International Women’s Day Breakfast

International Women’s Day (IWD) is a significant day to celebrate our achievements whilst also acknowledging the struggles women worldwide continue to face to this day. This year, the United Nations theme for IWD was Choose to Challenge, in that a challenged world is an alert world and change arises from challenge. On Friday 5 March, the SRC Executive were lucky enough to host the 2021 International Women’s Day Breakfast. In previous years, the SRC attended this event at the Convention Centre. However, due to COVID-19 restrictions this year, the guest speakers presented online. To uphold the tradition, Wilderness School decided to host this special occasion on our campus. This was an incredible and unique opportunity for us to speak to two hundred other young, inspiring leaders from the Alliance of Girls’ Schools in South Australia. To make the most of this morning, we organised a Round Robin conversation

where we took turns in sharing our ideas around our tables, guided by conversation prompts. Aiming to inspire each other about ways to maximize our opportunity to make a difference as school leaders this year, over our delicious breakfast we shared our initiatives, challenges, and other aspects of our leadership journeys so far. We shared the best advice we have received, our favourite events and our successes so far. Many schools had similar goals to us, and we were able to have conversations about the importance of female leadership in our current world.

Discussing our initiatives was also extremely productive. Our Wildyness Instagram page inspired other schools as an accessible, casual and fun way of engaging with their peers. Similarly, an idea that inspired us was an innovative platform for all students to share their personal ideas and potentially put them into action. We organised for each girl to write down the three ideas that excited them most, so they could discuss these with their leadership teams back at school. Following these productive discussions, we listened to the Hon. Penny Wong, and special guest speaker, Natasha Stott Despoja. As politicians, they shared their career journeys and experiences, with a primary focus on gender-based discrimination.

A particular idea that resonated with us was the power of female leadership and the importance of feminist role-models.

Natasha and Penny are examples of such powerful females. We were so inspired by them and will cherish their advice, not only throughout our Wilderness leadership journeys but also into our lives beyond school. The United Nations theme of Choose to Challenge and the IWD guest speakers prompted us to further reflect on what we, as an SRC, wish to challenge. Relating to our theme of Authenticity, this year we choose to challenge the societal expectations which may limit us from voicing our opinions and being our true selves. By fostering an environment where we support each other in our identities, passions and aspirations, we can uplift each other and create an environment where everyone can choose to challenge society. And together, we can achieve so much more.

Ella Beinssen, Ishani Sood and Trinity Hong SRC Executive