This year, GENDER.ED and the Edinburgh University Students Association (EUSA) came together for the launch of the Undergraduate Feminist Trailblazers Awards and Blog Series. The Awards seek to recognise and celebrate the contribution of undergraduate students from the University of Edinburgh who are furthering the cause of feminism through important and impactful work. Nominations were invited from University of Edinburgh students and staff for these Awards. These nominations were then considered by a panel of judges from GENDER.ED and EUSA. This year, the panel consisted of GENDER.ED Steering Group member and ‘Understanding Gender in the Contemporary World’ course convenor, Dr Meryl Kenny, EUSA Vice President Education, Tara Gold and GENDER.ED’s Interim Director, Dr Radhika Govinda.
The panel identified the three award winners and two honourable mentions as follows:
Katie Horsburgh (Sociology, 4th year), for her focused and productive engagement in various areas of feminist political and social activity in Scotland, including her involvement with the National Advisory Council on Women and Girls, as well as her long-standing presence at Girlguilding Scotland and Edinburgh Rape Crisis.
Jaime Llorente Prada (International Relations and International Law, 3rd year), for their passionate work towards gender justice as Liberation Officer, and their dedication to the queer student community. Jaime has worked to implement the Gender Empowerment Fund, making a huge difference to marginalised students at Edinburgh.
Shy Zvouloun (LLB in Law with Honours, 4th year), for her work with GENDER.ED as this year’s Communications and Events intern. Her behind the scenes work at the hub has helped promote feminism by showcasing the valuable research and teaching in gender and sexuality studies being done at the university.
Pia Wahi-Singh (Medicine MBChB, 3rd year) for her work with the Association of Women Surgeons Edinburgh. Pia consistently advocates for gender equity and a reduction of gender-bias in surgery, as well as being the co-founder of Diverse Unified Real Global Action.
Rebecca Gascoigne (Spanish, 4th year), for her work with CERT (Contraception Education Reform Team), where she has coordinated a research project into stealthing and organised a campaign to criminalise the practise in Scotland.
The prize included a Blackwell’s book voucher worth £50 from GENDER.ED for each of the three award winners.
Look out for the individual blog posts profiling the winners— these posts will be released on the GENDER.ED blog over the course of the next few months! We are so excited to share with everyone more details about the phenomenal work that these trailblazers are doing and the impact they are having in Edinburgh and beyond. We will be announcing a fresh call for nominations for the Awards for AY2022-23 in January next year.
