EQUALITY SCOUTS

Written by Equality Scouts Members (students): Eren Ateşçi, Salih Osman Özçayan, Elif Neva Kantarcı, Gürhan Cem Işık, Eslem Azize Duman, & Ada Uçar.

Mentor: Esra Karahan, Global Schools Advocate.

Who Are We And Why Are We Making This Article

We are Equality Scouts and we are writing this article because we want to raise people's awareness about inequalities that people are faced with. We have begun with small research by conducting a survey that we have filled out with our school community. But now, our aim is to share this blog post with you.

Our Topic

Our topic is gender equality, which is the 5th global goal.

When we discussed about the global goals within the framework of our exhibition processes, we knew that gender inequality was a crucial problem all around the world. Therefore, we all came up with a plan to take action to find a solution for [SDG 5]. To carry out this plan, we first conducted a survey and observed people's readiness about gender inequality in the community and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Now, we are writing an article based on these results which constitutes the last step of our exhibition project.

Sustainable Development Goals

Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), otherwise known

as the Global Goals, are a universal call to action to dissolve poverty, protect our planet, and ensure that all people live in peace and prosperity. Gender Equality is a goal which determines how we deal with the inequality problem in our society. During our project, we have focused on this goal specifically.

Gender Equality

SDG 5 consists of five targts. The most important of these goals is "the elimination of discrimination against women and girls (5.1), the end of forced marriage and female genital mutilation (5.3), the empowerment of women and their support through technology (5.B)". Most of the research we conducted illustrates that inequalities against women can affect motivation and productivity. Inequalities in the workplace are not the only way that women are faced with inequality. In societies, women can have more responsibilities taking care of children and completing chores in their daily routines. Nowadays, women have an important role in working life, so the roles of genders will be changing day by day.

Our Logo And Why Do We Made Our Logo Like This?

We have designed our logo by demonstrating half-pictures of a man and a woman. We thought that purple should be the background color because it represents the mixture of blue and pink. This is why we decided to make the background of our logo purple, and the male and female in the middle is a logo that indicates equality.

Gender Gap Index and Turkey

Gender equality is based on diversity in countries' culture, traditions and beliefs. These differences create social problems between men and women over time and bring about inequalities. For gender inequality, [women's] participation in educational attainment, education, labour force and political empowerment remains at lower levels. The global gender gap index functions as a compass in monitoring the differences between women and men in health, survival, economy, and politics. The global gender gap index is an indicator that helps better understand what the gender gap is and how it changes across the years, disaggregated by health, economic empowerment and labor market indicators. The aim of the study is to evaluate Turkey and other developed and emerging countries within the framework of the countries considered in the global gender gap index. According to the index results obtained [in our research], it is seen that Turkey is amongst the countries with the lowest equality between genders.

Discussion about the results of our survey

We carried out a survey with students between the ages of 8 and 15 in our school by asking questions about the SDGs and gender inequality. Most of the students had heard about the SDGs at least once before. However, they did not have different ideas about finding solutions for gender inequality. They exemplified the problem of gender inequality through colors and specific occupational groups.

Our Solutions And Work

First, let's talk about our recommendations.

1. Men and women are already equal in law in most countries. But how well are these laws enforced? Men and women are required by law to receive equal pay from the same position in the same job, but most employers do not apply this to their workers.

For example, a female surgeon receives a salary of 20-50k averagely, while a male surgeon receives a salary of 20-80k. We are aware that this is not the right behavior and we should warn employers near us about it.

2. In most political parties, women do not have a very important position, so if we share this article to take into action to find solutions for this problem on an international website, we will grab people's attention related to this global problem.

3. We had meetings with the Purple Certificate Program which is a non-governmental organization in our country. Purple Certificate Program provide lesson materials to stop gender inequalities in education. They give opportunities to teachers to extend their perspectives on inequality problems. They have contributed to our process a lot because we have learned a lot of information about what is gender equality and how we can deal with it from Ms. Nazlı and Ms. Berfin who manage the program within the scope of Sabancı University in İstanbul. We can work with non governmental organizations collaboratively. If we reach even one person, we can change a life.

Scan the QR code to see what we have done during our exhibition process!

Resources:

https://www.unicef.org/gender-equality

https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/gender-equality/

Download this article in PDF version down below:

Equality Scouts - Exhibition Article 2023.pdf

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