View from the Top of the World

by Ann Bancroft

At this moment, women are on top of the world. The Paris Olympics showcased the talents of thousands of women athletes of all ages, ethnicities, and body types, and the US women won more than half of their country’s medals. Women are filling all kinds of arenas. The meteoric rise in attendance at WNBA games this season to watch basketball phenom Caitlin Clark has finally placed the terrific league on a steep growth trajectory. Vice President Kamala Harris is drawing enthusiastic crowds upwards of 15,000 people in multiple cities. The excitement for her joyful leadership style with a hopeful vision for the future is palpable.

That exhilaration and sense of accomplishment is a feeling I know well. I’ve actually been to the top of the world. I’m a polar explorer. As the first known woman to cross the ice to the North Pole, I was the only female member of the 1986 Steger Expedition – traveling with seven men and 49 male sled dogs. I then led an all-woman expedition to Antarctica in 1992, becoming the first known woman to trek to both Poles. I’m one of a very small number of people who have had the privilege to explore these beautifully untouched, remote ends of the Earth. These and other expeditions have taught me a few important lessons.

• You can’t get to new heights on your own. Whether you’re an explorer or an athlete, a teacher or a politician, a carpenter or a scientist, we each need a team. We need folks we can trust to bring a range of skills, share the load, assess risks, and be thought partners, especially when the goal feels out of reach. If you’re lucky, you’ll have an audience cheering you on. When the American Women’s Expedition (AWE) was making our way across Antarctica, we were being followed virtually by 350,000 schoolchildren who learned about this fascinating continent through our journey. And in our hardest moments of isolation, injury, or exhaustion, it was the thought of those schoolchildren and their belief in us that kept us going.
   
• You must seize the moment when opportunity presents itself. Vice President Harris is perhaps the best current example of this. With almost no notice, she stepped into the race for the most powerful position in the world – without hesitation and with considerable enthusiasm. She has worked hard her whole life to be in this position, and she also stands on the shoulders of the many women “firsts” who paved a pathway forward.
   
• You should always leave a place better than you found it. The AWE team took this very seriously – we packed out everything we brought to Antarctica. However, the impact of climate change is devastating, especially on our planet’s polar regions. They are melting at alarming rates, causing rising sea levels and new currents that affect weather patterns and increase dangerous climate events globally. We must shift our thinking and actions dramatically to stem the tide. I love the Iroquois Seventh Generation Principle: the decisions we make today should result in a sustainable world seven generations from now. Now is a historic inflection point – time for millions of women and their allies to build on this momentum and take control of our destinies. Let us use our collective power to heal our fragile environment, guarantee reproductive healthcare for all, reinstate voting rights, protect our democracy, and leave a thriving universe for the next generations. The future is in our hands.

– Ann Bancroft is a polar explorer, educator, and childless cat lady who lives in Minnesota. She is also the founder of the Ann Bancroft Foundation which inspires girls to pursue their dreams.