News
Fall Speaker Program
CFUW Stratford Annual Meet & Greet
This year's annual Meet and Greet included returning members, interested visitors, and new members...
2019-2020 Speaker Programme
2019-2020 Speaker Programme 100 Years of Canadian Women; Their Impact Locally, Nationally and...
Intercultural Communication & Competency Workshop
2019 AGM with Guest Speaker
Thanks to everyone who attended and contributed to our AGM Tuesday evening! We had an excellent...
2019 Annual General Meeting
Our Annual General Meeting, held in May each year, is an “enhanced” version of our monthly general...
Established in 1919, CFUW is a non-partisan, voluntary, self-funded organization with close to 100 clubs across the country. This year the CFUW is celebrating a century of service to women in Canada and around the world!
Since its founding, CFUW has been working to improve the status of women and to promote human rights, public education, social justice, and peace. Every year, CFUW and its clubs award $1 million to women to help them pursue post-secondary studies.
We invite you to find out more about CFUW Stratford! You can join our 100th anniversary celebrations with guest speakers on a century of women and their accomplishments, plus special events coming up in December and April. New members are welcome! Please take a look at our website: www.cfuwstratford.ca.
National Geographic: Akashinga - The Brave Ones with conservationist, Damien Mander, & ranger, Vimbai Kumire, will be delivering their powerful message on our stage November 6 @ 7:30PM, Centre in the Square.
“The fate of humanity is inseparable from our willingness to conserve biodiversity”
In early 2017 the International Anti-Poaching Foundation (IAPF) was approached to assist with conservation efforts in Zimbabwe’s Lower Zambezi ecosystem. Due to poaching, elephant numbers in the region had declined by 40% since 2001.
Law enforcement and conflict resolution around the world has increasingly evolved to include women in key roles. In Africa and conservation however, men take most front line positions. Despite the fact women often do the majority of manual and household labour in Africa, Western conservation models have ignored their inclusion at scale. Inspired by the progress of women and driven by the need for evolution in the conservation industry, the IAPF set out to deploy an all women team to restore and manage a reserve that was historically used for elephant hunting. This formed the Akashinga model. Their mission would be to establish the first team of 32, then expand east and west to secure an area of almost a million acres, cutting off access for poachers into one of Africa’s largest remaining elephant populations. Making their way towards the training grounds they were harassed by a group of drunken men yelling: “This job is not for you. It has never been. Go back home where you belong!”
Selection was opened exclusively to unemployed single mothers, abandoned wives, survivors of sexual and physical abuse, wives of poachers in prison, widows and orphans. By doing so, opportunity was created for the most vulnerable women in rural society. Having never received a secure form of income, they dealt with adversity and poverty within the marginalised areas of rural Zimbabwe every day of their life. Challenging ridicule and stereotype, they would seize the opportunity and return home as rangers.
Below, a glimpse into the world of Akashinga: The Brave Ones:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAmQLQwF_BE
Zimbabwe's women's anti-poaching group protecting elephants - BBC News
Vimbai is a ranger in Zimbabwe's armed female anti-poaching unit, Akashinga. They protect one of the biggest elephant populations in Africa. BBC News looks i...Friday was the International Day of the Girl and our international federation, Graduate Women International - GWI, shared an advocacy toolkit for girls’ rights and equality. Take a look and reflect on what has been done for girls in the past 25 years and what further action is necessary to empower girls worldwide >> ow.ly/R2Z350wGmcT