News
Students launch HeForShe association at the Belo Horizonte campus
Created to encourage men to act alongside women against political, economic, and social inequalities, the HeForShe association is present on the three French campuses of SKEMA and now on the Belo Horizonte campus. Angèle Dubos, an MSc International Marketing and Business Development student, and Amanda Amaral Garcia, a Global BBA student and HeForShe president, tell us more about it in this interview.
Angèle, why did you want to launch the HeForShe association at the Belo Horizonte campus?
Before flying to Brazil for an explosion of colours, energy and fragrances, I inquired about my condition, that is, my status as a woman in Brazilian society. Despite recent public policy interest in the issue of gender inequality, sexism remains high, and women's representation is insufficient in the dominant sectors. "How can we change a world if only half of it is invited?" So, creating HeForShe on the Belo Horizonte campus was an obvious decision.
At our level, we aim to change the chauvinistic beliefs and mentalities that are rooted in cultural behaviours and everyday practices. It's a real accomplishment to represent an association like this in our own management school. We enable students to have the keys in hand to manage the world of tomorrow in a progressive, respectful, and fair dynamic.
Amanda, as a Brazilian student, why did you want to get involved in this community project?
I vividly remember when Angèle entered the room where I was studying in March 2022. She explained what she plans to do with HeForShe on the Brazilian campus. I immediately wanted to get involved in the association, and from there, we started to build this trajectory together. In April, I created an online form with questions about "Why HeForShe" and submitted it to SKEMA Internet groups. We reached over 300 students, but unfortunately, only 17 students responded.
Of the three questions, 23.5 percent of people voted "no" to "Do you think it's also the role of men to help the movement for gender equality?", 35.3 percent voted "no" to "Are you interested in learning more about gender equality, the issues that remain and how we can solve them?" Finally, 82.4% voted "no" to "Are you interested in actively participating in the HeForShe movement to help us achieve gender equality?" I was shocked to discover these answers. I had no idea that there was such a disconnect between students and the struggle for gender equality. Since then, I am even more convinced of the importance of the association, not only within SKEMA Brazil, but also internationally.
How is the association doing currently, a few months since its launch? What concrete actions are you taking?
Today, we have a well-structured association, with several projects and ideas in progress. We have a team of 13 people, which includes eleven female students and two male students. We decided to divide the team into poles (finance, communication, etc.). Every six months, we will invite four women from civil society to speak to all students at the Belo Horizonte campus about their careers and experiences as women. The first such event took place in June 2022. In addition, we organise monthly conversation circles outside of class hours. We bring, for example, a psychologist to teach us how to react to male oppression at work, etc. We also plan to write various articles on this topic, for dissemination on social networks. To this end, a blog is already under construction.
