The League of Women Voters is an organization of female leaders that’s mission is to strengthen the community through voting, the values of doing the right thing, working together with members of the community, and teaching citizens about voting. Social media coordinator for the League of Women Voters of Whitewater Area Michelle Whisner is one of the involved members of the organization and viewed by many as a leader for her work over the past year. She is also an UW-Whitewater alumna. Her family has been involved in such organizations in Wisconsin dating back to the Suffrage Movement, and she continues that legacy by working to get people’s voices out there in the world. 

Q: How long have you been involved in this organization?

A:  I’ve been involved with it for just a little over a year. I’ve been involved in the elections and  election inspecting for over fifteen years. 

Q: What made you want to join this organization?

A:  It’s actually an organization that’s been on my radar for many years. My maternal grandmother was actually involved in the suffrage movement. She was very active in northern Wisconsin. My mom did the same kind of thing, instilled that overarching need to be involved in the elections movement, spurred me into reaching out to them. I have a variety of different things that I do, one of them was election based and I wanted to be able to introduce myself, and let them know that some of the things that I do are very specific one of them was about activism elections making your voice heard and wanted to know if they would be interested in being the recipient of funds for. That’s kind of how my love of graphics design merged with elections and the League of Women Voters became another organization that I’m proud to be affiliated with.

Q: What about the organization that inspires you with values and overall with what they do?

A:   Everybody is very passionate about elections very much, little democracy kind of the feeling of being able to educate the importance of elections, empowering voters and being a group that really stands behind defending democracy and making sure that everybody has the same ability to vote and that there are no restrictions on that. The idea of work ethic embraces possibilities of standing up for not only your own need to vote or your own responsibility to vote, but really making sure that you’re standing up for other people. No matter what the situation is being able to be involved in that type of activism, I think those are just kinda tips of the iceberg. What kind of inspires me throughout my day is just knowing that what I’m doing is making a difference.

Q: What do you hope to see from working in this organization in the future?

A: My hope is that we are able to carry our message into future generations. One of the biggest things that I think is I’m kind of one of the younger members but we have a variety of members from all  ages and all walks of life. The future, I hope we see more students. I hope we see more high school students involved in our organization. I hope we see more men. It kind of branches out from there, our organization kind of touches all four corners of a couple of different communities kind of branch out, you can kind of see where the road is and just knowing that we’re always always a growing organization that has 102 years worth of roots to it, hopeful to see it grow in the future become just as important as 200 years from now as it is right now for the members. 

Be on the look out for League of Women Voters of Whitewater Area upcoming events happening soon. To learn more or get involved visit https://www.lwv.org/.