Empower your students this International Women's Day

Every year, International Women’s Day is celebrated across the globe on 8 March. The day is an opportunity for everyone to celebrate women’s achievements throughout history, while learning about the issues that women across the world continue to face today.

At Yes Futures, we believe that all young people should be empowered to believe in themselves and discover their personal potential. But it’s clear that young women continue to face barriers throughout society:

• More than 1 in 3 girls and women don’t think women are treated equally in the workplace, compared to 1 in 5 boys and men (Literacy Trust, 2020).

• It takes young women 7.8 months to attain their first job after completing education, compared to 6.9 months for men (ILO, 2016).

• Today, women are three times more likely than men to experience common mental health problems. (Mental Health Foundation, 2021).

This International Women’s Day, we wanted to empower the brilliant young women on our programmes by putting together a short video of motivational messages from female members across the Yes Futures team.

You can watch it below. We hope you are inspired...

Looking for other resources to celebrate International Women’s Day with your students? We’ve selected five of our favourite resources below!

• See the International Women’s Day website for a range of classroom activities designed to build self-confidence, challenge stereotypes and bias, and inspire an inclusive mindset.

• The BBC have produced a series of videos telling the stories of inspirational women, which have been tailored for primary and secondary classrooms.

• Oxfam have produced a series of classroom activities for students aged 9-14, to help them to learn about gender equality and inspire them to take action for a fairer world.

• Tes have selected their favourite classroom resources for International Women’s Day, tailored for primary and secondary classrooms.

• Watch British Council’s webinar to learn what we can do as educators to call out gender bias, discrimination and stereotyping and to help forge an inclusive world.

Want to discover more ways to empower your students? Check out our blog on how to support your students’ personal growth.