By Claire Amatucci

Educate girls, change the world.

The film Girl Rising was shown as an event on campus on Monday, February 17, at 4 and 7 p.m. in Knott Auditorium. Before the film rolled, a speaker from Catholic Relief Services spoke, stressing the importance of education of women and her experience abroad with helping women similar to those in the film.

This was a very significant event to the Notre Dame community especially because our school is based on the education of women and the obstacles the School Sisters of Notre Dame had to face when first establishing the school in 1895.

“It really put into perspective how crucial it is that females all over the world receive a proper education,” said Kellye Henry, a freshman in the Women’s College.

Girl Rising is an interesting and emotional film that portrayed the importance of education of women throughout the world. It tells the stories of nine girls from different third-world countries that had to struggle with obstacles and injustices that kept them from an education such as poverty, arranged marriage and slavery.

Each story is filmed in a different way, spanning from black and white to animated pieces to communicate each unique experience. Each girl was paired with a writer from her own country to record her story, while a well-known actor narrated each story. A few included Anne Hathaway, Cate Blanchette and Meryl Streep. In between stories, harsh facts and figures about the reality of women’s education were illustrated, including the shocking fact that more than 66 million girls around the world do not receive a proper education.

Maggie Linz, a sophomore in the Women’s College, had this to say upon viewing the film: “Watching Girl Rising made me appreciate my education at Notre Dame. It’s disappointing that parents sell their girls to provide more opportunities for their boys.”

Hopefully, the screening of Girl Rising at Notre Dame was able to open up others to a dialogue and be reminded of how important education-especially for women-really is.