SLU student going to U.N. conference

CANTON — Before heading to Chile for the semester, Kenyan Grace A. Ochieng is making a stop at United Nations headquarters in Manhattan.

The St. Lawrence University junior is one of 23 women college students across the nation selected to go to the U.N. for a practicum in advocacy during the Commission on the Status of Women Conference. During her week at the U.N., Miss Ochieng will meet with officials from nongovernmental organizations and sit in on policy discussions.

"I'm really interested in women's issues and so having done stuff locally on a lower level, it's been really exciting," she said. "Now, I'm going to these conferences and seeing how these policies are made that affect the women at a local level."

During her sophomore year, she started a project in which women sew reusable menstrual sanitary pads to be sold to schoolgirls in her village of Lwala, in the southwestern corner of Kenya.

In Kenya, girls frequently have to miss school when they have their periods because they do not have access to sanitary pads. Since the project began, two American NGOs have partnered with Miss Ochieng to help the girls buy school uniforms and to help the women sew bags to hold the pads.

Though her interest in working with the U.N. predates her sewing project, part of Miss Ochieng's purpose for going to the Manhattan conference is to meet with other organizations to further what she has started.

"I know going to this would be a chance to meet some NGOs. It's a networking opportunity, trying to find other NGOs who have similar goals," she said. "It's always amazing to be surrounded by such people; they learn from you, you learn from them, but it's also a challenge."

She will be at the conference for a week, leaving Feb. 26, sandwiching it between a trip to Boston this week to finalize her visa and her departure Feb. 28 for Chile, where she will be studying until the summer. After three months in Chile, she hopes to be able to go home to see her family and check up on the sewing project.

"I'm amazed when I look back at the women from my village, how strong they are, how hard-working they are," said Miss Ochieng, who went to high school in New Hampshire. "From where I'm from, being a woman, it's really hard to get an education. Knowing that made my going through high school easier. I want these girls to have the same opportunity."

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Kenyan SLU student...