Trinity College Celebrates International Women’s Day on March 8th

Posted on: 07 March 2007

This year’s International Women’s Day was marked by a number of exciting events throughout Trinity College, celebrating diversity and collaboration between women from arts and sciences.

A Future Leaders seminar featuring Jane Williams of the Sia Group and Martina Harford of the Smurfit Kappa Group was organised by the Centre for Gender & Women’s Studies (CGWS)  at TCD to start the day.

The official launch of TCD’s celebrations followed this event. The celebrations were launched by Trinity’s Vice Provost, Professor Ruth Byrne. Professor Jane Ohlmeyer, Erasmus Smith’s Chair of Modern History and Head of the School of Histories and Professor Sheila Greene AIB Professor of Childhood Research delivered a series of short speeches to mark the occasion.

Following the launch, a colourful procession of students performed a dramatic presentation of a selection of statistics on gender equality issues in Ireland.  The students wore items of purple clothing representing the official colour of International Women’s Day and performed a range of facts and figures including:  women represent 46% of the labour market; 91% of lone parents are women and 13% of professors in Trinity College are women.

Linking to the International aspect of the day, Professor Jane Grimson, speaking from Front Square, stressed that “education – particularly of girls and young women – is a central element in strategies to lift the least developed countries of the world out of poverty. Trinity is planning to partner with universities in Africa to work towards ensuring that young women there have the same opportunities to avail of higher education as women in Ireland have enjoyed for over 100 years. This will ensure that they can take their full place in society and in shaping their country’s future.”

The day was finished off by a special screening by the Dublin University Gender Equality Society of the Lilya 4 Ever, which was accompanied by an introductory talk by Jennifer Redmond of the GGWS, on prostitution and trafficking.

International Women’s Day was organized by a collaborative team including the Centre for Gender and Women’s Studies (CGWS), the Centre for Women in Science and Engineering Research (WiSER), Dublin University Gender Equality Society (DUGES), Music and Media Technologies, Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering and the School of Drama, Film and Music and the Trinity College Equality Officer.