Hey everyone! Happy Valentine’s Day!! I’m Prathyusha Pillari, the Co-Campus Correspondent of Her Campus at University of Washington, Bothell otherwise known as HCUWB. I first came across Her Campus before my freshman year of college in Fall 2016. I was very inspired and wanted to be a part of this community. I asked my first friend I ever made in college, Gloria Gonzalez-Zapata, to be the Co-Campus Correspondent with me. I told her that it would be fun and we could create a community of women on campus that will feel like home. We gathered 4 more girls, Sneha Ravichandran, Loralyn Narvaez, Haley Null and Midhadu Kedir and launched our chapter exactly one year ago. Even now, I spelled these girls names from our banner that we made together a year ago that’s hanging on my bedroom wall.
Since then, a lot of girls joined our mission and helped us be successful in what we do: create a platform and home for all women on our campus. It’s our one year anniversary today and I wanted a few of our girls to share what HCUWB means to them. This is what they said:
“HCUWB to me is sharing your experience of what it is to be a woman. Whether that’s make up, or coding, and representing women as more than just one thing. And having the support of other women while you do it.” – Sneha Ravichandran
“Being in HCUWB connects me to WA and my life there even if i don’t live there anymore. I learned how to be independent and more of my own person because I had to figure out a lot of stuff on my own. Joining Her Campus gave me a support group of really strong empowering and sweet women that I can share my passions with.” – Loralyn Narvaez
“Becoming a part HerCampus UWB is when I really felt apart of the UWB campus! I love being part of something so fun and made up of amazing girls. Seeing HerCampus grow as a club has been amazing and I can’t wait for the clubs future!” – Haley Null
“HC means opportunity and community. The ability to receive a platform that gives you the opportunity to share your voice, your stories. There are not that many opportunities that allow you to do that besides your Facebook status and needing to create your own blog. It has allowed me to connect and share with my community and also create dialogue within my community through my articles.” – Angelica Salmeron
“Being a part of HCUWB is a constant reminder of how powerful women are” – Aylar Atadurdyeva
“Being able to write articles on topics I am passionate about without too much of a topic hold, finding a family within campus where I feel like I belong and reading articles that I can better relate to.” – Saravanan Sonia
“Being a part of HCUWB means being an empowered woman with a voice and medium to just be expressive and creative with the support of other women” – Bryanna Bui
And finally, what does HCUWB mean to me? 5 years later if anyone asks me what the best part of my college was, I would say HCUWB. All the time I spent working to build this chapter, it’s not work, it’s a part of me. I’m grateful for all the girls that helped me build this platform this last year on our campus. I can’t wait to see all the great things my girls are going to do in the future!