Julie Keffer, a 2007 graduate of The Advocacy Center’s Partners in Policymaking, was chosen from a field of thousands of applicants to participate in the first ever Women Rule! Leadership conference, a collaboration of the White House Project and O Magazine. Keffer attended the three-day conference in June 2008 with 79 other women leaders who want to make a difference. The purpose of the project was to enhance the leadership skills of the participants so that they could take their ideas to the next level.

Keffer, 37, started Peer Pals, an organization pairing preschool children with peers who do not have disabilities in order to build relationships prior to kindergarten. Of her experience, Keffer says, “At Women Rule!, I was with a group of really smart, powerful women who were just there to encourage the rest of us to be smart, more powerful, and more successful in our own realm. There was no agenda other than that.”

Keffer lives in Oyster Bay, New York with her husband Mike and three children; Megan, Abbie, and Riley.