2023 |风格她授权
她的风格(SHE) is the 2023 winner of the Distinction in International Service Award (DISA). SHE is most well-known for creating the uniform that grows when the program launched in 2017 in Notse, 多哥.
在多哥, girls spend an average of 2 - 3 years in school, and only a third of girls go to junior high school. A required school uniform is the largest financial barrier keeping girls out of school in 多哥 and in many countries around the world. 为了解决这个问题, SHE designed the world's only school uniform that grows so girls can wear their uniforms for up to 3 years! Every girl receives a new school uniform as part of her sponsorship at SHE.
The DISA is annually awarded to a locally based organization with international scope. Students and staff of the 马丁研究所, part of the U of I’s College of Letters, 艺术 and Social Sciences, form the DISA committee to research and honor excellent international endeavors.
Committee member Megan Kiser, a freshman majoring in international studies and business economics, 说, “During our selection process, we established collective criteria, then we researched on our own and brought our individual ideas to the table, and slowly narrowed things down, 选择她. We really wanted to pick an organization that was both helping and empowering, a great model that isn’t always used.”
佩顿McGriff, SHE的创始人兼首席执行官, a 2017 graduate from the 365滚球官网 with a bachelor’s in marketing, visited the 马丁研究所 to accept the award on behalf of SHE.
“SHE all started with the idea of teaching girls to sew school uniforms in Africa during my entrepreneur class after I was inspired by the book 半边天佩顿解释道. “But we quickly realized that these girls had no extra hours and it was creating too much of a burden. We ended up adding a women’s branch.” Now SHE focuses on three areas: Girls’ Education, Women’s Employment and Sustainability.
SHE increases access to education that builds girls' self-reliance. 它们也创造了安全, 可靠的, and dignified jobs for women from low-income and low-education backgrounds. They do all of this sustainably while making uniforms that grow and reusable menstrual pads.
“The people of 多哥 have been very welcoming because we have a locally driven team that has respect and trust within the community. At first, there was a paradigm to overcome,” Payton 说. “People wouldn’t look one of our initial local employees in the eyes when she began our program. 人们躲着她. Now they see what she has done for herself, and they are seeking her out for advice! It has been a small cultural shift but now she is admired for her work. We aren’t trying to change their culture, we are changing their mindsets.”
McGriff is planning another trip to 多哥 this Fall and is excited to continue to grow the organization and see where it leads. “I would encourage people to remain curious about their own potential to create impact in their world. Unexpected things happen, many that are good, because you remain curious. 这是非常值得的.”
SHE的2022年影响
• 1,500 girls sponsored through school
• 30 women employed in 多哥, Africa
• 21 towns and villages served in 多哥
• 2 Sustainable Factories in rural 多哥
• 99.9% of our students passed their grade levels
• 5,000+ pounds of fabric recycled into reusable menstrual pads
All photos courtesy of Style Her Empowered, Inc. 谢谢你！!
