Hope: working on a centre for gender equality
We’re super excited to share that we have been successful in our application to Inspiring Scotland and the Scottish Government to help develop a gender equality centre in Scotland, the first of its kind.
Starting from April, we’ll be working with communities, organisations, funders, individuals and institutions to hear what Scotland needs from a centre that will promote and work on gender equality.
Six years ago, one of our team, Ellie Hutchinson worked alongside colleagues Kate Nevens and Talat Yaqoob at the collective to write “we need this to do things differently”; a report on what works in changing attitudes to gender equality, and the type of body Scotland needs to make this a reality. Six years later, the world has changed significantly. We wrote that initial report in bedrooms and living rooms, talking to people delivering support in the middle of a pandemic. AI didn’t exist, Zoom was new, and the political and economic world looked very different.
Six years later, and picking up the baton is the team from the dots: making the connections for change ltd, Ellie, Heather Williams, Megan McHaney, Rhianna Mallia and Mansi Panjwani. Together, we will be exploring what the world looks like now and what we need to promote gender equality. To do this we will be reading lots, listening lots and reflecting lots. This centre needs to withstand whatever the world throws at it.
Our team is deeply invested in hope. We know that this centre, and this work is overdue. We know that communities are struggling. We know that people feel let down by institutions. We know that staff in those institutions are burnt out. We know that systems are fractured.
We know that a handful of billionaires have changed the face of the world, how we interact in it and the care we give each other. We know that regressive, racist, and sexist attitudes are normalised in our schools, parks, online spaces, workplaces and politics. We know that this is an uphill battle.
But we are committed to the future. We are committed to hope and to change. We will do this work as we mean to go on- as gardeners, tilling the soil of change, planting seeds of hope and inviting everyone in to see it flourish. We will work with care and compassion. We will take our time and we will challenge ourselves.
We are deeply committed to collaboration, to relationships and knowledge sharing. We are so excited to do this work alongside you- you, the person reading this right now. From June, we’ll be reaching out to friends old and new to learn and listen together. For those doing social transformation work, wherever you are, we invite you to join us.
We see that hopelessness is withering the plants of change. Dignity, healing, connection, hope, change; this is what will breathe life into what is already there; the knowledge, the evidence, the connections, the wisdom. There is much to learn and to share.
As Arundhati Roy reminds us, “another world is not only possible, she is on her way. Maybe many of us won't be here to greet her, but on a quiet day, if I listen very carefully, I can hear her breathing.”
We’re really excited to listen carefully alongside you. It’s time to get started.
