We talked with two alumnae, both in the Class of 1989—one a Democrat, the other Republican—who matched their passion for politics with a career focus on civic engagement. Both are staunch supporters of civil discourse when it comes to civic engagement, with wise words on how women can and should wield their political power.

Delegate Betsy Carr ‘68 (69th District), Mary Dana Hinton, and Senator Jennifer Barton Boysko ’89

Ellen Gober Walter ’89

Chief of Operations, Office of Presidential Correspondence

Senator Jennifer Barton Boysko ’89

Virginia State Senate, District 38

Senator Boysko was first elected to the Virginia State Senate in 2019, having previously served as a member of the Virginia House of Delegates from 2015 to 2019. She chairs the Transportation Committee and Commission on Civic Education in Virginia and is co-chair of the Virginia Private Colleges Caucus, in addition to serving on numerous other Senate committees and boards and commissions for the Commonwealth. Prior to her elected positions, Boysko was an aide to Fairfax County Supervisor John Foust, a governor-appointed citizen member of the Virginia Board of Real Estate, and an active community leader in Herndon, Virginia.

I always had a passion for justice. My dad was a social justice theologian. In elementary school, I successfully led the effort to petition our principal to allow girls to be crossing guards. We discussed women’s rights and racial issues at home. In the 1985 printed “Facebook” of all the freshmen at Hollins, Sweet Briar, Mary Baldwin, Washington & Lee, and Hampden- Sydney, I listed my three interests as “People, Pets, and Politics.”

I planned to have a career in psychology. Paris abroad and meeting people that I never would have met changed my career plans. My summer internship on Capitol Hill before senior year cemented for me that I wanted to be engaged politically and civically. I moved to Washington, D.C. after graduation and worked for Senator Richard Shelby from my home state of Alabama. Growing up, I watched my mom struggle as a single mother. Once I got involved in politics, I saw the intersection between people who are struggling and what the government can do to help.

Rod Sinclair, Hollins Chaplain, helped me think about things in a broader context. He took us to Washington to lobby Congress about human rights issues and learn about atrocious things that were happening to people in other countries. I now live in a community with a high immigrant population, and my Hollins experience helps me to have compassion for and an understanding of their experiences. Rod and I did an independent study of books that I had missed in high school like To Kill a Mockingbird. He helped me see the intersection of theology, public policy, and human responsibility to one another.

The General Speakers Fund-sponsored debate between Phyllis Schlafly and Sarah Waddington was quite impactful. I picked each of them up from the airport and got to spend one-on-one time with them. That debate was one of the first times that I saw people bringing signs about being pro-choice and having a real conversation. The opportunities at Hollins that we had to really engage with important and influential women were frankly lost on me then, but it was very meaningful to my future.

“Every person has that ability and agency to make a difference.”

Every person has that ability and agency to make a difference. I have interns from middle school through Hollins students to give them the opportunity to be in the room where the decisions are made and see how the process works. What you see from the outside is very different from what is inside.

Young people have changed their communities and society for the better, so that people are all treated more fairly. When I spoke at Hollins Commencement in 2019, I was really touched by seeing how confident and comfortable our LGBTQ community is. I have a daughter who’s gay, and it makes me so happy for so many people in my life who are living their best lives and being included and embraced.

The Commission on Civic Education in Virginia is increasing youth activism and awareness. We’re having discussions at colleges and schools on how to have difficult conversations and still treat each other with dignity and respect. I would like to see us disagree without being disagreeable. All of us sit around the table with our families, and we’re not all going to be on the same page, and that’s OK. We need to actively engage with one another, especially when we disagree, to try to find some common ground, to build some trust and kindness. I’m a Democrat and recently had dinner with someone who was appointed by the Trump administration in transportation and wanted to know more. While we probably don’t agree on a whole lot of things, we had a great dinner together and respected one another.

I see students speaking up for what they believe about gun violence, women’s health, and the war in Gaza. It’s been difficult and painful, but I think it’s also important that they believe there are issues that they need to act on. Students are getting engaged, owning their space, and making adults uncomfortable. Not everybody’s going to agree with them, but they have every right still to speak their truth.

There are ways to engage and to advocate for the kinds of policies that are important to individuals outside of the federal level. If we don’t like our leaders, perhaps we should look to ourselves and see what we can do, whether running for office or helping in another way. Each of us can make a difference no matter how small. This is the only country we’ve got, and we all need to realize that we have a responsibility for making it better.

Ellen Walter has spent over three decades working on campaigns for Republican congressmen, senators, and presidents. After helping Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin get elected in 2021 by focusing on women voters, she founded The Walter Group: Winning with Women Voters. Since, Walter has worked on 22 races across the U.S. in the last three years. She’s also worked in three White Houses for President George W. Bush and for both Trump administrations. She’s currently the director of operations for the largest and oldest office in the White House, the Office of Communications, which handles the comment line, gift office, all emails and letters to and from the President. In a year, though, the Alexandria, Va. resident will be back on the campaign trail, working with candidates to listen to women voters.

My dad was mayor of Corsicana, Texas, when I was in middle school. I worked on his campaigns. On election night, the [poll workers] would call the house on the land line with precinct results, and my sister and I would run out to the garage to write them on a big chalkboard where his team was. Now, it’s a war room with 30 people and computers. It’s fun to see the 50-year process of how elections happen. The one thing that hasn’t changed is engaging with voters. What we did in 1976, we did in 2024.

In 1976, I wrote First Daughter Amy Carter. She was my age, and we both had cats. I asked her if I could sleep over at the White House and told her about my cat. She wrote me back, which is funny because I’m now in the Office of Correspondence that handles all of this. She sent a photo of her and her Siamese cat and gave us tickets to the White House Easter egg roll. My mom flew us to Washington that spring break for the Easter egg roll, but it rained and got canceled.

I majored in American Studies but took a lot of political science classes. I remember having conversations with Dr. Jong Ra about women in politics and whether a woman could run for President. At the time, Geraldine Ferraro was the most well-known woman on a national platform. How sad that we even had to have the conversation about whether a woman [could] be president. For Short Term sophomore year, I interned on Capitol Hill with my hometown Congressman Joe Barton. That was when I realized politics could be my career. When I graduated, I got a job in his office and have been in D.C. ever since. My first campaign was Senator Barton’s re-election campaign. When I was home raising my kids, I volunteered for John McCain’s Presidential campaign and on the Va. governor campaign.

Growing up, being civically engaged was all about being involved on the local level. We knew who the school board president and city commissioners were. If you want to engage young people, you do need to start early and teach them the importance of government, so they’re brought up appreciating it. My son and daughter grew up on politics with Congresspeople and governors in and out of our house. I am a lifelong Republican, and my son is a very liberal Democrat, and that’s absolutely fine.

Grassroots organizing and engagement are what I do, and it’s how campaigns are won. We still knock on doors, use yard signs and do sign waves, especially when I am working on campaigns in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Nevada. That’s real grassroots territory. When Gov. Youngkin asked me to work on his campaign, I kept saying, “Look at the number of women that Biden won in 2020. He did really well and won Virginia.” That was the first time that we put so much emphasis on women voters. We met women in homes across the state and asked them what was going on in their community and what do they want to see changed.

I was appointed to the bipartisan, all-female Virginia Council on Women by Governor Youngkin. We serve in an advisory role to the Governor on matters pertaining to women and ways to improve their educational, professional, cultural, and governmental status within the Commonwealth. I’m also a board member of the Black Conservative Federation. I love being a part of a national network of Black conservatives that seek to expand business and professional networks through community service, political action, speaker training and social events.

“We need engagement to learn from each other. Having a civil conversation on a political or difficult subject should not be so hard.”

Candidates need women voters to win but also to know what is going on. Most women run the checkbook in a home. They know the price of eggs. They’re the ones dealing with the schools, checking on their kids at 11:30 p.m. when their teenagers are past curfew. It’s all right there—economy, education, crime— the top “kitchen table” topics in politics.

Campaigns are finally understanding the power of the female vote. Before I started my consulting firm, my friend who runs Black Conservative Voices told me campaigns don’t listen to women or Black voters until September [during an election cycle]. But we make up over 50% of the voters, vote at a higher rate and are registered at a higher rate. In every presidential election since 1980, the proportion of eligible female adults who voted has exceeded the proportion of eligible male adults who voted. Last November, 68.4% of registered women voters voted in the presidential race compared to 65% of registered men voters [Rutgers data].

Male candidates like to stand at a podium and talk to women. People ask me, “How do I get women to vote for me?” We want to be heard. I get male and female candidates around a table with 25 women to talk. I do small business tours to have a candidate meet several female business owners at their business. If the woman is working in a business that she owns, she can’t take the time to go to a luncheon with a candidate or afford a $1,000 fundraiser.

I believe that there is about 70% of Americans who agree on more than 50% of the issues. We need engagement to learn from each other. Having a civil conversation on a political or difficult subject should not be so hard. We need to slow down, put our emotions aside, use our brains and have real conversations.

I think early voting is really important for women. It’s about meeting women where they are. If you’re a working mom and your kid’s sick on election day, you’re not going to vote. I encourage women to vote together and to check in with friends and neighbors to be sure that they know how to vote. Or maybe someone is embarrassed that they’ve never voted before, but it’s never too late to vote for the first time.

Whether this election went your way or not, your vote mattered. Don’t be discouraged. And if you are on the winning side, don’t gloat. I want Hollins students to get involved in their community. Maybe run for school board or another office. Get engaged. Don’t just watch one news channel. Get different opinions. Contact candidates—their offices read emails. Vote every year in every election because local politics is where it really starts. And make sure your voice is used and heard in a way that is helpful to you and to other generations.

Hollins gave me the strength and the intellect to do what I do today. I trust women and work well with women of any socioeconomic, political, or religious background because we were all thrown together at Hollins. You can learn something from anybody, and I learned that at Hollins.