At a school like Penn where everyone is constantly rushing from one activity to the next, clothes that are multi-purpose are a must. Heading straight from class to Pottruck or Flywheel is no longer out of the question thanks to the new ath-leisure trend that sports brands are embracing. However, these versatile and cute clothing items often come at pretty high prices, especially from brands like Lululemon and Athleta. But, what if I told you that you could buy Athleta gear at a huge discount and contribute to a great cause while doing so? Enter Schoola, an online retailer that sells clothes from socially conscious brands at huge discounts while giving a percentage of proceeds to specific charities around the world. Athleta recently donated thousands of sweatshirts, sweaters, and pairs of running leggings (in awesome colors) to ‘Schoola’ to create the Athleta for Malala collection. When you buy workout clothes from this collection, 40% of the proceeds go to the Malala Fund.
In case you aren’t already sold on the idea, I’ll tell you about the Malala Fund and all the good it does. The fund was founded by the 19-year-old Nobel Prize-winner Malala Yousafzai and her father, Ziauddin, with the goal of educating girls in parts of the world where women can’t and don’t receive the same level and quality of education as their male counterparts. In the words of the Malala Fund, their goal is “to enable girls to complete 12 years of safe, quality education so that they can achieve their potential and be positive change-makers in their families and communities.” This goal is personal for the Yousafzai family. They live in Pakistan, which possesses the second highest number of children who don’t attend school in the world. Ziauddin Yousafzai ran a school in Swat, the district of Pakistan where his family lives, and was a constant and outspoken opponent of Taliban policies restricting education, especially those aimed at stopping girls from going to school. Malala grew up with a family who supported her efforts to get an education wholeheartedly, and at age 12 she began her career as an education activist by writing a blog for the BBC about her experiences and fears pertaining to the restrictive education system in Pakistan. Shortly after, Ziauddin was forced to close his school. However, this did not deter the Yousafzai family, who continued to speak out in favor of education for girls. Around this time, Malala shed her anonymity as the writer of the BBC blog and was also featured in a New York Times documentary. Her newfound fame came with rewards (she was awarded the first National Youth Peace Prize in Pakistan in 2011) and great risks—in response to her growing repute, Taliban leaders voted to kill her. On October 9, 2012, Malala was taking the bus home from school when a gunman boarded the bus and asked for her by name, then proceeded to shoot her at close range. She survived her injuries and recuperated in the UK while her name spread across the world like wildfire, triggering widespread protests across Pakistan and eventually the ratification of Pakistan’s first Right to Free and Compulsory Education Bill.
One year after the attack, Malala Yousafzai founded the Malala Fund to create awareness about the need for improved women’s education as well as to empower girls in disadvantaged circumstances to realize their full potential through schooling. The Fund provides a platform for girls around the world to speak out against education discrimination, invests in organizations that are providing quality education to girls at the local level, and supports the advocacy work of Malala and her father along with many others. If you’d like to read more about the Malala Fund and its cool projects, please visit www.malala.org.
Athleta believes strongly in the Malala Fund’s goal, and therefore has donated lots of workout clothing to Schoola so that girls with the #firstworldproblem of workout clothing being too pricey can simultaneously get their clothing for a lower price and help out with a real world problem. If you want to empower girls all over the world and help improve education standards in undeveloped developing countries, and if you also want cool running crops for less than 25 dollars, then you need Schoola in your life. Go ahead and buy as much as you want guilt-free—the prices are insane, and it’s for a great cause! I’d keep checking back to Schoola as well, because more and more brands (think ModCloth, etc) are following Athleta’s example and donating. Shoutout to Athleta and Schoola for taking the social responsibility of businesses seriously and taking on the very worthy cause of global education for girls.
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