Glasgow Girl’s Club
The Carter Centre began their ‘Inform Women, Transform Lives’ campaign in 2021 with the aim of raising awareness about women’s right to information and to help partner cities provide women with information about beneficial local services. The latest cohort of partner cities in 2023 included Glasgow, with the Carter Centre reaching out to Glasgow’s Lord provost to invite the city of Glasgow to join this campaign. Following a successful application, Glasgow is now part of the 2023-2025 cohort of 12 cities from around the world, joining the 23 cities from the previous 2 cohorts in this international network. Glasgow is the first and only city from Scotland to be part of this campaign and joins Birmingham as second in the UK. Through this international network, Glasgow can now access the large bank of tools, information and knowledge sharing opportunities and guidance with other cities worldwide.
This initiative in Glasgow will comprise an 18-month campaign from September 2023 to 8th March 2025. A working group was established to drive this project, led by the Lord provost’s office and in partnership with different departments across Glasgow City Council, the Glasgow Violence Against Women Partnership (GVAWP) and its Standing Group, Community Justice Glasgow, Glasgow Girls Club (GGC). Its initial idea focuses on young women’s safety and wellbeing, building on the achievements of GVAWP and Glasgow Girl’s Club.
Through discussions and workshopping, it was agreed that the aims for the Glasgow campaign were to:
- Raise awareness about Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) and young women’s right of access to information.
- Reach young women (age 16 – 21) with information and messaging related to VAWG and the services that are available to them.
- Increase the number of young women accessing information, and seeking support sooner, thus demonstrating the value of information.
In addition to the community-based work that GGC lead with young women in the city, they are also a social enterprise, providing digital solutions for public and third sector organisations, to support positive change and social inclusion. Therefore, as well as the Carter Centre funded campaign, GGC have developed the app, ‘ADA,’ which will be a user-friendly and accessible, providing young women direct access to information about VAWG and support services. This will provide a lasting legacy for the city, in addition to the Carter Centre campaign.
The Campaign aims to launch a comprehensive, awareness raising movement targeting young women aged 16-21 in Glasgow, to recognise the signs of VAWG and signpost them to support services. The campaign will primarily feature a short film aimed at educating and empowering young women about VAWG. The Call-to-Action (CTA) of the film will be to signpost viewers to ‘ADA’ which has guidance and information about VAWG and the services and support available.
Work will be ongoing throughout 2024, following on from the inception of this collaboration, and the citizens of Glasgow will have a lasting benefit, through ADA once it is launched, during the 16 Days of Action to end violence against women and girls.
