1. Cash Cayen spends a lot of time at the local library in Timmins, Ontario. She was excited when she saw it was going to offer a session about robotics, and went to sign up. But the library said she wasn’t allowed — it’s for boys only.
2. Here’s the ad for the July 20 “Special boys program” in the library’s summer program for kids.
3. Cayen and her mother say they spoke to assistant library director Elaine De Bonis, and were told that boys’ academic and literacy skills “don’t improve over the summer break [and] therefore this program would only be offered to boys.”
“I explained that it was unfair that I was being denied this opportunity simply because I am a girl, but she insisted I could not register,” Cayen said.
4. So Cayen launched a petition to require the library to let her and other girls register for the session.
It attracted over 3,000 supporters, and Cayen was later invited to meet with the mayor, according to an update posted by her mother.