Women's News: Goldman Sachs bets on Black women

Hello and welcome to Friday. I don’t know about you, but I’m even more desperate than usual this morning for some women’s news, so let’s get right to it. 

Here’s what’s on the rise this week:

Spotlight

• 146 women graduated from Black in Business, a free 10-week business course offered by Goldman Sachs as part of its “One Million Black Women” initiative.

  • Launched in 2021, the project is a 10-year, $10 billion effort to drive economic opportunity for Black women. In addition to the course, it has funded grants, philanthropic efforts, and research about Black women in entrepreneurship.

  • According to the bank, closing the earnings gap for Black women would benefit the entire nation, adding an estimated 1.7 million jobs and $450 billion to the national economy.

  • This year’s graduates were the fifth cohort to complete Black in Business, which has educated over 750 businesswomen in total.

World

• In Ecuador, a group of women invented a new sport after growing tired of being excluded from men’s soccer games. “Handball with anaco” players wear Indigenous traditional skirts and pass the ball toward the goals for two 25-minute halves.

  • “We wanted to show that women are not only made for staying in the house raising children or taking care of the animals,” said one of the players, “because we can also have fun on the field.”

• Two Russian women are on trial for writing and directing a play based on the experiences of Eastern European women recruited to the Islamic State. Despite the playwrights’ insistence on their anti-terrorist stance, prosecutors claim the production romanticizes violent extremism. 

U.S.

• The Supreme Court upheld a law that prevents people under domestic violence restraining orders from possessing a gun. 

  • It’s a sigh of relief for the one million women who report having a gun used against them by an intimate partner. Before the ruling, the National Domestic Violence Hotline had observed a 40% increase in calls mentioning firearms. 

  • It’s not the only time a Supreme Court decision has impacted calls to the support center. Since the court repealed the constitutional right to abortion, the hotline has also seen an influx of callers reporting birth control sabotage or forced unprotected sex.

Business and Tech

• Snapchat’s parent company will shell out $15 million to settle a gender discrimination lawsuit. The plaintiffs sued Snap for failing to ensure its women employees were paid and promoted equally, resulting in the “marginalization of women” at the company.

• Raquel Urtasun founded Waabi to bring driverless semi trucks to roads everywhere, and she just got one step closer to that goal — the autonomous vehicle startup announced it raised $200 million in new investment capital.

Politics

• Organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union and House Majority PAC have promised to spend millions of dollars campaigning for abortion rights in this year’s election cycle; so much that Planned Parenthood actually reduced its funding for the cause compared to previous years. 

  • Still, the nonprofit has $40 million allocated toward supporting President Biden and other Democrats. 

• Billionaire philanthropist Melinda French Gates gave her first-ever presidential endorsement when she announced her intention to vote for Joe Biden, a decision she said is largely due to his stance on women’s issues.

Healthcare

• Data shows more women than ever are opting for IUDs, a form of long-term birth control that requires an often painful procedure to insert. With tightening abortion laws in many states, women say the discomfort of the IUD is worth it.

• A Supreme Court decision will allow doctors in Idaho to perform emergency abortions, but experts say the limited ruling left the issue open in other states.

Sports

• Sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson will finally make her Olympic debut. She sealed her ticket to the Paris games this week with a record-breaking 100-meter run, three years after being disqualified for marijuana usage.

• For soccer player Alex Morgan, on the other hand, this week brought disappointment. The long-time veteran was left off the list for the U.S. Women’s Olympic squad, which was announced on Wednesday. 

• In other Olympic news, trials for the U.S. Gymnastics team will take place this weekend. Four-time gold medalist Simone Biles leads the competition, which will offer roster spots to five of the 16 current contenders.

Culture

• The acclaimed show “The Bear” returned this week, bringing a milestone moment for Ayo Edibiri. The actress directed an episode this season, telling The Hollywood Reporter that she focused on staying positive and talking decently to people during her stint in the leader’s chair.

• The Ladies Lounge, a beloved (if controversial) art installment that we’ve featured previously on The Rise, is raising the stakes in its battle against accusations of gender discrimination.

  • The exhibit, which contains some of the museum’s most renowned art, was initially only open to women, a choice intended to convey the feeling of gender discrimination to male museum patrons.

  • Now, after a court ruled the lounge must indeed admit men, the creator moved the artwork (including several Picassos) out of the lounge and into a new location — the women’s restrooms, which men are prohibited from entering.

Further Reading