SHREWSBURY SHINES A SPOTLIGHT ON EMPOWERMENT FOR WOMEN AND GIRLS

On International Women's Day, Shrewsbury is partnering with the United Nations Economic and Social Conference Asia Pacific (UNESCAP) to bring you a collection of opportunities to celebrate women and girls' achievements and rally for gender equality. 

Our students' response for ‘Shine a Spotlight’ has been fantastic, with several great initiatives aimed at highlighting women empowerment both on International Women's Day and more generally in both the Junior and Senior schools. 

Sixth-Form students Milan, Minmin, Anna and Anand, have named their initiative ProjectForHer. It focuses on three SDG goals - Gender Equality, Good Health & Wellbeing and Quality Education aiming to reduce gender inequality, remove gender barriers and stigma, promote girls' education, and raise awareness and support women's health and hygiene. ProjectForHer have submitted a video to the  ‘Ambassador for a Day’ programme at UNESCAP and await the results.

For our younger students in the Junior school, Shrewsbury will mark International Women’s Day by creatively shining a spotlight on activities encouraging and uplifting women to pursue their goals without bias or barriers. Greg Threlfall, Shrewsbury’s Head of Outreach, has challenged students to create a piece of artwork, drama, creative writing or essay that answers the question ‘What uplifts women to pursue their goals?

These initiatives will culminate on Women’s Day with a workshop attended by Ms Channe Lindstrøm Oğuzhan, Social Affairs Officer at UNESCAP attending via video uplink. Ms Lindstrøm Oğuzhan is going to assess each initiative and give feedback on what they can do to improve or enhance their actions. After the workshop is complete, teachers, parents, students and alumni from the Shrewsbury community will be invited to contribute their ideas to a Shrewsbury Outreach coffee table book also titled ‘Shine a Spotlight’. 

To come full circle, the book will be marketed and sold to our community and beyond in order to raise money for the school’s Outreach partners that put in particular efforts to empower and support women, including Sister Louise, The Hub and The Klong Toey Women’s Group and Credit Union.

Head of Outreach, Mr Greg Threlfall, says part of the role of Outreach is to create opportunities for students to learn about and take action related to the sustainable development goals, and goal number five (Gender Equality) is particularly pertinent to our school and society.

“We at Outreach have been delighted with the response from students in ‘Shining a Spotlight’ on initiatives related to Women’s Day. We are excited to have the opportunity to show the work we are doing at Shrewsbury to representatives at the UN and are hopeful that the resulting publication will be successful so we can continue to financially support our community engagement partners who are also working hard to advance the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal #5,” he insisted.