- schools
KidsCan welcomes Government’s free period products programme
Thu, 18 Feb 2021
Period inequity is creating huge anxiety in our already vulnerable young girls. It is a barrier to an education they desperately need to get out of poverty.
KidsCan welcomes the Government’s announcement today that free period products will be provided to all New Zealand students who need them.
“In New Zealand no one should be missing school because they don’t have period products. It is a basic human right,” KidsCan’s CEO Julie Chapman says.
“Due to Covid-19, we have more families than ever forced to choose between buying period products or food. Period inequity is creating huge anxiety in our already vulnerable young girls. It is a barrier to an education they desperately need to get out of poverty.”
KidsCan has been providing free period products to schools since 2015. We provide free menstrual products and supporting educational materials in a youth-informed model designed to reinforce dignity and respect. Our programme reaches more than a third of public schools in New Zealand and last year we distributed over 130,000 packs of products to students across the country. In 2020 KidsCan supported four Waikato schools as part of Government’s Phase 1 Access to Free Period Products Waikato Trial.
KidsCan shares Government’s aim of improved engagement, fewer young people missing school due to their period and reducing financial strain on families. We will continue to work towards the goal of ensuring no student goes without– we consider that access to period products is a necessity, not a luxury.
Related articles
&w=1080&q=90)
If our kids are hungry, how can they be expected to learn?
It always sticks with me. "What did you have to eat last night?" I asked an upset kid at interval, as I tried to get to the bottom of what was going on. "Red soup," he said. "Tomato soup?" I asked. If only.&w=1080&q=90)
"I worked my way out of poverty - but I'm the exception, not the rule"
I was one of the poor kids. I grew up in the era of Live Aid, so we never really thought of ourselves in that way - poverty happened in other countries.&w=1080&q=90)
How-to Dad: That's crap, New Zealand, let's help feed our kids
You know when you were a kid and when you didn't finish all your breakfast, and your Mum would say something like: "You know some kids in Africa don't have any breakfast".