The new issue of Positive News is out now, and features a number of inspiring achievements. Here are some of the firsts you’ll find in the magazine
The new issue of Positive News is out now, and features a number of inspiring achievements. Here are some of the firsts you’ll find in the magazine
Toymaker Mattel has produced a blind Barbie to “allow even more children to find a doll that represents them”. It comes complete with a cane and, following testing with blind and low-vision children, is dressed in clothing that has tactile fabric detailing.
Disability activist Lucy Edwards (pictured), who lost her eyesight aged 17 due to a rare genetic disease, said it could help young people accept their blindness.
Image: Mattel
The environmentalist and barrister Paul Powlesland made history in July when he became the first member of a UK jury to swear an oath on river water. Powlesland (pictured), the co-founder of Lawyers for Nature, explains in this issue why he considers the River Roding to be sacred, and the “magic” that happens when you get to know an aspect of nature in intimate detail.
Image: Anselm Ebulue
Secondhand fashion is in the spotlight at the moment, with preloved clothing recently playing a star role at London Fashion Week. Our new issue delves deeper into one of the exhibitors at The Good Clothes Show, which recently unfolded in Birmingham. The brand new event has drawn inevitable comparisons to the former Clothes Show Live, which ran for 20 years until 2014. The mission of those behind the new show is to inspire positive change in the mainstream market by bridging pop culture and sustainable fashion.
Image: The Good Clothes Show
Beavers have given birth in London for the first time in four centuries thanks to a reintroduction programme. In what is being called “a huge advancement in urban rewilding”, the birth of two kits in the capital follows the successful return of beavers to London by the Ealing Beaver Project. The news features in this issue’s ‘good figures’ section, in which we crunch the numbers on some of the quarter’s most buoyant breakthroughs.
Image: Cathy Gilman
Another encouraging numeral to make our news section is 35,000: the number of pupils at the Ormiston academies trust who will be the first in England to go phone-free. The national academy chain, which runs 44 state schools including 32 secondaries, has begun phasing out access to phones for pupils at all its schools across the country. Eight secondaries have adopted the policy as of the autumn term and the rest will follow, after liaising with parents.
Image: SeventyFour
Sweden has passed a law allowing grandparents to take paid parental leave to care for their grandchildren. Under it, a parent couple will be able to transfer up to 45 days of their parental leave to a grandparent (for single parents it’s 90 days). Sweden was the first country to introduce paid parental leave for fathers in 1974. It’s also famously generous with its allowance, with both parents together getting 480 days’ leave per child: 390 paid at full salary and 90 paid at 180 kroner (£13 per day). The pushback against smartphones in school is gaining momentum amid research linking them with mental health issues in young children. France is trialing a phone ban at 200 secondary schools, while the Netherlands outlawed the devices at schools in January.
Image: Miodrag Ignjatovic
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New issue out now
From our cover story about the wildlife protectors who are each dedicated to a single species, to how AI could save the planet – discover all the good news that matters, in the Oct-Dec issue of Positive News magazine.
