I am a proud Rotarian, but that is no big deal, you see there are girls around the world who are missing out on a proper education due to menstrual period issues.
At the Rotary World Convention in Sydney I was alerted to an awesome project relating to girls and education. Education is, of course, one of the critical keys to breaking the circle of poverty. The staggering thing is this project is so simple.
You see there are girls in the poorer regions on earth who are missing out on 5-7 days of school each and every month. It is not that they do not want to go; there are no family issues preventing them from going and there are certainly no gender barriers, so why don’t they go to school?
They cannot attend school because they are having their menstrual period and they have NOaccess to any sanitary supplies.
This means DAYS without school, DAYS without income, DAYS without leaving the house? These poor girls use leaves, mattress stuffing, newspaper, corn husks, anything they can find…but the fact is that they miss up to 2 months of school every year.
Days for Girls was founded in 2008, when Executive Director Celeste Mergens asked at an orphanage in Kenya what girls did when their menstrual period hit. The answer was “Nothing, they wait in their rooms”. And so began Celeste’s mission.
At the Rotary World Convention I learned that dignity has a price. The price of dignity, I learned, is $16.00.
$16.00 buys a Days for Girls kit which has product that will last 3 years, thereby providing a full 3 years of education. The kits are sewn by volunteers and distributed at little or no cost by wonderful volunteers.
Check out what is in a kit. http://www.daysforgirls.org/#!whats-in-a-kit/c623
This is so simple, and epitomises the absolute ‘no brainer’. In order for girls to have an education they have to attend school each and every day and this is the way to make that a reality.
A recent article in Australia outlined that a single day of absence from school can impact a child’s NAPLAN score. If one day makes a difference in Australia, what would the impact be of missing 60 days in a poor African region due to a lack of feminine hygiene supplies?
For this reason my club, the Rotary Club of Crows Nest, has jumped aboard and will sponsor 333 kits which will allow a full 3 years for 333 girls, this represents 1000 years of full education for girls.
To jump on board a serious no brainer which makes such a tremendous difference let me know….I can put you directly in touch with my mate Walter Bock who is the Australian National Co-ordinator for Days for Girls. Check out http://www.daysforgirls.org
Peace.
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