International Women’s Day 2023 Event Recap
International Women’s Day is one of the most important days on the calendar when it comes to celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity.
This year WiAD put together a series of events focused on the theme: Cracking the Code for a Gender Neutral Future. The theme highlights the role that innovative, transformative ideas, inclusive technologies and accessible education in the digital age can play in combatting discrimination and marginalisation and empowering all women and girls, globally.
Events were held in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane with incredible speakers in each city sharing their thoughts and experiences with attendees. Here is a recap from each city!
Melbourne
The first Women in Aid and Development event of the year was held in Melbourne, in the wonderful open lounge space at the OXFAM offices in West Melbourne. Fittingly, our guest speaker was the CEO of OXFAM, Lyn Morgain, who welcomed our WiAD group warmly, reflecting her pride in the workspace, which she and her staff have created over the past few years.
With a glass of wine in hand and tempting morsels plated, our intimate group sat and listened to a conversation with Lyn that covered her 30-year career in the upper ranks of executive management through to her passion for advocacy, gender equality and representation. Lyn also touched on First Nation’s right to a voice in parliament.
She particularly highlighted, given our topic, the focus of OXFAM on the protection of activists and civil society organisations who are using digital tools. Her insight and passion for this were evident.
It was again, as with most of our events, an enlightening, enjoyable evening of conversations around relatable experiences and ideas in the development sector and was well supported by our WiAD volunteers and friends.
Jill Scanlon - WiAD Board Director
Sydney
Our Sydney event was again held at the Canva Café in Surry Hills. We were so grateful to have access to this lovely space for the second time!
About 25 people turned out to hear from our speaker, Caritas CEO - Kirsty Robertson, who shared her own career journey and spoke about this year’s IWD theme, ‘Cracking the Code: Innovation for a Gender-Equal Future’. Kirsty addressed the theme broadly, talking about the kinds of innovations that are needed in the sector to break the age-old project cycle and ways of thinking she asked: “ Do we still want to be here in 20 years doing projects the same way?’’ and stressed the need for NGOs and Boards to take risks and embrace change, and build strong relationships with country partners to ask how to add value and listen to what will best accelerate impact. There was a range of excellent questions from the floor, which generated lively discussion both during the session and among the group afterwards. When we left the venue, some people even moved on to dinner together nearby – usually a good sign of a successful evening!
Thanks to Journey Boydon (WiAD volunteer), Mary-Anne Lang (WiAD EA) and Michelle Jouve (WiAD Board member), Chris Franks (WiAD Chair) for their efforts in ensuring that WiAD's year has started on a high note!
Michelle Imison - Sydney City Leader
Brisbane
We were delighted to have the guest speaker Rebecca McDonald, Founder and CEO of Library for All, with WiAD and QIDN members in Brisbane at the IWD event. It was so inspiring to hear Rebecca’s passion and professionalism in advocating for quality education for all children. Volunteering in Haiti, Rebecca saw classroom after classroom full of students eager to learn but with no books. She was struck by this injustice and dedicated herself to realise her dream to let the world learn. She is now an award-winning global authority on the connection between technology and education for low-connectivity environments worldwide.
At ‘Library for All’ the dynamic, diverse, and committed team is focused on supplying digital books and educational products for millions of children who would otherwise miss out on quality education. They are provided with books in their own languages, written by local authors, with pictures of kids like them, delivered via the Elevate App and by Spark – an offline, off-grid, portable digital learning environment in a box. Spark brings tablets loaded with books and learning resources to communities anywhere in the world and delivered sometimes by camel!
Covid was a catalyst for expanding their work into many new communities, including Indigenous communities in Australia and multiple NGOs use the materials to deliver literacy programs.
Thank you to our partner organisation, Queensland International Development Network for supporting the Brisbane event. Shoutout to the Brisbane volunteers Yunrui Deng and Ruhiayh Ali, and WiAD members for coming along!
Yunrui Deng - Communications Intern
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A massive thank you to our speakers - Lyn Morgain, Kirsty Robertson, Rebecca McDonald - all those who attended and of course, our city leaders, who so generously shared their time to ensure that all events were a success.
We hope to see you all again at our next series of events in May!