Thank you to everyone at the Women Empower Expo for making this event a positive and uplifting experience. From meeting with Alexa Rose Carlin, to watching engaging panels, listening to incredible speakers, and having the amazing opportunity to promote our book, WEX was jam packed full of unforgettable experiences. We are incredibly grateful for the opportunity to promote our book and meet inspiring women.
Our book, “Equal & Empowered: Essays, Poems, and Art Inspired By Feminism By Young Students Around the World,“ is now available for preorder on Barnes and Noble and Amazon!
We were fortunate to receive amazing, inspiring submissions from around the world that highlight the importance and impact of feminism. We encourage anyone to give them a read!
This book would have never been possible without the endless support from Palm Beach Philanthropy Tank and our incredible publisher, Benton Buckley Books. Order now! A portion of our proceeds will benefit charity, and the rest will go towards our own projects to educate others on the importance of equality, as well as helping those who have been victims of inequality.
With your help, we can change the way the world views feminism and achieve equality!
Congratulations to both Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams for their impressive victories during the US Open. Naomi Osaka is the first Japanese Citizen to win a singles Grand Slam Tournament, and defeated her idol, Serena Williams, in the final match. Though Serena did not win the final match, her progression in the tournament is an impressive return for the new mother. Serena did not see her child as a setback, nor did she end her career, instead, she went back on the court, as determined as she ever was, only about a year since she nearly died due to complications with her pregnancy. Serena shows us that you can be a mother and have a successful career, someone who others could look up to. Osaka and Williams are an inspiration to children everywhere, showing them that determination and hard-work will lead you far in life.
“My story isn’t over… This is just a new part of my life.”
~ Serena Williams on having her first child, Olympia
Today marks the anniversary of the passing of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote in the United States (though some minority women were not able to vote until much later). We have much to be grateful for, and many passionate, determined activists to thank. We’ve come a long way since then, but we still have a ways to go. Some places are much closer to equality than others, but complete equality does not exist anywhere in the world just yet. Although unequal laws may no longer exist in these places, social inequality still persists in many, if not all, of them. In the United States, for example, only 20% of Congress is comprised of women, and more information is included in the articles below commemorating Women’s Equality Day.
Today and everyday we celebrate the success of feminists in the past, and hope for continued success in achieving equality. For these feminists who blazed a path for the rest of us to follow, thank you. Your bravery and determination changed the world for the better.
NBC News article showing how inequality still persists
Forbes article showing inequalities and how rectifying them will positively effect society
PBPT helps young change makers receive the support they need to succeed. We competed in PBPT a few years ago, and the support we received helped us to grow to where we are today. It was an amazing experience for us, and we learned a great deal about how to effectively creative positive change in society. We received two incredible mentors and funding for our book, which will be released soon!
We are truly thankful to PBPT, and we hope that other students take advantage of the wonderful opportunities given to us by this incredible organization. If you want to make a positive change in your community or in society as a whole, you should apply to Palm Beach Philanthropy Tank!
Winners of our book contest have been selected, and will be published in our book! Congratulations to all winners! We received some truly incredible submissions, and we are proud to showcase all of these creative pieces in our book. Thank you to all those who submitted, your contribution to helping others understand more about feminism, and especially the importance of feminism, will hopefully translate to progress in society!
We are currently working with our publisher, benton buckley books, on formatting and editing the book to ensure that we showcase all of the wonderful submissions in the best way possible. Please stay tuned for updates coming soon! We are truly excited for what is to come!
For more information, please visit our website or Instagram (@EqualAndEmpowered)!
If you are eager to share your unique experiences in regards to our mission of equality, we are pleased to inform you the submission deadline has now been extended to February 17, 2017. We at Equal and Empowered want to showcase the most diverse set of voices possible, so we have extended the deadline in order to ensure all voices are heard on such an important subject.
Due to the deadline extension, submission acceptance notifications will be made on a rolling basis, so the sooner you submit, the faster you will hear back from us. We understand that in order to make our book have the most impact, it needs to be composed of submissions from a variety of people. We would not have been able to deliver on this with the present deadline, so we look forward to having a wide variety of submissions by February 17!
We are happy to announce that we have begun to receive submissions, and they are all outstanding. We have received nearly ten in the past few days, and we thought that we would take this opportunity to remind you that they are due at the end of January and ou will be notified by mind-February as to whether your submission has been accepted. Submissions of all media type will be accepted, and please feel free to express yourself as creatively as possible.
The submission form can be located here.
The past few months have been very busy for us in Equal + Empowered. School has picked back up again, which has meant that we’ve been able to spend less time than we’d like on this project, but we feel like we’re starting to get back on our feet again.
Coming up is the halfway point meeting with Philanthropy Tank, where we will meet with our mentors and present our accomplishments so far. We are looking forward to this and to reconnecting with the other participants in Philanthropy Tank, and we are excited to meet and connect with this year’s contestants.
In addition to this, we are seeking out new members! If you live in the Palm Beach County area and have been following this blog, consider emailing us at equalandempowered@gmail.com with a little bit of information about yourself and how you feel you can contribute to the group. As always, our goals are to reach out to more and more people and to spread the message as much as possible, so everyone is welcome and we’re excited to get to know you.
Finally, and most excitingly, the submission form for our book is up and running! We are taking submission of art, poetry, prose (fiction and nonfiction), or any other physical medium that you can think of. As suggestions for what to submit, we ask that you consider talking about what feminism means to you, why you feel it is important, and instances of discrimination and sexism in your own life, but we encourage you to be creative and speak from the heart.
Equal + Empowered is pleased to present our completed video, which is being used both to spread awareness and education and to work as promotional media for the book which we have begun work on. The video includes our middle school ambassadors who were discussed in our previous post, in addition to which, we incorporated brief interviews with people from a wide range of genders, races, sexualities, and ages. We hope that the video will give you an insight into what we are trying to do with Equal + Empowered, and maybe inspire you to contribute to the book.
Our book is going to be a compilation of poetry, prose, short stories, art, and anythingelse that people should choose to submit, in order to create a picture of feminism that encompasses and helps everyone. Submissions will be opening soon, so be sure to keep an eye out both here and on our website, http://www.equalandempowered.com/#!writing-contest/az6mt, for more information.
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