Great Scot April 2019 Great Scot_156_April_2019_Online | Page 39

RAISING AWARENESS
OF INEQUALITY
Continuing its engagement with the event over the last few years, on 15
March Scotch participated in the United Nations Walk for Women, for which
students initially congregated on the Melbourne Grammar School city
campus before heading down to the Royal Botanic Gardens for the walk.
Each year the walk has two main goals. The first is to raise awareness
of the inequalities facing women around the globe. In Third World and
developing nations, systems of authority and orthodoxy not only continue
to disenfranchise females, but reinforce and perpetuate their abuse. Of
course, such injustices rear their ugly heads on a much closer level, with
domestic violence continuing to destroy the lives of too many people,
particularly women, here in Australia.
With such disconcerting thoughts in mind, organisations such as the UN
have risen to the foreground in the campaign for justice and women’s rights,
and things have steadily improved as these issues have increasingly come
to light. This brings us to the second purpose of the walk – to raise money
to support the UN Women’s Fund, which strives to improve worldwide
gender equality, especially in developing countries.
So it was that a group of about 30 Scotch boys spent their afternoon
in the city, walking around the Tan and in the process rasing funds for
the cause. Such a strong contingent of Scotch boys made a very marked
impression about our willingness to do our bit in striving towards a better
future for women. The event had been scheduled two weeks earlier, but
was postponed until 15 March because of extreme heat.
Though set against the backdrop of some rather confronting themes,
the live entertainment and food stalls provided for a very engaged
participant group, and an insightful and formative afternoon.
Thanks go to Miss Jackie Cowcher and Mr Tim Rayner for their efforts
in coordinating and supervising the boys.
NICK MARKS – CAPTAIN OF THE SCHOOL
www.scotch.vic.edu.au Great Scot
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