On Thursday, March 8, Facebook users around the world will be celebrating International Women's Day and its 2012 theme, "Connecting Girls, Inspiring Futures."
It's a fitting outlet in which to celebrate, because the story of Facebook exemplifies precisely why the global community needs to invest in young minds and young leaders -- especially girls.
Imagine if Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, had been born one of the 600 million girls who live in the developing world. Imagine if his inventive mind -- rather than being given the opportunity to create, flourish, and ultimately change the world -- had been squandered by poor health and inadequate education.
It's not a far-fetched scenario.
If Mark had been born a girl in rural Rwanda, for example, rather than a boy in White Plains, New York, he could have been among the millions of young girls (and boys) who die each year before their 5th birthday from a preventable illness such as malaria, diarrhea, or pneumonia.
At the young age of 15, rather than studying computer programming in school, he would likely have been at home helping his family to fetch firewood, retrieve water from unsafe sources, and raise his siblings. By 19, he could have had a child of his own, joining the 14 million adolescent girls in the developing world who give birth in a given year (and often die while doing so).
Before the age of 20 -- the age at which Zuckerberg launched Facebook -- he could already have contracted HIV. More than 75 percent of 15 to 24-year-olds living with HIV in Africa today are girls.
At the age of 29, rather than making global headlines by launching a multibillion dollar IPO for Facebook, chances are he would have become another statistic -- another life, another mind that had never been given a chance to achieve its full potential and impact the world.
It's time to break the status quo.
On International Women's Day, and every day after, the global community needs to make the lives and futures of young girls a priority. We can and must work together to invest in programs and resources that give all young minds, regardless of gender or geography, the opportunity to build their lives on their own terms -- to protect their health, to stay in school, to channel their creativity, and to pursue their dreams. Our global economy -- and our global future -- depends on it.
The 12+ Program in Rwanda, supported by PSI, the Nike Foundation, the Rwandan Ministry of Health, and other partners, is a model for success. Every week, 10 to 12-year-old girls across Rwanda meet in youth centers and schools to discuss and learn about topics that are vital to their health and future, including HIV, delaying sexual debut, and financial literacy.
It's time to take the message and impact of programs like 12+ global. It's time to give every future Mark Zuckerberg, or Wangari Maathai, or Ellen Johnson Sirleaf the chance to become the leader the world desperately needs them to become.
This is why I am proud to support International Women's Day. It's why I support and praise the girl-affirming work of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, DFID, the UN Foundation's Girl Up Campaign, the Girl Effect, and countless other health and education programs designed to empower young girls, like my new baby daughter Lilly, to live healthy, safe, productive, and optimistic lives.
What you are doing to support girls? "The clock is ticking."
Follow Kate Roberts on Twitter: www.twitter.com/KateRobertsPSI
The article will discuss the great strides the Rwandan government is taking to transform our country into a regional ICT hub! Of course, the writer will mention how Rwanda was the first country where women outnumbered men in parliament. Perhaps there'll even be a note on how Carnegie Mellon, one of the top universities in Engineering & Technology, recently choose to setup its first African campus, right here in Rwanda.
I was so excited to read it! Click click click!
... and then, I read it and I was like...
Oh. Yay.
It's one of those of articles.
I don't want to downplay the work of the organisations you mentioned; I was just really hoping for a different kind of message about what it means to be 'a girl born in Rwanda'.
It is tempting to ponder how a person could have achieved greatness had he or she had the resources. And I am guilty of this occasional temptation too. But what's realistic is an entirely different story. Even the US can't provide all of its citizens with a spot at the Ivy League; what makes Rwanda can?
the weight is heavy on her tiny shoulders, but she does what she must,
she's a beautiful girl, in a beautiful nation , in an ignorant world!
Women take less risk, therefore, don't suffer the consequences of failure, nor the rewards of success.
So, basically, the entire premise of this article is moot.
I'm not saying that women aren't inventors. They are, and in increasing numbers. However, the best inventors will always be men. The best composers, the best intellects, the most successful bankers, the most successful politicians, the best chefs, etc.
With that comes the least talented in the arts, the most mentally challenged, the worst, the most failed gamblers, the most scandalous politicians, the worst cooks, etc.
Men are extremists because men have to take risks to be successful at their primal duty of spreading their seed. If you don't take the risk of asking the girl out, you will never have a chance at copulating with her... And with that asking the girl out come both success and failure.
"Most men are looking for in a woman..." is absolutely correct, because of men's and women's innate roles.
In the same vane, men are more likely to take risks in life than women. That is why men's car insurance is more expensive than women's, more men in dangerous jobs than women, etc.
The simple point is that women and men are different. They generally think differently, act differently confronted with the same challenge, have different sex organs, different hormones. You simply can't make a woman a man, or the reverse.
Women have outpaced men in college for 3 decades or so, yet it's men who have built the internet.. Please name a prominent a publicly traded internet company started by a woman. Afterwards, I will name dozens more started by men. You can't tell me that women are simply working at home being providers with all of those college degrees under their belt, can you?
Larry Summers was right in general, he got fired, and got a better job.
How dare you? Your article is an insult to the dignity and intelligence of people who you are supposedley advocating for. Painful illustration of the *holy humanitarian saving poor, hopeless Africans". Only the hungry child poster misses. Too bad! You have so badly missed the point.
Jeanine Munyeshuli Barbé.
PS: By the way, how many Mark Zuckerberg have you ever met in your life? I know amazing HIV positive women in Rwanda and other very smart women...unsung heroines that your paper reduces to "poor little things" or "statistics". Stupid idea of yours! Stupid analogies!
You can play the what if game with anybody and anything all day, but it will not help whatever cause you are trying to stand for.
-Lauren Schmidt
Many people who are better off care less and focus more on the least important details while failing to see the whole purpose of a humanitarian cause.