URBANA - If there was any question about the nature of the group that converged Wednesday upon the University of Illinois' Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, one only had to look to the men's restrooms for answers. The small female outlines taped over the male figures marked the overwhelming female presence of the Biennial Conference for Women 2008.

The two-day conference, which was started in 1984, is expected to attract about 3,500 attendees this year.

Sheila Crump Johnson, co-founder of Black Entertainment Television and a University of Illinois alumna, helped kick off the day with an interview-style session done by Champaign news anchor Anne Dill.

"If we don't empower women globally, we're going to see society go down in flames," Johnson said.

She emphasized the importance of working to ensure worldwide change in an increasingly global society. She encouraged the women to give to their communities through positive interactions with others.

"That's giving back in the rawest, purest, finest sense," Johnson said.

Among the conference attendees were representatives from Millikin University and Archer Daniels Midland Co., officials said. Visitors could attend a conference bookstore and an expo fair that included representatives from area businesses and organizations.

"Everybody thinks that Girl Scouts is cookies, camps and crafts," said Molly Wilson, communication specialist for Girl Scouts of Central Illinois, the conference's charity sponsor. "And we really are not that. We have one of the premier leadership programs in the world."

Wilson emphasized the similarities between the Scouting organization and conference's missions to educate and empower women. During the opening session, girls from local troops invited attendees to join in saying the Girl Scout promise. Without hesitation, many grown women in the audience held up three fingers and recited the words they had never forgotten.

Breakout speaker Consuelo Castillo Kickbusch, a retired Army lieutenant colonel, talked openly about the pain and joy she experienced during her childhood in Laredo, Texas. Kickbusch spoke about self-worth, passion and the power of forgiveness.

"Forgiveness is not so much your gift to them," she said of life's transgressors. "It's your gift to yourself."

The day's speaking topics focused on all aspects of wellbeing. Zonya Foco, a nutrition expert, spoke about eating healthy on the run. Having a career and a family shouldn't have to compromise a woman's health, she said.

Closing the conference's first day was Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Anna Quindlen.

"Much more of what happens to change the way we live together in the next 50 years is going to happen in living rooms than in courtrooms," Quindlen said before she took the stage.

Although there has been tremendous progress for women in her lifetime, she said there is still work that must be done to repair a vital disconnect between men and women in this country.

"… Much of the lack of progress does take place in our personal lives," Quindlen said. "It's not so much, 'Oh you can't have this great job,' it's, 'How in the world are you going to have this great job and have two kids under the age of 3?'

"And the fact that those issues haven't begun to be worked out yet is a testimonial to the fact that we drove this only so far out in the world before we had to drive it at home."

Annie Getsinger can be reached at agetsinger@herald-review.com or 421-6968.