On Friday 25 February, 17-yr-old Caroline Christie of the Diocese of Newark presented the Statement from Girl Delegates to the UN’s 55th Commission on the Status of Women.

Caroline, a Girl Delegate to CSW55 on behalf of the Anglican Communion, was speaking as the ACC’s Girl Advocate for UNICEF’s NGO Committee’s Working Group on Girls (WGG).  She participated alongside at least 20 ACC girl delegates and attendees at WGG’s orientation “Girls Stand Up!”.   Michelle Bachelet, former President of Chile, now the newly appointed UN Under Secretary General for Women, and Leymah Roberta Gwobee, documented in the film “Pray the Devil Back to Hell”, provided the WGG with background and inspiration.  In response to Advocacy Training, girls gathered to write the statement to member nations of the CSW.

The participation of girls was a high priority for the Anglican UN Office, which made a concerted effort to bring girls and young female delegates from across the Communion to support this year’s Priority Theme:  “Access of women and girls to education, training, science and technologies: including promotion of women’s equal access to full employment and decent work”, and particularly the Review Theme: "Elimination of all forms of violence and discrimination against the girl child". Amongst the Provincial Delegates, young women attended from Haiti, Swaziland, Brazil, Japan, Tanzania, the US and Canada. There was also a concerted effort to make attendance at NGO events available to many girls and young women across the Communion who were interested and able to attend.  For example, seven international students from the Roedean School in England travelled to the Event with their Head of Religious Studies.  The Native American Ministries of the Episcopal Church sponsored seven young women.  Parishes in the greater New York area promoted girls’ attendance at many events and activities, including a mother-daughter team from Long Island. CSW55 was a key year to assess progress in the area of global treatment of girls. For the first time in history, real progress has been made in the education of girls, but many other conditions have worsened, particularly in the area of the protection of girls, as you will see in reading the Girls Statement, made by Caroline.

 Statement from Girl Delegates to the UN’s 55th Commission on the Status of Women