About Samantha
Women's and girls' issues and advocacy have been Samantha’s driving passion since her first march on Washington at 18. Since then, she has worked to amplify stories of women who relied on Planned Parenthood for safe, affordable health care; lobbied to expand and protect reproductive choice in New York State; worked to change the way people think about homeless women and children for Win; and helped advance maternal and infant mortality goals in NJ as a representative on First Lady Tammy Murphy’s task force.
Most near and dear to her heart, however, was in 2013 when as a special advisor to then New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, she created and directed a first in the nation body image and self-esteem campaign with the goal of helping girls realize that who they are and what they do is more important than what they look like.
At the time, Mayor Bloomberg said “New York City is one of the most diverse cities in the nation with strong, successful women in every area of leadership. Yet girls are struggling with body image issues at younger and younger ages, a struggle that has negative public health consequences: including eating disorders, bullying, alcohol abuse, early onset of sexual activity and obesity. New York City is going to take a leadership role in sending a message about what really should matter – their skills, their beliefs and who they are and who they are going to be, not what they look like.”
The New York Times noted that the City was“taking on the popular, unattainable notions of beauty promoted by professional image-makers with a campaign that tells girls that they are beautiful the way they are.”
Subsequently, Samantha worked with the City of DC to replicate the campaign.
She has also published writing on the subject of body image in The Huffington Post and the Daily Beast.
After 20+ years in New York City, Samantha recently moved to Orlando, Florida to be closer to her nieces — her inspiration for this work — where she works at the intersection of homelessness and affordable housing.
Why A DIFFERENT MEASURE
Neuroscientist and author Dr. Sandra Aamodt wrote “"Our daughters have learned to measure their worth by the wrong scale." Those words stuck with me and I thought, “It’s time we change the way we value girls. It’s time for a Different Measure.”
