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Girl s Day without barriers [Germany] Girls with disabilities are often assigned to specific groups related to their condition or impairment (women in wheelchairs, epileptics etc.). However, it is much more important to look at the existing resources, strengths and skills of these individually very different young people and seek out their contributions to the city. The publicly-funded Girls Day is a nationwide project in Germany for career and study orientation of girls, and creates events that are accessible for girls with disabilities. On the annual day of action, schoolgirls get to know professions or subjects in which the proportion of women is less than 40%. Girls from grade 5 upwards are targeted. Companies, businesses and universities throughout Germany open their doors and offer apprenticeships and courses in IT, crafts, natural sciences and technology. Or they meet female role models in management positions in business and politics. Girls Day offers that are marked barrier-free enable as many girls as possible to take part. In individual cases, providers and girls contact each other in advance in order to clarify specific questions. In addition, the organisation gives specific instructions for barrier-free events on their website that are shared with all participating organisations. In the city of Bühl (Germany), the Robert Bosch Stiftung provides practical insights into their technical jobs, such as mechanical engineer, mechatronics technicians and electronics technicians for automation technology. Under the guidance of trainers, the girls work on a mechatronics project, which can then be taken home.
[ CALL TO ACTION ] Do you want to learn what the Gender Equality Index 2021 says on disability? The European Disability Forum Gender Equality Index 2021 might give you some new ideas.
7D. AGEING
93 AGE-EWL joint report (2014), Improving the situation of older women in the EU in the context of an ageing society and rapidly changing socio-economic environment , available at: https://age-platform.eu/sites/default/files/EWL_ AGE_gender_paper_2014.pdf
94 AGE-EWL joint report (2014), idem.
On the whole, women in Europe tend to live longer than men, which means that programmes for the elderly need to include a gender perspective so as to take older women s needs into account. In addition, questions of accessibility both in physical space (e.g. dropped kerbs, kneeling buses, stair-free entrances, lifts) and in infrastructure planning can increase older women s independence and quality of life. Accessible public toilets can, for example, be an important aspect for older women s ability to travel through the city comfortably. The quality of eldercare disproportionately affects women, therefore understanding older women s needs is crucial in improving services, especially those co-funded or offered directly by the municipality. The gender pension gap in Europe is at an average of 39%, which is more than twice as high as the gender pay gap (16%)93. Single female pensioners together with lone mothers face the highest risk of poverty today.
In addition, using an intergenerational perspective to design social infrastructure can help in knowledge transfer, preservation of social knowledge, and loneliness prevention. Accessibility in public services (such as text readers, large font sizes, analogue offerings parallel to digital ones) can help elderly residents feel included and heard. The European AGE platform has therefore a dedicated working group on gender equality in old age. A joint paper by the European Women s Lobby and AGE illustrates policy recommendations for improving the situation of older women in the EU in the context of an ageing society and rapidly changing socio-economic environment94. An innovative city-led example from Artziniega in the Basque Country is to introduce gender equality clauses in procurement contracts for eldercare services to require equality training for both staff and users.
Case Study
