A community–based developmental initiative, Ladies Helpline Initiative, recently organised an annual programme “Young Women Summit 2016” for adolescent girls in secondary schools,at Redeemer’s High School, Redemption Camp, Lagos/Ibadan Expressway, Ogun State in commemoration of the International Day Of The Girl Child. The theme of the programme was tagged – Young Women Leading the Change.
The summit focused on the challenges and gender related issues faced by the girl-child in Nigeria and around the world. Schools in attendance were Redeemer’s High School, Redemption Camp, Deeper Life High School, and Jextoban Secondary School. Teachers and other invited guest were available to grace the occasion. The convener of the Summit Mrs. Hannah Agunkejoye, the founder, and director of Ladies Helpline Initiative, said young girls are in need of role models who would guide them into making wise decisions.
Keynote speakers at the event included Mrs. Olubukola Rosanwo, a counseling psychologist, who charged the young girls on minding your influence. Mrs.Timilehin Oyebode, CEO ADI, talked about how young girls can be courageous to face the future like Queen Esther in the Bible and Mrs. Hannah Agunkejoye communicated ten nuggets on how to be a confident teenage girl in the 21st century.
The theme of the summit Young Women Leading the Change arises as a clarion call to enhance and imbibe leadership skills in our young females irrespective of where they are.
Young women may face unique challenges in asserting and developing a leadership style. Some struggle with managing others while maintaining a “good girl” image. They don’t want to be ignored, but they don’t want to be seen as too pushy, either. It’s a delicate balance to find a style that’s effective and feels like a good fit.
One major problem is a shortage of female role models. People often learn leadership styles by observing others, but there are often few female to observe. Hence, the vision of Ladies Helpline Initiative is to reduce the impact of moral decadence to raise a generation of creative women leaders and role models towards the attainment of higher levels of development for a better society has come to stay.
The speakers in their speeches recognised the unique challenges girls faced around the world and concluded that girls have the potential to change the world, also noting that the power of adolescent girls is fundamental to breaking the intergenerational transmission of poverty, violence, exclusion and discrimination and to achieving equitable and sustainable development outcomes.
“The mission of this initiative is to promote sustainable development to young females through advocacy, guidance and counseling, productive mentoring, mobilization of resources and provision of qualitative capacity building programs through dynamic leadership and professionalism.
