It's different at the top: leadership in the statehouse has seen plenty of changes in race, gender and religious background.

• Author: Boulard, Garry

Colorado Senate President Peter Groff and House Speaker Terrance Carroll, both African-Americans, and the women of the New Hampshire and Maine legislatures are a few examples of the growing diversity in legislative leadership.

These leaders, the result of an unprecedented and unplanned series of election victories, signal that leadership in state legislatures increasingly reflects the race, gender and ethnicity of the people they represent, according to Richard Bucher, author of Diversity Consciousness--Opening Our Minds to People, Cultures and Opportunities.

"This is a very good thing for all of us because it vividly illustrates that our state legislatures as political institutions are open to change," says Bucher.

Here is a look at some of the notable firsts who demonstrate the changing look of state legislative leadership.

Assemblywoman Karen Bass

State: California

Post: Assembly speaker

Age: 55

Background: Bass was elected to the Assembly in 2004. She became speaker in 2008, making her the first African-American woman leader in any state. Bass grew up in a middle-class section of west Los Angeles. After college she went to work as a licensed vocational nurse but was also a community organizer and political activist. She began her rise to prominence when, in her words, she became "obsessed" with the crack cocaine epidemic, which hit inner-city black communities especially hard. She formed the Community Coalition in the late 1980s and got early funding from the first Bush administration.

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Representative Barbara Buckley

State: Nevada

Post: House speaker

Age: 48

Background: Elected to the Nevada Assembly in 1994, Buckley is its first female speaker. She graduated with a B.A. from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas and received a J.D. from the University of Arizona. After serving as assistant majority floor leader from 1997 to 1999 and majority floor leader from 2001 to 2005, Buckley won election as speaker in 2007.

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"I have been approached by some senior citizens who have said to me, 'I am so proud. This would never have happened 50 years ago.' It touches me when I have a parent say, 'I want my girl to never know a glass ceiling. Thanks for breaking another one.'"

Nevada House Speaker Barbara Buckley on the political blog Dullard Mush

Representative Armond Budish

State: Ohio

Post: House speaker

Age: 55

Background: Budish was elected the first Jewish speaker of the House in Ohio history this...