future.”

Priscella.Vega@latimes.com

Twitter: @vegapriscella