It is Show Time

Blogged by Brandon, Mackenzie, Ian and Matt

This week is the final week of our UN Global Goals project! Our group, No Poverty is currently working on an educational video to share on YouTube about poverty and about the David busby centre we visited back in November. This video we hope will promote change as well as educate anyone who is willing to watch it.  We are planning to release this video on YouTube when it is completed for Friday December 15th. The link will be provided within our next blog when the video is released, so stay tuned!

References (Image)

Youtube: Latest News, Youtube Videos & Photos. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/YouTube

The Rise Against Hunger

Nottawasaga Pines Edition

Molly, Mickayla, Dylan and Maddy

On October 23, 2017, a project was started. Students in the grade 12 World Issues class at Nottawasaga Pines Secondary School started their tasks to help end 9 of 17 pressing world issues that the UN launched awareness to, in September of 2015. Our group decided to tackle Zero Hunger, with hopes to help support hunger in our community. Which was exactly what we did.

To Begin, we started by planning out exactly what we wanted to do within our time span. Together, we decided that running a food drive from within our school would be very beneficial to our community, especially with the holidays nearing. We understood that it would be very hard to meet our goal without having a reward to those who participated. That’s why we had a competition on what class could bring in the most food items. After it was revealed the Civics and Careers class won, we announced that they would be receiving an in class pizza party, the following Friday, December 15. In order to pay for this pizza, our group ran a bake sale with baked goods we made ourselves, this provided us with enough money to purchase 3 extra large pizzas, cheesy bread and drinks.

We decided this wasn’t enough, we took our goal to the next level by volunteering at a global food bank in Uxbridge, Ontario, The Loaves and Fishes Food bank. When we arrived we were notified that there wasn’t much food donations that needed to be sorted, this is the reality of a food bank, communities are in dire need for food to support the local people. With the holidays coming, food is coming off the shelves twice as fast as usual. You are able to make a change by donating food you don’t need.

This issue is one that touches many people, that often gets ignored. People learn to hide hunger well, the statistics are rising for the amount of people who go to bed hungry every night. Although this project is ending as a part of the class, that does not mean the four of us are going to drop it. We’ve realized how pressing hunger is not only in the world, but in our communities. We have decided to continue volunteering at food banks, and will continue to spread the word to our peers on the importance.

Stealing a Girls Youth

Blogged by Rachel and Zaheela

One in four girls get married as a child. Imagine if that child was you. There are over 700 million women all over the world that have been married as a child. Child marriage is an arranged marriage where one or both people involved are under the age of 18. This marriage can either be a formal or informal joining. Every year about 15 million girls are married before the age 18. Could you imagine being stripped of your childhood and forced into a marriage with someone you may possible barely know? A child that is forced into a marriage is often much younger than their partner. Child marriage is often “fueled” by inequality, poverty, traditions, and insecurity. They could also result in issues in one's life, and other family conflict. These marriages are often abusive and very difficult and sometimes impossible to get out of. They cause a wide rage of conflicts and difficulties to the person and it leads to many disadvantages. Child marriage happens all over the world and affects a wide range of countries, cultures, religions and ethnicities. It has been estimated that by 2050 over 1.2 billion women will be married as children. Child marriage usually results in child brides becoming young mothers. They also usually don't have the chance of being educated which stops them from reaching their full potential. Also this does not give them the chance to be independent and they live their lives feeling like they are being controlled because they are so dependent of their husband. In canada the legal age in to get married is 16 with the consent of parents until they turn 18. A child deserves to enjoy their childhood. It's scary to think that such young kids are parents. Kids can barely take care of himself and they have to raise their own children. It is unreasonable that through such a precious moment of life, a child is forced into so many decisions and responsibilities that they are expected to live up to. Child marriage is intolerable and the world needs to know that if not stopped know, it is only going to get worse.

The top 5 countries with the highest rates of child marriage

Country	Percentage of child marriage in country
Niger	76%
Central African Republic	68%
Chad	68%
Mali	55%
Bangladesh	52%

References

Image 1:

Rajagopal, K. (2017, October 11). SC verdict will have immediate effect on those in child marriage: Legal experts. Retrieved from http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/sc-verdict-will-force-people-in-existing-child-marriages-to-live-separately-experts/article19840796.ece

Image 2:

Ending Child Marriage in Africa. (2017, February 22). Retrieved from https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/12/09/ending-child-marriage-africa

Image 3:

Child Brides Are a HUGE Issue Across the U.S. (2017, March 25). Retrieved from http://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2017/march/child-brides-are-a-huge-issue-across-the-u-s

Information:

Brides, G. N. (n.d.). Child marriage around the world. Retrieved from https://www.girlsnotbrides.org/where-does-it-happen/  

Inequality in Education

~ Blogged by: Rachel and Zaheela ~

Education gives one the knowledge of the world around us and it alters our views on life in a positive way. It creates an outlook of preserving life as it results in one creating opinions and decisions that help one excel. Without education life skills do not get acquired and the chance for achievement become harder as education results in independence. Many factors make up for inequality in the education system. Inequality in education affects millions of people all over the world. Factors of educational inequalities include, economic standings, gender, race, and disabilities. Educational inequality can appear in many forms and can be described as a lack of availability or use of academic resources.  

Relating this topic directly to our global goals project, gender inequality plays a large role in educational inequalities. Approximately 130 million girls are without education worldwide.  This statistic is shocking and very unfortunate.  According to plancanada.ca (Because I am a Girl webpage), some factors that keep girls out of school include: poverty, child marriage, poor health and nutrition, family care and domestic housework, early pregnancy, violence in schools, long distance to schools, and  a lack of girls washrooms.  In many countries women are still seen as the main caretaker of the family and lose their chance to become educated. Thousands of women stay home every day to complete daily household chores and care for children. They are also expected to cook for the family and education is not perceived as an important factor in their lives. Early marriage plays a large role in education inequality as the outcomes is her youth essentially being stolen from her.  It can also be predicted that girls forced into child marriage are more likely to have a children at a young age. Thus, being married at a young age makes it difficult or impossible to go to school, it is even less likely for a girl to get education after conceiving and having children. This all relates back to the fact that women are still seen as caretakers. What might happen if the roles were reversed? Why do such beliefs still remain so popular around the world?  Girls deserve equal rights to education and should not be thought of as nothing more than caretakers.  

Another major factor to educational inequality is race and economic standings. An example can be seen in indigenous communities. Indigenous post-secondary graduation rates are as low as 35.3% in Canada. This compared to the 78% of non-indigenous post-secondary graduates is very disheartening.  Studies completed over recent years have shown that, students living in a family with higher incomes have a better chance of getting a good education and tend to do better in school than, students in low income families. According to information on opencanada.org people of indigenous descent can make nearly 11,000 dollars less than the average Canadian. This is shocking as the indigenous population makes up approximately 5% of Canada's population. This may play a large role in the statistics shown in indigenous education levels. We personally believe that many people fall behind and miss educational opportunities due to economic reasons.  A lot of students (especially in low income families) work to support themselves and their families, often making education less of a priority.

Females in different parts of the world often are left out of education because, they are perceived as caretakers while males are expected to work to support their family.  Males often get to complete their education and gain more opportunities for better work, while women stay home to care for children and complete daily household chores. This likely plays a huge role in poverty as well. If women could have equal use of educational resources families, a family  would shave  a better chance at higher incomes to better support themselves and their loved ones.

Everyone deserves an equal right to education. Educational inequality needs to be resolved. The question is, how is society going to fix this everlasting issue? Race, gender, and economic standing should never affect how people are educated and should not define whether or not someone can be educated. Education is very important in the progression of one's life and we as a society need to learn to treat all equality and put an end to gender inequality.    

           

References

Educational inequality. (2017, December 08). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_inequality

Girls'Education. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://plancanada.ca/girls-education

Google Slides - create and edit presentations online, for free. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1gkSnrvsoF75IV6t08fbQZ7uf88E_ovH2kpstLFzw5zM/edit#slide=id.g2af55feba8_0_5

Inequality Explained: The hidden gaps in Canada's education system. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.opencanada.org/features/inequality-explained-hidden-gaps-canadas-education-system/

Image from:

http://sisson67.umwblogs.org/2011/11/07/equality-in-education-starts-in-the-classroom/

          Why are People Defending Melanie Martinez?

Blogged by Ayden and Zaheela

Recently in the news,  rape allegations have been coming out practically everyday. The latest one was about singer named Melanie Martinez her female best friend Timothy Heller. Her best friend spoke out about how Meleine raped her at a sleepover.  Heller stated in a tweet:

“ Melanie would repeatedly coax me into having sex during a sleepover. She said that Melanie didn’t stop asking even when Timothy told her “no” and that she had a boyfriend. “Regardless of my response the first night, she was not giving up. If she had gotten the hint, she didn’t care.”

That is not the full quote, but we found her account far too graphic to repeat. If you want to read more details regarding the issue refer to the link listed at the end of the article.

Melanie fired back at Timothy saying that “we both consented and, Timothy never said no to me”.

After this came out many of her fans took to social media to shame her for her actions. They also refused to  support her any longer. Unfortunately some of Melenies fans are skeptical that Timothy is telling the truth and the brilliant reasoning they had for this is that “Melanie is a woman and women can't rape” This is a ridiculous thought of course as rapists does not associate to a specific gender. Unfortunately anyone can commit this unlawful act regardless of gender. Society has bias over gender and it tends to have a more negative viewpoint for male rapists only, never women. This is unacceptable and society needs to accepts the idea the anyone can commit an offence and they should be held accountable for it.

Women on women rape in never talked about and is sometimes dismissed as “lesbian experimentation gone wrong” ,but that's not the case lesbian relationships can be abusive.

If you think people like Harvey Winsten make unethical decisions then Melanie Martinez should fall under the same category in your mind. People need to put aside there love for Melanie and  stop the victim shaming and see that rape is rape, and it should  never go unpunished as it has been present for many years in our society.

References

Arias, J. (2017, December 05). The Accusation Against Singer Melanie Martinez Is a Wake-Up Call to Woman-to-Woman Rape. Retrieved from https://preen.inquirer.net/64127/the-accusation-against-singer-melanie-martinez-is-a-wake-up-call-to-woman-to-woman-rape

Melanie Martinez Photos (87 of 442). (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.last.fm/music/Melanie Martinez/ images/c970110dd2e93c03c2f1b7f91dbdfbde

Why are we Still Taking Violent Measures

Blogged by Zaheela and Rachel

Every five minutes a girl dies as a result of violence. Women all over the word struggle to stand up against the abuse that they face throughout the course of their life. Many women worldwide take a passive approach towards violence and choose to stay quiet. Violence and abuse is a violation of human rights that every human being is entitled to. In today's society men tend to have more social power against women. Things need to be changed and society needs to learn to treat women equally.

Women are more likely to be a victim of violence by their intimate partner. About 30% of women who have been in a relationship report that they have experienced some form of physical and/or sexual violence by their intimate partner in their lifetime. This is almost ⅓ women who are affected by violence worldwide. Indigenous women are six times more likely to suffer from abuse and violence than, non-indigenous women. Violence and abuse has proven to have many unfortunate lasting effects. The effects of violence and abuse can include: lower education levels, children being exposed to maltreatment (which could lead to continuing the abuse throughout generation), witnessing family violence, antisocial personality disorders, alcohol abuse, more people developing an acceptance towards violence, and gender inequality. Violence is unacceptable and unnecessary it can have lasting effects for everyone involved. We as a society should do what we can to end violence.

Works Cited

Image

http://9jalegal.com.ng/featured/experts-canvas-stiffer-penalties-violence-women/.

“The Facts About Violence Against Women.” The Facts About Violence Against Women | Canadianwomen.org, www.canadianwomen.org/facts-about-violence.

“Violence against Women.” World Health Organization, World Health Organization, www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs239/en/.

It Was A Success!

Blogged by Kyla, Mady, Sarah, Ethan and Hunter

On Friday December 1st we had our Global Goals Fair! We prepared for weeks for this event, and it felt like a success! Our goal was to educate and take action towards Global Goal #3; we feel like we left our school community educated and excited to life happier and healthier lives.

During the fair our group chose to educate people and encourage them to ask questions with a throwing game which consisted of a large mouth with holes to throw socks through. In order to encourage our goal ‘Good Health and Well Being’ our prizes for the game where sunflower seeds, various fruits such as oranges, bananas and apples and our mental health bags.

We heard that people within our school really enjoyed our booth at the fair and we would like to thank them all for coming to the fair and participating in our game. Hopefully, we educated some people on the need to be healthy and how it helps your physically and mentally.