Don Bosco Secondary School Gears to Celebrate International Women's Day 2024, Under the Theme; “Inspire Inclusion of Women in the Development of South Sudan’

Don Bosco Secondary School Gears to Celebrate International Women's Day 2024, Under the Theme; “Inspire Inclusion of Women in the Development of South Sudan’

By Sr. Henriette Anne, FSSA

International Women’s Day is celebrated annually on 8 March every year. It offers an opportunity to reflect on progress made, to call for change, and to celebrate acts of courage and determination by ordinary women who have played an extraordinary role in the history of their countries and communities, for Don Bosco Secondary School, this year’s International Women Day will be celebrated “as a way of motivating girls to persevere in their studies and thus reduce the frequency of girls dropping out of school”.

Don Bosco Girls

According to Fr. Taban, a member of the Salesian of Don Bosco, the decision to celebrate International Women’s Day was a result of a meeting organized by the girls during the first week of the opening to set goals and to see how they can support themselves and organize attractive programs for the growth in a male-dominated society like theirs.  

“On the first week of the opening of the school, the girls had their first meeting in the school to help girls set goals for themselves and to see how they can support themselves and organize attractive programs for their growth in a male-dominated society like ours”.

“Fr. Taban explained that “preparation is going on for this event and the whole school is busy involved in this. Invitations to other schools have been sent, various NGOs have been requested for material support, students have made their financial contributions, some parents have sent their support and banners have been printed”.

Apart from celebrating International Women's Day, the following suggestions were also made; Periodical meetings for girls to address their issues, a request to the administration to employ one more female teacher in the school, a counselor to be available in the school to take care of girls, solicit funds to cater for poor girls' educational needs, and Election of one more girl to assist the head girl in organizing girls in the school.

In his message shared with the Rurugene Online Newsletter, he disclosed that the school has already added the female teacher as requested by the girls and a prefect for girls welfare has been appointed to work together with the headgirl to address issues of girls.

He added that a significant development this academic year is the almost equal representation of girls and boys in the school. Currently, there are roughly 116 girls and 124 boys, reflecting a more balanced enrollment.

“Another important information is that the number of girls this year is almost equal to boys in the school. So far with the new intake of Senior One and a few newcomers to Senior 2 and 3, we have roughly 113 girls and 124 boys. This is very encouraging and we hope to get more girls enrolment in our school in the following years”.

He also expressed that this academic year they have a diverse student body, comprising individuals from all states of South Sudan, except Northern Bahr El Ghazal State.

“This year we have a mixture of students hailing from all States of South Sudan except Northern Bahr El Ghazal State”.

He noted that “Don Bosco Secondary started the new academic year on the 5th of February with regular classes till 2.30. 85% of the students from Senior 2 to 4 were present in the school. The second day of classes witnessed the presence of 97% of students in the school”.