“If you educate a woman, you educate a nation”
As the world celebrates International Women’s day, findings from the UN Women 2016 show that a significant number of women are still facing barriers to education and they make up more than two thirds of the world’s 796 million illiterate people. As a result, women are still facing social, cultural and economic issues barriers to accessing education and employment opportunities.
Through its gender sensitive initiatives, Higherlife Foundation is committed to empowering women particularly the girl child by educating and creating opportunities for them to grow into bold, confident women who are drivers of change in their communities. In this light, Higherlife Foundation launched the “Walk With Me” mentorship initiative in 2016 that provides psychosocial support to girls coming from difficult backgrounds by pairing them up with young professional women in Zimbabwe. Through the initiative girls are educated and empowered to overcome the social, cultural and economic issues that hinder their all-round development and potential.
While progress has been made in urban primary school enrolment, data from 42 countries shows that rural girls are twice as likely as urban girls to be out of school. In an effort to lessen this gap, Higherlife Foundation in partnership with Econet Wireless also developed the Ruzivo online learning platform that removes the physical barriers to accessing education and gives disadvantaged girls access to high quality educational content and learning resources.
Higherlife Foundation celebrates the achievements of Women globally today and reiterates the need for women empowerment through education and in the words of Tsitsi Masiyiwa (Co–founder of Higherlife Foundation); “When we support the growth and development of women and girls, we rise the quality of life for everyone…”
Happy International Women’s Day!
