If you happened to be walking through Midtown Manhattan yesterday afternoon, there’s a fair chance you felt something akin to a magnetic force pulling you toward the Manhattan Center, where former First Lady Michelle Obama, Melinda French Gates, and Amal Clooney came together to discuss an issue close to their hearts: girls’empowerment and education. Right now, more than 100 million girls around the globe are out of school—whether due to violence in their communities, poverty, racism, the COVID-19 pandemic, or a number of other compounding issues. In response, these leaders joined forces for an event in support of the Girls Opportunity Alliance’s new Get Her There campaign, a call to action to educate and empower adolescent girls so they can reach their full potential. Because, as Obama said to the crowd, “When we don’t take these issues seriously, we see our rights as women and girls erode for all of us.”
In short, Obama’s words were the thesis for the day: Girls’ education may sound important on paper, but in reality, it’s an issue that affects and connects us all—and what we do about it could be our saving grace or our downfall.
To set the tone for the day’s programming, Sara Bareilles took the stage to perform her hit song, “Brave,” and backstage, the musician told ELLE.com what it meant for her to participate in the campaign: “We are each other. We are every girl in every country all over the world. No one is free until everyone is free; I really believe that. This initiative is so special, because it allows people to have this point of connection to join. We’re so powerful together.”
Next, Marsai Martin, the host of the day’s event and the producer of the campaign’s short video “Dear 25-Year-Old Me,” interviewed three young women who have been directly impacted by the Girls Opportunity Alliance, a program started by the Obama Foundation that has funded 54 projects from community-based organizations in 20 countries, all focused on girls’ empowerment and education. “Right now, so many young women are facing obstacles to fulfilling their potential, and as a result, the world is missing out on their talents and their ideas,” Martin told the crowd.
Cre: ELLE
