Ahead of International Women’s Day (8 March), the Afghanistan and Central Asian Association (ACAA) hosted an ‘Empowering Marginalised Women conference’ at the Houses of Parliament on Monday 4 March.

The Afghanistan and Central Asian Association work to address key issues as such as language barriers, advice and information and life skills. Their hope is that in supporting women, they can help women in supporting and empowering their children too.

The conference held on Monday shared ACAA’s findings from its Women’s Project and the wider work it does to support Muslim migrant and refugee women.

Gill Frigerio, Associate Professor at the Centre for Lifelong Learning presented at the conference: 'Pathways to employability? Career development for marginalised migrant women.' (View the PDF of the presentation here)

"I wanted to emphasise the importance of seeing programmes like this as careers work, and to expand policymakers’ view of career as individualistic and about linear progression in paid work." She says. "I shared some insights into intersectional understandings of women’s career development and spoke about how grassroots organizations like ACAA are so well placed to reach marginalised women, build trust and provide connections to other services."

Gill leads on the Centre’s qualifications in Career Studies and Coaching. She is module leader on a number of modules within the programmes on Career Development and Coaching Studies (CDCS) and Career Education, Information and Guidance in Higher Education (CEIGHE) and supervises dissertation students.

She specialises in covering theory and practice in career coaching; coaching and spirituality; learning from work experience and its contribution to career development; theoretical perspectives on employability and implications for policy and practice; placement design and management of higher education career and employability services.

"Although I knew quite a lot about ACAA having worked with Rabia Nasimi on a few activities, it was great to see their work in the context of wider support for marginalised women, in Afghanistan as well as the UK." Gill says.

"The other speakers were all very interesting and there were lots of good comments and questions from the attendees. The setting of the Houses of Parliament was possible because of a supportive MP and made for a sense of occasion, sharing the experiences of those on the margins with those at the centre of our politics."

To find out more about Gill's work, visit her staff profile. You can also find out about our Career Studies programmes and the work done by the ACAA.

Gill strikes the #Balanceforbetter pose, the theme of International Women's Day 2019