Broadening Access to Education

Wanda Bedard, an MBA graduate of Hautes Études Commerciales Montréal and a graduate of McGill University, considers her work as a volunteer with UNICEF throughout her talk on girls education.

She starts out by explaining her experience learning about the way women in Afghanistan are treated, which she first started hearing about in the late 1990s. After continuing to hear of more issues regarding the treatment of women around the developing world, Wanda Bedard was inspired to make a difference. While continuing her research, one of the main issues she noticed that made these women so vulnerable was a lack of access to education.

She goes on to explain the details of this, pointing out that education decreases the risk of HIV/AIDS and malaria, results in smaller families, makes girls less likely to be involved in child marriages, and of course, enables them to make more money to support themselves. By delving into these topics, Wanda Bedard's talk on girls education shows that there's many different ways in which access to these resources benefit the developing world.