"Development cannot be achieved if 50% of the population is excluded from the opportunities it brings"
- Helen Clark, UNDP Administrator.
Pakistan has been facing the issue of gender discrimination ever since its formation. Though the issue has diminished to significant degrees in the urban towns and cities, it still persists in the rural and the poverty-stricken areas. The major thing that gets affected due to this biasness is the education of women. People find it very easy to engage girls in the household chores and deprive them of education. Even if the girls are allowed basic education, then they are discouraged to chase their dreams of attaining higher education. This kind of social injustice brings forth uncountable problems which nullify the efforts taken for the progress and stability of our beloved homeland.
To raise voice against such a social evil, the Constructive Students Network (CSN) stepped forward on 23rd May 2011 to empower the women of Pakistan at SMB Fatima Jinnah School through various easy-to-impart notions and fun-to-learn activities. SMB Fatima Jinnah School is basically a government school for girls set up in Garden East of Karachi and several of the girls who don’t have access to the lavished lifestyle of the urban class are enrolled there. Team CSN held the workshop in the 8th class whose basic aim was to build up the confidence in the girls, make them realize their social responsibility and to prepare them for the better future ahead of their present. Sessions of Career Counseling and Social Responsibility were carried out for an hour each. Both were diffused with numerous interactive games and activities which could practically impose the importance of both subjects and instill some positive changes in the mindsets of the students.
The workshop started with the activity “Rain Effect” and its moral was to delineate the importance of teamwork and unity to the girls. It was followed by the “Direction Hands” Activity which put forward the notion that everyone has its own perception of the direction of North which helped us to tell the students that the interests of each and every one of them was different from each other and so should their profession be. Thus, they should follow what they, personally love to do rather than doing what their best friend does and what their parents impose on them. Next up was the lecture on the career counseling. The students were briefed that its their own will to choose their occupation for the future and they were also notified of the importance of higher education. When they were given the charts to write “How do they see themselves in future?” the answers received were very interesting. Apart from the repetitive comments of Doctor and Engineer, some girls commented “chef”, “News Anchor” and even “An atomic scientist”. This activity reflected that despite having low resources in their pockets, the individuals had great outlook of their future. All of the opinions were highly encouraged. “To be or not to be” was thoroughly discussed among them and then we told them that the world isn’t limited to “Doctors and Engineers” by giving them examples of female role models like Namira Saleem-Pakistan’s first woman in space, J.K Rowling-The author of Harry Potter series, Razia Bhatti-the symbol of courage in Pakistani Journalism, Oprah Winfrey-The famous TV host of “Oprah”. All of the role models had weak backgrounds but their passion lead them to become the distinguished of all. This activity provided the students with a noteworthy insight about some new fields and we received highly positive responses. Then, there was an open Question Answer session that we arranged with them in which we answered the questions they raised about different occupations and professions.
As the career counseling session ended, we held an interactive activity right before the start of the session of Social Responsibility. The activity was “First and Third word activity” which lead the students to think spontaneously and instantaneously. Its basic aim was to sharpen their minds. The Social Responsibility session started along with a brief discussion on “How should we fulfill our social responsibilities?” Charts were circulated among the pupils titled “Things around you that irritate you” and very obvious points were highlighted such as Load shedding, pollution, rough driving, garbage thrown on the road etc. Then, the pupils were asked individually that how would they solve these numerous problems and the answers were highly appreciated. The students were also delineated the one-liners such as “Education is the only way out”, “If trees fall, we all fall”, “Verbal abuse is still abuse”, “Save paper, save wildlife” through a Picture Depiction activity. This brought an end to the session of Social Responsibility as well.
At the last, we received some written feedbacks from the students and they bid farewell to us. Truly, this workshop made a positive impact on the young minds and CSN continues its constructive contribution to the Pakistani society.
- Taha Javaid
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