Celebrating the female side of things

Do us a favour and look around you for a moment. How many women do you see? None? A few? Plenty? If you answered ‘plenty’, we’re guessing you’re at Architecture or Industrial Design Engineering. As you know, female students are sometimes a bit outnumbered at TU Delft. Even more reason to value them!

On the 8th of March, the world celebrates International Women’s Day 2016. Sports & Culture extends this celebration to the whole month: so let us introduce you to the range of activities.

Sports&Culture, Amnesty Internationa, Studium Generale and The School of Life join hands to celebrate International Women’s Day 2016 with the pledge for parity. The programme includes six activities, all free and open to everyone.

• 1 – 30 March: Women’s Right Today exhibition @ Culture: an exhibiton about the current status of Women’s Rights in countries like Iran, China and Ireland.
• 1st of March, 12:40-13:30: Women of the Caliphate @ Aula hall A: lecture, Dutch
• 1st of March, 20:00-21:30: 7 women in philosophy you should know @ Culture: lecture, Dutch
• 8th of March, 19:30-21:30: interview Marianne Vos & athletes of TU Delft @ Culture: interview with Dutch World Champion and Olympic Champion cycling
• 10th of March, 20:00-21:30: Women’s Rights Today featuring Maartje & Kine @ Culture: comedy and music about Women’s Rights
• 15th of March, 12:45-13:30: Life is no fun when you keep quiet @ Aula hall A: lecture, Dutch

For more information, check the website. Both men and women can pledge to take concrete steps and help to cross the gender gap more quickly. This can be done by helping women and girls to achieve their ambitions, but also by calling for gender-balanced leadership or developing more flexible workplace cultures. Take a moment to evaluate what we have and what happens in the countries further away.

One final tip for the men. Let’s say there’s a lady you like, but you didn’t dare to walk up to her on Valentine’s Day. We believe International Women’s Day is an excellent opportunity to start that conversation. It’s way more original than Valentine’s Day. Surprise guaranteed.