Leading by example, the Paradise College encourages both male and female students to participate in all subject activities together without discrimination.
This factor was revealed by the School Principal, Safak Delismail, during the observance of the International Women’s Day Celebrations on Wednesday 8th March, 2023.
Delismail said after considering to celebrate the IWD, all 380 high school student body from grades 7 to 12 at Paradise College in Port Moresby had the opportunity to listen and benefit from the experience sharing of five women leaders who were invited to a panel discussion on Gender Equality, under the International Women’s Day theme of “DigitALL, Innovation and Technology for gender equality”.
As a naturalized citizen who had lived in PNG since 2009, Mr Delismail reckoned Papua New Guinea has been changing for the better.
“I came here in 2009 and now there’s huge difference. So women are also fighting to make sure that their place is recognized in the society, and in our school when I see performing students male and female, the females are performing better than the males at the moment.”
“In the classroom they are more hardworking, more focused but they have to be recognized and they have to be reminded that they can play bigger role in the society. They can have saying in whatever is happening in the country,” he added.
Mr Delismail said holding this event also will give them some confidence because they met with the real figures in society.
What is Paradise College doing in its contribution to developing leadership?
Mr Delismail said they enroll selected students from grades 9 to 12 one period every week attending ‘Leadership classes and they had invited, Believe Institute from Melbourne to partner with them in running special leadership course. Believe Institute provide the instructor, for one period of leadership class.
“And it’s a beautiful, beautiful class. They discuss about cases of real happenings and students share their thoughts freely during the class and they make decisions under pressure. What I observed through this classes students have changed. For example last two years we are having less discipline problems, students become more responsible. They have more initiatives. They organize things by themselves so it helped a lot,” he added.
These skills were observed during the discussion panel on the International Women’s day on Wednesday 8th March when the College invited women leaders in the community to come and talk to the students.
The students both male and female and from all grades were boldly standing up and participating in the discussions, asking relevant and intelligent questions to the issue of leadership in women.
Mr Safak said that the leadership class that the students are receiving from Melbourne is changing their lives.
For instance the selected students for leadership, about 8 of them in grade 11 are now tutoring the interested students from grades 9 & 10.
Thus bringing in the respectable women as the four from the community is not new but just building on what the school is already investing in grooming the youngsters in leadership.