IWD 2025 - Accelerate Action
It’s International Women’s Day 2025 on 8 March and although we don’t love this day at WAGIS HQ - we think every day should be women’s day - it does give us all an opportunity to stop and reflect on the progress we, society, are making towards equality and equity for women and girls.
Sadly, it’s not good news with a World Economic Forum report saying that it will be 2158 until we reach equity. That’s five generations away, girls. Five. 5. This means that we have to continue advocating for ourselves. We have to keep on being activists. We must support each other, promote each other, encourage each other and celebrate each other.
In sport, we have to overcome girls’ barriers to participation. The more girls on the field, track, court, pitch and in the pool means that we can not be ignored. Our voices can not be silenced. Plus, more girls in sport means more chance for people to see how awesome we are and want to watch us play!! We can show that we’re serious competitors with skill, determination and commitment.
Girls’ sport needs more investment from big business but also government too, be that national or local and it is happening, especially from the big brands but progress is slow.
If all of that that feels big and overwhelming, we can take small steps every day, small actions that will build up and build up towards achieving the goal of equality and equity.
Barriers for women being active
Periods
Periods are one of our favourite topics here at We are Girls in Sport, but they are a huge barrier to being active for girls like you. If your club doesn’t provide free period wear, get involved with our campaign, Play On. WAGIS believes that all sports clubs and venues should provide free sanitary wear to help you if you’re caught short or if you had to decide between tampons and food this week. Take a look at our Play On stuff and if you need help talking to your club or coaches, get in touch.
What you wear when being active and on your period can also impact how you feel moving your body. Men and boys don’t have to worry about that. Lots of clubs that used to have white kit are changing to darker colours and there’s no reason that your club can’t do the same. If it means that more women and girls are active, it’s worth a difficult conversation. Perhaps you can approach the club as a team to say what you’d like to wear.
If your club is full of male coaches and you feel as though they don’t understand about periods and menstrual cycles, cramps and not feeling like going to training (we get it!), arrange some training for them. We can help so contact us about that too.
First steps
Play Loo Bingo - how good are your club’s toilet facilities? Not good enough? Check out our guide for talking to your club.
How do you feel about your kit? Gather opinion from your teammates and think about what you could change.
Ask your male coaches how much they know about periods. Not impressed? Get in touch with us about training.
Financial barriers to being active
Being active can be expensive. We love the idea of walking and running as you don’t need much kit but they might not be your sport, favourite form of exercise or preferred activity.
Clubs need to make their sport more accessible, helping low-income families with reduced subscription fees and more flexibility on kit or even a ‘recycling’ of kit - second-hand kid is better for the environment too. Local authorities and businesses should help too. We know that there are so many benefits for girls from being active - mental, physical, social and economic (sport helps in your career too!) so it’s worth their while.
Could you pass your kit on to someone who needs it or create a second-hand kit drop off point? Be sensitive as some people might not feel good about not being able to afford brand new stuff. Find a way to make it anonymous.
First steps
Discuss with your teammates about organising a fundraising event to help with costs of playing like kit costs, travel expenses. What about cat washing, bake sale or simply asking for donations?
Opportunities
This is a pretty important one and comes down to equal opportunities. Girls should have the same opportunities as boys but we know that isn’t always the case. Sometimes there are good reasons such as not enough players, or the club just hadn’t realised (not really good enough, but hey we’re all human!) but it’s always worth asking the question. Perhaps you could get involved with marketing to boost numbers and raise the profile of new teams and the club (also great for investment).
First steps
Identify if the girls and boys have the same opportunities and if not, why that might be and should it be changed.
Equality vs equity
Do you know the difference between equality and equity? We’ve used those words a lot and although they sound similar, they mean different things.
Our friends at Sports Ethics Examiner put it like this
“The notion of equality is at the core of what we generally understand as justice: everyone deserves to be treated with the same respect and dignity.
However, it is important to notice that treating everyone as equals does not always mean treating everyone equally.
This means that in some instances we should acknowledge the existence of inequalities that justify treating people differently, if that will guarantee that this can improve the situation of those with disadvantages.”
This means that we have to recognise that men and women, boys and girls, and all other genders are not the same and we may need to make amendments to allow each gender to play a sport.
From Interaction Institute for Social Change | Artist: Angus Magus interactioninstitute.org and madewithangus.com.
Here’s an example.
Zoe is a girl who hasn’t found her sport yet. She has an older brother called Joe. Joe plays golf and borrows them from the golf club for now. Zoe is keen to play golf too and the club wants to boost its teen girl members (equality - she can play too), but when she turns up at the club, they only have men’s clubs. They are heavy and she finds it hard to swing. This is inequity. Treating her with equity would be to provide her with women’s golf clubs that suit her physique and strength.
Remind me why we’re doing this?
That date in the future, 2158. We need to ‘accelerate action’ to make sure that we don’t have to wait that long to be on a level playing field. Take those first steps. Demand equality and equity. Help be the change.