Big Impact on the Big Screen
Author(s)
Lorne Fultonberg
Writer
Womenâs College alumna Betty Heid is winning awards for putting Colorado women in the spotlight
The documentaries Betty Heid produces always have a turning point. Thereâs a moment when the soon-to-be-successful Colorado women she features get the opportunity to reach their full potential.
In Heidâs own story,Ěýthe plot twisted at the unlikeliest of times: as a newly divorced mother, unsure of what lay ahead.
âI knew I was going to be successful,â says Heid (BBA â84, MSS â93), a trustee at the âI didnât know how. I didnât know what I was going to do, but I knew I was going to do it. I knew that I was going to make a life for myself and my son that was good. And had I not gotten divorced, Iâm not sure Iâd have ever thought that way.â
A passion for documentary filmmaking certainly wasnât on her mind. Nor were her dreams registering the awards the Heartland Emmy chapter and the Los Angeles Film Festival would bestow upon episodes of her series, airing Thursday nights on Rocky Mountain PBS.
At the time, the path to success was only marked by an article in The Denver Post, promoting an opportunity to finish the college degree she had sacrificed for marriage and a husbandâs career. As it happened, the CWC was offering a weekend program on what was then its Park Hill campus, specifically for women like Heid working demanding jobs.
It was the opening Heid had been looking for.
âI like learning,â says Heid, who had been a manager in the telecommunications industry, âbut I also felt for my career it would be important for me to get a degree.â
The skills she learned at the CWC â which became part of the 91´ŤĂ˝ midway through her education â translated naturally to a pair of consulting businesses she created later. But when the economy took a downturn, she began to recognize the worth of the diplomas she had earned.
She got involved with the rising to the role of chair and learning still more about the women who have shaped the Centennial State.
â[I realized,] the world doesnât know the stories of these women,â Heid says. âAnd I thought, âthereâs got to be a way to tell their stories.ââ Recognizing the power and reach of film, she started the Film Library Project to memorialize as many of the hall of fame inductees as possible. Each production was produced with schools, colleges, libraries and other organizations in mind.
For Heid, it was just like starting a business. She identified a need, hired the most qualified filmmakers to help and began honing her new craft.
In the years since, âGreat Colorado Womenâ has ballooned to 10 half-hour installments. They include the stories of Marion Downs, a pioneer in newborn hearing screenings; Dana Crawford, the visionary responsible for preserving Larimer Square; and Marilyn Van Derbur Atler, a Miss America winner and an advocate for incest survivors.
The impact, Heid says, has been tremendous. The films have been a vehicle for starting conversations, inspiring confidence in young girls and teaching young boys. Sheâs already at work on season three of âGreat Colorado Womenâ and hopes to revise her documentary on Van Derbur Atler for consideration at the Academy Awards.
âThese films are critical for history,â she says, âPeople need to know that women are smart, they can achieve. Sometimes they need the chance to do it.â
So much of Heidâs chance can be traced to the CWC, where a brick engraved with her name is part of a third-floor wall. She doesnât often climb the stairs to look at it, but she doesnât need to to feel the connection to the institution and its supportive, knowledgeable faculty and alumnae. The CWC community, she says, offered a sense of family and an environment where womenâs voices were powerful. The education she received, she adds, set her up with the people skills, confidence and mindset to pursue her passions.
âIâll never forget that experience I had at Colorado Womenâs College,â she says. âIâm pleased to be a part of something thatâs growing and moving in a good direction.â