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"This week&amp;#x27;s news features the good (Beyonc&amp;amp;eacute;! Michelle Obama! Marissa Mayer! Hillary Frey!), the bad (being a woman is expensive, and one of my favorite actors let a sexist remark slip at Comic-Con), the crazy ($8000 sorority rush workshops, anyone?), and more. Read on--then tell me what you think! VIDEO: Beyonc&amp;amp;eacute; to Michelle Obama: &amp;amp;#8220;I&amp;amp;#8217;m proud to have my daughter grow up in a world where she has people like you to look up to.&amp;amp;#8221; If ever there were a great note on which to end your weekend, this letter from Beyonc&amp;amp;eacute; to Michelle Obama is it. In the touching video tribute to my favorite First Lady, Beyonc&amp;amp;eacute; says, &amp;amp;#8220;Michelle is the ultimate example of a truly strong African American woman.&amp;amp;#8221; She praises Michelle for the important role she has both in nurturing her family and looking out for millions of people with her healthy eating initiatives. How wonderful to see one powerful, accomplished woman honor another&amp;amp;#8217;s remarkable achievements. Speaking of the First Lady, She Just Launched a New Campaign Program! On Friday, First Lady Michelle Obama traveled to Virginia to officially launch &amp;amp;#8220;It Takes One,&amp;amp;#8221; the new Obama for America initiative that emphasizes the impact every individual can have on this election. In the campaign video, Michelle reminds voters that this year&amp;amp;#8217;s election will be even closer than four years ago, which is why she and President Obama are encouraging voters to get one additional person involved during the election: to register one new voter, or drive a neighbor to the polls on Election Day. &amp;amp;#8220;You could inspire five, or 10, or 100 new people before November,&amp;amp;#8221; says the First Lady. &amp;amp;#8220;Don&amp;amp;#8217;t ever underestimate the impact you can have.&amp;amp;#8221; What do you think of the Obamas&amp;amp;#8217; new initiative? I&amp;amp;#8217;m pretty excited to see the online strategies, like this one, and social media tactics of both campaigns in coming months. The $849,000 Penalty for Being Born Female I apologize for the shift from inspiring news to the bad: Dailyfinance.com did the math, and when you add up all the costs associated with being female, the total comes up to a shocking $849,000. Let&amp;amp;#8217;s take a look. I&amp;amp;#8217;m not complaining that one of largest contributing factors is the average five years women live longer than men (cost = $200,000), but some of the other costs are infuriating. For example, women typically pay 30 percent more than men in health insurance&amp;amp;#8212;more than 90 percent of the best-selling health insurance plans charge women more than men (cost = $44,000). Wait, there&amp;#x27;s more: DailyFinance cites lower pay for equal work as a whopping $400,000 burden for women. Bottom line is that all of these factors make it necessary for women to understand investing and personal finance, which, yes, is absolutely true, but I think this conclusion carelessly shifts responsibility away from the structural disadvantages we constantly face. Joseph Gordon-Levitt Thinks Pretty Girls Aren&amp;#x27;t Funny More bad news bears. Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who I&amp;amp;#8217;ve been a major fan of since 10 Things I Hate About You was one of the first PG-13 moves I was allowed to watch (!), said earlier this week at Comic-Con, &amp;amp;#8220;Most pretty girls aren&amp;amp;#8217;t funny.&amp;amp;#8221; Yes, he was trying to compliment Looper co-star Emily Blunt, who he says made him laugh during filming, but come on! As someone who has worked with Zooey Deschanel, Ellen Page, and Anna Kendrick, I&amp;amp;#8217;d think Gordon Levitt would have a deeper appreciation for how funny attractive females can be. Pledge Prep: Prepping Students for Sorority Recruitment Guess which college experience is like &amp;amp;#8220;speed dating meets interviewing meets beauty pageant meets upscale summer camp? That would be sorority recruitment. In case you missed the New York Times article about sorority consultants and coaching, here&amp;amp;#8217;s a recap. More and more girls and their mothers are turning to workshops and private consultants (at $125 per hour) to deal with the pressures of sorority rush. These involve not only making a positive impression during the multiple rounds of rush, but also compiling mounds of paperwork, including &amp;amp;#8220;a resume stressing community service, leadership, academics and teamwork, letters of recommendation from alumnae of each chapter, preferably on the campus in question, and reference letters.&amp;amp;#8221; In the article, rushees discuss their pre-rush dieting and anxiety, and what it feels like to be cut from your top choice sorority&amp;amp;#8212;&amp;amp;#8220;exactly like a breakup,&amp;amp;#8221; according to one girl. I think it&amp;amp;#8217;s a shame that a process established to create sisterhood and lifelong friendships is being turned into a high-stakes judgment fest. What do you think? Has anyone been to a rush workshop? The Navy Introduces Gender Neutral Bathrooms on Ships Last week, the navy announced they will no longer have urinals on many of their aircraft carriers. The change is meant to foster gender equality through a gender-neutral environment. It has a lot of people talking, and what they&amp;amp;#8217;re saying isn&amp;amp;#8217;t entirely in favor of the new policy. One writer spoke of the need to get rid of the &amp;amp;#8220;nanny navy.&amp;amp;#8221; A navy vet argued that women can use urinals with a &amp;amp;#8220;bit of practice.&amp;amp;#8221; Other vets said they didn&amp;amp;#8217;t see what the big deal is, and that it would be good for sanitation, because sailors tend to throw away dip in the urinals, which leads to clogging. What do you think about gender-neutral bathrooms on navy aircraft carriers? Not entirely necessary or a positive step toward gender parity? Marissa Mayer Isn&amp;amp;#8217;t Yahoo&amp;amp;#8217;s Only High-Level Female Appointment This Week: Meet Hillary Frey, Yahoo! News New Editor-In-Chief Congratulations, Hillary! Frey was promoted to editor-in-chief in a move that seems like Yahoo&amp;amp;#8217;s means of strengthening its commitment to original journalism. Of her strategy, Frey says that she wants to concentrate on being smart and focused on what Yahoo! already has rather than rushing new products, as well as moving away from a blog strategy. &amp;amp;#8220;When I came here it sort of made me crazy that we had all these great reporters being referred to as bloggers,&amp;amp;#8221; she remarks. &amp;amp;#8220;We&amp;amp;#8217;re a newsroom, not a blog network.&amp;amp;#8221; Also see this adorable congrats tweet from Hillary&amp;amp;#8217;s husband Mark Lott: My super-talented, ultra-competent, just-had-a-friggin-baby wife, @hilella, is now the EDITOR IN CHIEF OF YAHOO! NEWS: capitalnewyork.com/article/media/&amp;amp;#133;&amp;amp;mdash; Mark Lotto (@marklotto) July 18, 2012 P.S. Check out these pioneering stories from the female trailblazers who came before Marissa Mayer! Women of the Internet on How It Has Changed Them And on that Note, read these accounts from the ladies of the web. How the Internet affects us is something I&amp;amp;#8217;ve been thinking about a lot lately. Now, when I have a clever thought or read a great article, one of my first impulses is to send it into the Twittersphere. I have mixed feelings about this, and reading about how some of the smartest women on the Internet think it has changed them in this Atlantic Wire compilation was super insightful. According to them, the Internet has made us tougher, a bit ADD, more careful, jaded, nostalgic, and confident. It&amp;amp;#8217;s done everything from bring out our inner eighth grade girl to turn fun into work. Intrigued? It&amp;amp;#8217;s a great read. Women Beating Men on IQ Tests for the First Time And, we finish on another smart note...this probably comes as a surprise to none of you, but here&amp;amp;#8217;s some great news to finish off your weekend right! New research found female IQ scores have risen above those of men. Historically, women have been as many as five points behind (that&amp;amp;#8217;s a little surprising!). Psychologists think the rise could be due to women&amp;amp;#8217;s more demanding lifestyles, as we multi-task between raising a family and working. Kudos, brainy ladies! Being a smartypants is always a major Glamour DO. Which of this week&amp;#x27;s stories resonated with you the most? "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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