SHE CAN, EMPOWHER: Six young women from Equal Chance participate in a two-day forum at Parliament

"Within a few hours of the cancellation of the 64th session of the UN

Commission on the Status of Women (UN CSW), independent Senator Marilou McPhedran (Manitoba), her staff, and her youth advisory – called the Canadian Council of Young Feminists – suggested a Youth Forum at the Senate as an alternative for young leaders who could re-route their travel to New York, to arrive in Ottawa instead.

On Monday, March 9th, more than forty mostly self-funded youth delegates arrived at the Senate for this “policy pop-up” to engage in meaningful dialogue with senators, Cabinet ministers and civil society leaders about women’s rights and international instruments such as the “Beijing Platform for Action”, and to strategize on further Canadian youth opportunities in multilateral spaces, such as the “Generation Equality”conference in Paris, France set for July of this year."

Equal Chance who was set to take 6 young black women as official delegates to the 64th session on the Commission of the Status of Women in New York, in collaboration with Vision Gram International, participated in Senator McPhedran's two-day forum. The young women taking part in our SHE CAN, EMPOWHER program were able to network and exchange with young women and other organizations from across Canada.