Holly Kearl has spent over 15 years addressing issues that impact marginalized persons around the world, especially women and girls, and elevating their voices.
She’s worked for entities like UN Women, the National Women’s History Museum, the American Association of University Women, and The Op-Ed Project on programming that promotes equity and safety for women and girls and/or showcases their stories and experiences.
In her current role as a community manager for the Aspen Institute’s New Voices Fellowship, where she’s worked since 2015, she mentors development experts in Asia, Africa and Latin America and helps them share their expertise and stories with the world, including through op-eds and personal essays.
Because she had a sister with a rare disease and parents a child with four rare diseases, since 2020, Kearl has engaged in activism in this arena (see more below).
Kearl is most known for her work on ending gender-based violence, particularly street harassment (see more below). She is the author of three books and four national studies on street harassment and/or sexual harassment. She is the founder of the nonprofit organization Stop Street Harassment and of International Anti-Street Harassment Week, which she’s overseen since 2011. She has extensive experience as an advisor and consultant, including for UN Women’s Safe Cities and Safe Public Spaces programme, USAID, Lyft, Google, Runner’s World and WMATA.
In 2018, Ms. Magazine included her on a list of 100 of the “most pathbreaking, important and widely read feminist scholars and activists.” In 2017, she was named by Women’s Running Magazine as one of the “21 Women Who Are Transforming The World Through Running.” She is one of the 25 activists featured in the book Speaking of Feminism: Today’s Activists on the Past, Present and Future of the U.S. Women’s Movement (UNC Press, 2019).
She has authored:
- Three books:
- Four national studies:
- Measuring #MeToo: A National Study on Sexual Harassment and Assault (2019) (co-author).
- The Facts Behind the #MeToo Movement: A National Study on Sexual Harassment and Assault (2018).
- Unsafe and Harassed in Public Spaces: A National Street Harassment Report (2014).
- Crossing the Line: Sexual Harassment in Schools (2011) (co-author).
- 90+ published articles for outlets like the New York Times, CNN, TIME Magazine, Washington Post, and the Guardian.
Since 2010, she’s given more than 150 talks and more than 350 media interviews.
Kearl received a master’s degree in Public Policy and Women’s Studies from George Washington University and bachelor’s degrees in history and women’s studies from Santa Clara University.
Rare Disease Advocate:
In 2018, after struggling through years of infertility, Kearl became a mother to a child born with four rare diseases and a disability. She’s scaled back her street harassment activism while caring for him and managing his many surgeries, illnesses, and daily interventions. As his mother, she’s become an advocate for people like him.
– Since 2020, she’s been writing a regular advocacy column for the newsletter of organization Pull-Thru Network
– In 2023 she began serving on the National Organization of Rare Disorders (NORD) Policy & Advocacy Taskforce.
– Starting in 2022, she established the Caring ARMS program at the DC Children’s National Hospital and, with her son, puts together care baskets for families of babies in the NICU who were born with imperforate anus. They deliver baskets twice a year.
– In 2021-2022, she served on the inaugural Rare Disease Advisory Council for Virginia.
– She’s written about him as a form of advocacy too:
- “I Went To My Son’s Class To Explain How He Goes To The Bathroom. Here’s Why.” HuffPost (July 2023)
- “5 Lessons I’ve Learned from Parenting a Child with a Rare Disease,” Parents.com
- Contributor to – “Raising kids during a pandemic feels impossible most days. 10 parents share unexpected moments of joy,” The Washington Post’s The Lily
- “My Baby was Born without an Anus. This is what I learned about Advocating for my Child,” HuffPost Personal
- The companion HuffingtonPost video on TikTok that has over 1.9 million views and over 1,500 comments (fall 2022)
- In October 2022, there was a companion Huffington Post Twitter Spaces about rare disease parenting and over 459,000 people “tuned in” live or listened to the recording.
Street Harassment:
Tired of strange men whistling and honking at her, calling out to her, following her, and grabbing her when she was alone in public, Holly wrote her master’s thesis in 2007 at GWU on gender-based street harassment and how women were using online websites to combat it.
* In 2008 she founded an anti-street harassment website and blog and began working on an anti-street harassment book.
* In 2010 she wrote one of the only books about street harassment: Stop Street Harassment: Making Public Places Safe and Welcoming for Women (Praeger Publisher, 2010), testified at the New York City Council hearing on the topic, and began speaking and giving media interviews.
* In 2011, she founded International Anti-Street Harassment Day, the first annual commemoration took place March 20, 2011 It expanded to a week in 2012: Meet Us on the Street: International Anti-Street Harassment Week. The most recent week in April 2015 had participating groups from 41 countries!
* In 2012, Holly became an advisor to WMATA on their anti-harassment transit campaign and Stop Street Harassment became a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
* In April 2013, Holly left her full-time job to devote more time to building SSH the nonprofit. Read about the work of SSH.
* In September 2013, Holly published her second book, 50 Stories about Stopping Street Harassers. She testified at the second-ever hearing on street harassment in Philadelphia in November 2013.
* In June 2014, Stop Street Harassment released a national report on street harassment, authored by Holly.
* In 2015, Holly wrote her 3rd book that was released on Aug. 30, 2015, Stop Global Street Harassment: Growing Activism Around the World
* In July 2016, Stop Street Harassment partnered with RAINN and Defend Yourself to launch the first-ever national street harassment hotline.
* In 2018 and 2019, SSH partnered with UC San Diego Center for Gender Equity and Health, RALIANCE, CALCASA and Promundo (in 2018) to produce national studies on sexual harassment. Measuring #MeToo: A National Study on Sexual Harassment and Assault (2019) and The Facts Behind the #MeToo Movement: A National Study on Sexual Harassment and Assault (2018).
Other highlights:
On Oct. 28, 2010, Holly testified before the New York City Council during a hearing about street harassment.
On Nov. 23, 2010, she presented at the 3rd International Conference on Safety for Women: Building Inclusive Cities in Delhi, India.
In 2011, Holly joined the board of Collective Action for Safe Spaces and participated in the elite Women’s Media Center Progressive Women’s Voices training.
In 2012, with Collective Action for Safe Spaces, Holly helped launch an anti-harassment campaign on the Washington, DC Metro system, including by testifying before the DC City Council in February 2012.
Also in 2012, she traveled to both Cairo, Egypt, and Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota to research street harassment and meet with activists and community members in each location to hear their stories.
In 2013, she testified at the Philadelphia City Council hearing on street harassment and released her second book on the subject.
In June 2015, she presented at the UN Safe Cities Global Initiative Site Leaders’ Forum in Delhi, India.
Holly testified at the DC Council Hearing on Street Harassment in December 2015.
Holly presented at the UN’s global conference on ending violence against women in Istanbul, Turkey, in December 2015.
Holly advised WMATA on their first-ever anti-harassment transit survey and the results were released in April 2016.
In 2017, Holly gave three presentations at UN Women Safe Cities Global Leaders Forum, Mexico City, Mexico
2017 UN Women Safe Cites Global Leaders Forum, Mexico City
In 2018, Holly was part of a team that advised Google on their MeToo Rising project.
Consultant:
After leaving her full-time job in April 2013, Holly has done consultant work for UN Women, USAID, Aspen Institute, AAUW, the U.S. State Department, and One World Education. She also works as a part-time facilitator for the OpEd Project and was an adjunct professor at George Mason University in the Women’s Studies department in 2014.
She is available to do other consultant projects. Her expertise includes: writing, researching, website editing, and social media, and topic specialties: gender violence, sexual harassment, street harassment, and Title IX.
Non-Profit Work:
From 2015 to the present, Holly has worked for the Aspen Institute as a community manager for their New Voices Fellowship.
From 2007-2013, Holly worked for AAUW, a national women’s equity nonprofit organization. She oversaw the Legal Advocacy Fund and Campus Action Project. She is the co-author of a national report on sexual harassment in grades 7-12, Crossing the Line: Sexual Harassment at School.
Prior to her position at AAUW, Holly worked in various positions at the National Women’s History Museum from 2004-2007, starting as a summer intern before her senior year of college.
Education:
George Washington University
MA Public Policy & Women’s Studies (2007)
Santa Clara University
BA History and BA Women & Gender Studies (2005)
Studied abroad for a year at Lancaster University, UK (2003-2004)
Other:
Holly lives in a suburb of Washington, D.C. with her spouse Mark, their two children, and their rescue pup DaVinci.
Holly is a long-distance runner who ran her first 5k at age 8 and her first marathon (26.2 miles) at age 14. She ran varsity cross country and track in high school and part of college. Today, she runs in several road races each year and the 10k is her favorite distance. Because Holly has faced so much street harassment while running over the years, when Mark and Holly bought a house, they purposely picked a place near a high school track and trails where Holly now runs mostly harassment-free.
