Charlotte is living up to its nickname, hosting hundreds of women for an annual leadership conference in south Charlotte.
The 12th annual Career Mastered Women’s Leadership Experience is a three-day event that awards more than $60,000 in scholarships to girls from grade school through high school.
Organizers also honored several influential women — including Oscar-nominated journalist Soledad O’Brien — for their work to create lasting change for young women.
“It’s been a rough year for women generally. It’s been a rough year for Black women specifically,” O’Brien said. “So career wise and job wise as far as job losses, I think events like this are really important.”
This year’s honorees also included Johnson C. Smith University President Dr. Valerie Kinloch and Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Estella Patterson.
“It’s an honor of a lifetime to be in this moment — to be supportive of other people, but also to now be supported myself,” Kinloch said. “The work is hard. It’s a labor of love what we do, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The three-day event wraps up Thursday with a masterclass led by leadership strategist Dr. Lisa Wicker.
“Being in this moment means that we continue to persevere,” Kinloch said. “We continue to invest in our communities and in our lives, and we continue to say that women also rule the world — and we do — and we’re being recognized for such.”
