Summer Term News from St Mary's

Charity Week: Plan UK

This week, we had a visit from Mrs Naomi Williams, the National Campaign Manager for Plan UK, who talked to the girls here at St Mary’s about their ‘Because I am a girl’ campaign. Plan UK is one of our school charities and the girls are busy organising events this week to support this cause as it is Charity Week.

Plan UK is celebrating 75 years in operation and have been working in 25 of the poorest countries across the world. Plan UK’s ‘Because I am a Girl’ campaign aims to ensure girls in the world’s poorest countries can access a quality education. This will in turn move people from a life of poverty to a future with opportunity.

Investing in a girl’s education is vital – it helps her to know she has rights, exercise them when she needs to and achieve her potential. It is also central to unlocking the cycle of poverty.

• An educated girl is less likely to marry and to have children whilst she is still a child.
• An educated girl is more likely to be literate, healthy and survive into adulthood, as are her children.
• An educated girl is more likely to reinvest her income back into her family, community and country.

Naomi told us about a girl called Noha who is 14. She’s about to marry a man twice her age. She’s just one of 10 million girls who will be married either too young, or against their will this year – some girls are as young as twelve years old. This can end their chance of going to school and shorten their lives by leaving them more vulnerable to violence, HIV and death in childbirth. Many girls who reach the age of 17 will already have two children.

She also told us about Patwa – one of Plan UK’s success stories, she married young herself and wanted to campaign to stop early marriage in her village. With their help, she engaged the support of local politicians and celebrities, and the village, along with four others nearby, are now enforced marriage free.

Plan UK help build skills for life, those both academic and practical, they work in partnership with women themselves listening to what is needed and providing support and materials, along with campaigning globally to provide opportunities for children to move out of poverty.

For more details about all they do and what you can do to help, please go to: http://www.plan-uk.org/