Dollars for Darfur and International Women’s Day

Kudos to Teen Voices’ Activist of the Month, Ana Slavin, a 16-year-old high school student from Northfield, Massachusetts. Ana and her friend Nick Anderson have created created the program Dollars for Darfur to raise awareness about the crisis there and get teens involved in raising relief funds. From their website:

We hope to raise $200,000 to help the people of Darfur. It won’t be easy, but we know that high school students are up to the task. There are over 27,000 high schools in the United States. If each school raised just $50, we could raise over one million dollars!

You’ll find everything you need to start a fundraising effort at your own school here. And don’t forget to check out their .

On a personal note…rock on, Ana and Nick! How awesome that you’re creating such incredible momentum and proving the point that we can all make a difference. You are an inspiration to us all!

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International Women’s Day: Countries all over the world are celebrating International Women’s Day today, March 8. The annual event was started nearly 100 years ago to draw attention to the inequalities faced by women throughout the world, and has evolved today to focus primarily on celebrating their achievements and inspiring women everywhere.

From the official website:
The new millennium has witnessed a significant change and attitudinal shift in both women’s and society’s thoughts about women’s equality and emancipation. Many from a younger generation feel that all the battles have been won for women while many feminists from the 1970’s know only too well the longevity and ingrained complexity of patriarchy.

The unfortunate fact is that women are still not paid equally to that of their male counterparts, women are still not present in equal numbers in business or politics, and globally women’s education, health and the violence against them is worse than that of men.

However, great improvements have been made. We do have female astronauts and prime ministers, school girls are welcomed into university, women can work and have a family, women have real choices.

To find out more about events happening through the U.S., visit IWD’s events page.