Amanda Amaeshi - Inspiring others to use their voice

A Girlguiding Scotland advocate, Amanda Amaeshi, is in her final year of high school and has been doing a lot of activism around young girls through the First Ministers National Advisory Council on Women and Girls that she was chosen to be a part of.

In 2020 she was named the Glasgow Times Young Scotswoman of the year through her amazing work for her organisation.

Girlguiding Scotland is a big organisation with its movement of guides all over the world. It is one of the largest voluntary organisations for young women and girls to take part in.

First Ministers National Advisory Council on Women and Girls is a group of women of all kinds that advise the First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, on how best to tackle gender inequality.

It is a group that is made up of women ages 16 and above, who have different life experiences and voices to bring forward.

Young Amanda believes that everyone is empowering in their way but particularly for her she is not afraid to speak out, for example in her activism or even at school.

She has been able to inspire people from ethnic minorities and women in general through her work and campaigning as well as speaking out for what’s right, especially being a woman of colour herself.

She was able to inspire these minority groups to also not be afraid to speak out and fight for what they care about.

When asked about who she finds most empowering, Amanda stated that she finds the question to be difficult as there are so many inspiring women to list.

However, she kept it more personal with the answer by speaking about how her mum is her inspiration and someone who has taught her life lessons. She has also mentioned all the women and girls she met and gets to work with through Girlguiding.

Amanda mentioned that what makes women empowering is their resilience and they believe in what they fight for.

Facing difficult challenges and obstacles and being able to persevere to get to the end goal, the aim of what the person is fighting for, Amanda finds that to be remarkable.

When asked about what she thinks can make others feel empowering, she said

If you want to hear directly from Amanda and want to hear more, check out her podcast by clicking here.