Female leaders to offer inspiration on Fylde coast for International Women's Day

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An online event to inspire and empower women on the Fylde coast is to take place on Saturday.

Blackpool community interest organisation, The Washington Group will be holding its annual International Women's Day Festival event online on March 6 to help boost equality by celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women.

Previous festivals in 2019 and 2020 saw more than 700 people attend the events held at Blackpool sixth Form College, but this year due to the pandemic it will be held online.

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This year's event has won the support of Dame Julia Cleverdon, vice president of Business in the Community and a woman who plays leadership roles in charities aiming to transform education and opportunities for young people.

Deborah Terras speaking at the 2019 International Women's Day festival event at Blackpool Sixth FormDeborah Terras speaking at the 2019 International Women's Day festival event at Blackpool Sixth Form
Deborah Terras speaking at the 2019 International Women's Day festival event at Blackpool Sixth Form

She will open the 2021 digital IWD Festival, with support from comedian Ruth E, Cockburn, Little Voices Fylde and a few surprise guests.

The Festival continues with the five key themes, Happiness, Innovation, Rainbow, This Woman Can and Environment. The festival will include interactive workshops delivered by organisations and businesses.

This year TWG have invited five role models from 2019 and 2020 to sit on a panel and answer questions around their profession and experiences. Seema Dalvi, Chrissy Griffin, Carolyn Mercer, Shelly Woods and Gemma Walker with Jane Cole as Chair.

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The event will aim to address the barriers faced by young women across the Fylde coast, to ensure they have a better place to learn, to create their own opportunities and to enjoy their life.

Dame Julia CleverdonDame Julia Cleverdon
Dame Julia Cleverdon

Deborah Terras director at The Washington Group said: "This Festival is more important than any year in that we raise the profile of opportunities for young women on the Fylde Coast, there are some amazing innovative plans for the future and we need to ensure young women have a voice and help shape those plans.

"We are working alongside Fylde Coast Responsible Business Network and local initiatives to support that objective and help create a vision for young women."

The Fylde Coast IWD 2021 is supported by the International IWD2021 theme "Choose to Challenge".

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The organisers are asking everyone to show their solidarity in challenging and calling out issues that are unhelpful to women. They are asking women to strike the #ChooseToChallenge pose and share on social media to challenge inequity.

The IWD Festival 2021 is supported by The Rank Foundation and the Covid Response Fund Grant as well as support from Mina Group and Blackpool Transport.

Details can be found at https://iwd.twguk.org/

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