Lisa Hinkelman Ph.D. is nothing short of driven. One of Lisa’s greatest accomplishments, she recalls, was receiving her PHD at 26 years old. Lisa is a first generation college student in her family and didn’t have a frame of reference for what college would be like when she began her career. Receiving her Ph.D. was not only amazing for herself, but her family as well.
In 2006, Lisa began a research project titled Ruling Our Experiences (ROX) which was aimed at empowering young women and addressing some of the issues that adolescent girls face growing up. ROX caters to women who are in grades 5 through 10 and help them develop skills necessary to grow with self-esteem, self-respect, a healthy body image as well as healthy relationships.
Lisa wrote a grant for the Women’s Fund of Central Ohio to request funding to develop her program and also create a pilot program for which ROX could be run. Her vision was supported and Lisa was provided with seed money to get ROX off of the ground. The Women’s Fund of Central Ohio has continued to support ROX in subsequent years and Lisa has also attracted attention from other organizations that have stepped onboard in helping implement and grow Lisa’s program.
In addition to ROX, Lisa also volunteers with Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland and their Bonds Beyond Bars program. Bonds Beyond Bars is designed to facilitate connections between mothers and daughters while mothers are in prison. The program works to maintain healthy relationships and build effective communication. The Girl Scout troops participating in the program visit their mothers in the state reformatory once a month.
Going through college Lisa was taught the value of her education early on. Working two jobs while obtaining both her undergraduate and graduate degrees, Lisa was also supported by student loans. It wasn’t hard for her to understand the importance of her work, and it was equally important that her peers to share that same understanding. “I was often mistaken for a grad student,” Lisa says about the first few years of her career. “It was frustrating not being treated as an equal.” Lisa recognized that women constantly face an uphill battle when trying to prove themselves and that they deserve to be heard.
The obstacles that Lisa faced early in her career only helped to strengthen her motivation to help those younger than her, facing the same struggles that Lisa once faced. “We’re constantly learning, growing and evolving. Some people give up on their skills and abilities and think that they don’t have competence in a particular area, and instead of working to learn a new skill, people just say that they’re not good at it,” says Lisa. This isn’t the approach that Lisa takes when working with young women; even as adults, new skills can be learned.
It is Lisa’s wish to be able to change the social conditions that girls and women face in our country by providing them access to education and the ability to recognize their own strengths. By equipping them with the skills necessary to move through the world more strongly and more confidently, we can enact a systemic change that will provide the right tools and opportunities for girls in their upbringing.