International Women's Day is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural ,and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity. Significant activity is witnessed worldwide as groups come together to celebrate women's achievements or rally for women's equality.

The campaign theme for International Women's Day 2021 is 'Choose To Challenge'. A challenged world is an alert world. And from challenge comes change. So let's all #ChooseToChallenge. Purple, green and white are the colors of International Women's Day. Purple signifies justice and dignity. Green symbolizes hope. White represents purity, albeit a controversial concept. The colors originated from the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in the UK in 1908.

Marked annually on March 8th, International Women's Day (IWD) is one of the most important days of the year to:

* celebrate women's achievements
* raise awareness about women's equality
* lobby for accelerated gender parity
* fundraise for female-focused charities

International Women’s Day is a time to reflect on progress made, to call for change, and to celebrate acts of courage and determination by ordinary women, who have played an extraordinary role in the history of their countries and communities.

Despite great progress, legal restrictions have kept 2.7 billion women from accessing the same choice of jobs as men. Less than 25 per cent of parliamentarians were women, as of 2019. One in three women experience gender-based violence, still. Let's continue to strive for progress.

Visit our page - Female Pioneers in Cryptology & Related Fields (see LINK below) to learn more about amazing women in history. And as we celebrate Women's History Month during the month of March - stay tuned to our social media channels to learn about the female pioneers of American cryptology and cybersecurity.