COSTA ALMERIA NEWS: Cantoria launches education initiative aimed at promoting equality

CANTORIA council has launched an education initiative aimed at promoting values of equality from the youngest age upwards.
Workshops, games, storytelling, theatre, music and video forums will be the kind of activities for children aged from three years old with the goal of installing values of an equal society without discrimination based on gender, race or religion.
The Equality School programme is designed to allow for putting into practice education models which undermine macho behaviour and gender-based violence.
“It is not enough to say that we have to do something, you have to act, and it is not enough to explain there are problems”, commented Cantoria Mayor Puri Sanchez.
The council head underlined the importance of education, and from a young age.
“That is what the Cantoria Equality School is about: teaching, from the very youngest, that we are, of course, all equal. That not only is society improved by learning to respect, but also by learning to defend that respect before anyone who is not capable of understanding it”, the Mayor added.
The activities are being organised by the council’s Equality department. Equality councillor Loly Cruz echoed the mayor’s views.
“We knew we had to act and it was not sufficient to be part of the VioGen system or to provide assistance to all women who come to us or to the social workers.
“It was our turn to start taking more definitive, long-term steps, which means an enormous time commitment, but which are as exciting as any other activity with a more immediate result”, the councillor explained.
The Equality School initiative is the first of its kind in the municipality, and is financed by the Equality Ministry under the State Pact Against Gender Violence action programmes.