Earlier this week elementary school students gathered at the PCU Centre in Portage La Prairie for the Generating Momentum Conference put on by the Manitoba Council for International Cooperation. 4 to 7 of these conferences are put on each year in Manitoba and give students from different schools the opportunity to get together to gain leadership skills, talk about global issues and participate in creative workshops.

The theme of this year's conference was gender equality and MCIC public engagement specialist Keana Rellinger explains it was an interesting subject to cover with the Portage students.

"Gender equality needs to exist everywhere so it was really interesting seeing them engaged in that. We talked a lot about gender roles, gender norms, how to break out of those barriers and also how that looks within Canada and abroad. They did amazing at it, we had a lot of great responses."

Yellowquill student Kelsey Lavallee took part in the conference and explains what stood out for her about the issues discussed.

"Boys also have these issues to worry about and it doesn't just affect girls and women. I always just hear about [gender inequality] affecting women and I never hear about it affecting men so it just surprised me."

Alexis Kennedy and Kelsey Lavallee (photo by Rae Hathaway)Yellowquill student Alexis Kennedy also participated in the conference and notes her school has been a part of the MCIC for the past few years. She explains some of the things her school's social justice group has done to raise awareness for the issues brought forth by the MCIC.

"Our social justice did a water week where we felt what it was like to carry water like the people [do] when they have to go get water and carry it all the way to their families. And [we did] a cereal week where we donated it for a hunger campaign."

She adds this year they'll do something relating to equality.