A Course In Money And Power
Money for Women, May-June 2000

AT 37, NAOMI WOLF is a best-selling feminist author who's been known to advise a presidential candidate in her spare time. She speaks with a certain authority--except when it comes to money. "It's an ongoing education for me," sighs Wolf, whose The Beauty Myth sold millions and who reportedly earned $15,000 a month from Al Gore's campaign. "Just about everyone of my generation could have used more [financial education]."

Her mission is to right that wrong. "If financial literacy is taught to a 21-year-old," says Wolf, "then by the time she's 35 or 40, she's in a much better position to realize her goals."

So she and four other women founded the Woodhull Institute for Ethical Leadership, a program for twentysomethings that treats financial know-how as a key to power. The nonprofit group--named after Victoria Woodhull, the first female to run for president and to found a stock brokerage--hosts weeklong courses at its 260-acre estate in Ancramdale, N.Y. So far, 44 young women have attended for a $300 fee (several on scholarship); plans are to launch similar programs for older women.

Carmencita Whunder, 23, arrived in Ancramdale last year unable to describe a stock or a bond. Raised by a single mother, she says, "It's was all we could do to pay the bills." While Howard University prepared her for law school and a budding career in international governance--"I want to develop infrastructures [in] developing countries"--it taught her nothing about how to manage her finances.

That's pretty typical of the accomplished young women at Woodhull, says Melissa Bradley, who runs its financial program. It's also unacceptable. "You can't start or run a business without some basic financial understanding," says Bradley, who at 32 has founded a dotcom that teaches money basic and a nonprofit that trains young people to start small businesses.

But what do stocks and bonds have to do with ethical leadership? One word: philanthropy. The institute trains women to go for those fat bank accounts so they can give back. "I used to say, I want to be a lawyer because I want to have money," says Whunder. "But now I know I want to gain wealth so I can share it with other people."

--LISA REILLY CULLEN