Verizon Partners With WNBA on Inspiring Women Luncheon


The WNBA Inspiring Women Luncheon presented by ESPN was held on Tuesday in New York City. The event recognizes individuals who have blazed new paths on the court, in the boardroom and in the community.

One such individual was Giovanna Allison, an instructional coach at McNair Middle School, who received the Verizon Innovative Learning Award. WNBA.com sat down with Genia Wilbourn, Vice President of Verizon Global Operations, to discuss Verizon’s partnership with the Luncheon, the award, and how Verizon is impacting communities across the country.

Why do you think it’s important for Verizon to partner with the WNBA on an event like this?

I think it’s a perfect marriage when you think of the WNBA. They’re focused on empowering women, they’re focused on emphasizing better education for youth. Well, guess what? So is Verizon.

When you think of Verizon, we’re creating assets to create education and economic equality for the disadvantaged. When I think about what we’re doing for women, there’s a recent campaign that we have called “She Can STEM” — our Chief Network Office, Nicki Palmer, is leading it — and that is really about reaching young women, young girls and showing them there are these possibilities. I am very proud to partner with the WNBA. This is really about inspiring women for today and tomorrow.

What inspired Verizon to recognize a teacher and give out the Verizon Innovative Learning Award every year?

We’re focused on the kids and we’re focused on the youths because we have to be. But if we don’t bring the teachers along, we missed it. Verizon recognized it very early and as we develop programs, we develop them for the educators, as well. To me, that’s inspiring for Verizon — to see teachers commit and dedicate their time to embrace the new way of learning and new technology because there’s a different way you have to teach. When you see teachers embracing that and running with it, that’s inspiring, so we should recognize them.

What makes this year’s winner, Giovanna Allison, so deserving?

She is a rock star. It takes a village, and I think she’s a leader in the village that’s really going through a brick wall for the students and she’s innovating and being creative. She was doing the weekend sessions and after-school sessions and inclement weather days — she’s maximizing her time.

It’s women like her and leaders like her that are educators that we need to build our future leaders. That is exactly what she is doing, so she deserves to be recognized. I tip my hat off to her. These are heroic efforts that she is doing to reach kids. They are very distracted, and to captivate them and channel that energy towards STEM is amazing work.

How does the Verizon Innovative Learning program work to inspire the younger generation, especially young girls?

When I think about what Verizon is doing with the Innovative Learning program, we are giving free WiFi, free tablets, free access to internet in these under-served communities as a result of the digital divide. That’s our challenge. We want to take this journey to improve the divide we have in our country.

When we look at the stats, we have reached over a million students, and they are three-times better at math and two-times better at reading. So to me, the progress we’re making is positive, but there is a whole lot more to do. What we’re hoping that we do is inspire others to take the journey with us.