By Emily Kestel Position: sexual assault forensic response coordinator, Office of the Attorney General of Iowa Hometown: Des Moines Family: Husband Chad and daughter Evie, 7 Education: Truman State University Age: 43 Contact: sara.hulen@ag.iowa.gov In 2021, the Iowa Legislature passed a bill that would create a sexual assault forensic examiner Read more…
Annual Fearless survey: 80% of Iowa women say they’re burned out and top issues include child care, pay equity, harassment By Emily Kestel Since 2016, the Business Record has published a survey dedicated to shining a light on issues that women face in Iowa, both at work and at home. Read more…
Stories compiled by Emily Blobaum, Fearless editor Each year, more than 15,000 children in the U.S. are diagnosed with cancer. Roughly 11% of those diagnosed die. Yet research on pediatric cancer remains underfunded – just 4% of the federal budget for cancer research is earmarked for childhood cancer. Although the Read more…
By Emily Barske, Business Record Editor 2020 was not a great time to build a home – or to kick off a capital campaign to fund it. As the coronavirus pandemic wreaked havoc on the economy, the prices of building materials soared and nonprofits struggled to find funding in the Read more…
By Emily Blobaum, Fearless editor When Amanda Jones found out she was pregnant in 2018 at age 25, she was surprised. She and her fiance, Aaron, had been dating for 1½ years and were both working as servers in Longview, Texas — Amanda at Cheddar’s and Aaron at Buffalo Wild Read more…
By Emily Barske, Business Record editor When it comes to sexual assault prevention, colleges have often focused on telling people to be safe – in other words, how to not become a victim – but have less often focused on how to prevent people from becoming perpetrators of sexual violence. Read more…
By Emily Barske, Business Record editor Like many in the medical field, when asked to explain what she does, Delrae Hennessy first tells people what the acronym for her job title means. “SANE” stands for sexual assault nurse examiner, she’d explain. And then she’d go on to tell them that Read more…
By Emily Blobaum, Fearless editor Discriminatory actions and comments are often clear and apparent. But it’s also important to address the seemingly smaller, daily instances of comments that showcase biases known as microaggressions. Kevin Nadal, a psychology professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, defines microaggressions as “the Read more…
As told to Emily Blobaum, Fearless editor Bopha Mom-Baccam has been a Re/Max real estate agent for two years alongside her husband, Sullivan. This interview, which has been formatted to be entirely in her own words, has been edited and condensed for clarity. In the real estate world, there’s not Read more…
Vanessa McNeal is a storyteller, writer and filmmaker. She is the founder and executive director of Story Maven Media, a nonprofit digital media platform that elevates social issues through documentary filmmaking. McNeal is a survivor of sexual assault and uses her story to empower and connect with others. You can Read more…