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Gala Beneficiary seeks to build school, empower young girls

by Jessica Neville

Every year the Caldwell Fellows Gala brings students, alumni, family and friends together to celebrate our community and how it inspires each of us to practice servant leadership in our daily lives. It is fitting, therefore, that the Gala serves as an opportunity itself to practice what we preach, by making the Gala a benefit for a selected charity. This year, Bricks Breaking Boundaries, an initiative for gender equality started by a group of our own Caldwells, will be the Gala's sponsored charity.

Inspired by the issues presented in Half the Sky, the Common Reading Book for this year's freshman class, the Bricks Breaking Boundaries (BBB) campaign is focused on eliminating gender inequality throughout the world by promoting education to empower girls. Currently, BBB plans to work with American Assistance for Cambodia to build a school for girls and boys in rural Cambodia, an area where girls are at high-risk to enter the sex-trafficking trade. With $25,000, BBB can build and sustain a school in Cambodia for up to 10 years. The initiative has gained the recognition and endorsement of Provost Arden, the Associate Deans of all NCSU colleges, and the Common Reading Initiative.

Mark Menesses, a senior in nuclear engineering, is one of the visionaries for BBB. He said he sees the mission of BBB as two-fold, to spread awareness about the issues of gender inequality and to fund a school to be built in rural Cambodia.

"Living in the United States shields most of the public from what gender inequality issues exist throughout Africa, Southeast Asia and South Asia," Menesses said. "Throughout these regions, problems with forced prostitution, gender-based violence and maternal mortality are a stark reality. Due to poverty, young women are often forced to stay at home from school and made to work for money for the family."

Menesses said current research shows that educating young girls in the present is the best way to change family cycles and combat poverty in the future.

According to Kristin Cunningham, a junior in nutrition science and BBB supporter, education for girls "opens up their options for a future other than the default: having many children and living under the financial independence of their husband."

Perhaps one of the most striking statements emphasized in Half the Sky, the book BBB has used as inspiration in its endeavors, is this:

"It appears that more girls were killed in the last fifty years, precisely because they were girls, than men were killed in all the battles of the twentieth century."

A striking statement, yet true- evidence from girleffect.org, a web-based initiative to provide resources for other organizations that wish to combat gender inequality, gives more quantifiable data that exhibits the same sentiment. For example, the site states that 75 percent of 15- to 24-year olds living with HIV in Africa are female, and out of the world's 130 million out-of-school youth, 70 percent are girls.

Despite these sobering statistics, the site also gives some that have encouraged organizations such as BBB to press forward for a brighter future. When women and girls earn income, according to the Girl Effect, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man. And when a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children.

The issue of gender inequality, therefore, addresses more than just gender inequality: it is a movement to end poverty, improve health, and combat the growing population crisis.

Erika Davis, a sophomore in international studies and biological sciences who works with BBB, said the issues of gender inequality have a special place in her heart.

"As a fortunate college student in America, I feel that it is advantageous for girls currently deprived of an education if college campuses initiate a lasting response to books like Half the Sky."

Davis said she is involved with BBB because she "has faith that our group's efforts can empower our fellow students to respond to gender inequality in education. Every single person in this group is motivated by selflessness and determined to spread awareness across campus."

The biggest challenge BBB faces now, according to Brinda Monian, a sophomore in chemical engineering, is finding ways to reach out to the student populace and convince them that this is a worthwhile and urgent cause.

"N.C. State is a huge campus, which means we have a large audience but not an easy way to speak to all of them at once!," Monian said. "We are planning events that we hope will attract student to our cause and make our campus more aware of these issues. Combating gender inequality in our world is enormously important, and I hope we can convince many students on our campus of that."

For more information on Bricks Breaking Boundaries, visit www.ncsubbb.org or find them on Facebook. For more information on gender inequality visit girleffect.org and www.halftheskymovement.org.