Christina in Burkina... IN TOGO!: June 2010

14 June 2010

Mission Accomplished!

Actually, not quite yet... I’ve still got over $3000 to spend.

For those of you who contributed to the Life Skills project, you’ll be glad to know that by the end of June all of your money – if I do say so myself – will have been well-spent.

Here’s a rough summary of costs to give you an idea of how we organized this year-long project:
Training of trainers (November-December): $1700
Five-six months of classes and clubs: in-kind or free
Monitoring and follow-up: in-kind or free
Mid-term evaluation (April): $500
Final evaluation (June) including gifts of mentoring books and soccer balls for the Life Skills schools: $2800
Follow-up Project Design and Management training for school inspectors (July): $900
(Actually this last item is not your money but USAID funding)

Our final event will take place on June 29 and will involve not only all of the educators and tradesmen trained to teach Life Skills but also approximately two dozen representatives from NGOs or other international organizations that work in girls’ education and empowerment, HIV/AIDS, family planning or youth. Money originally budgeted to bolster classes and clubs (which turned out to be free) will now be used to host this large-scale event. We will invite local authorities and the press. There will be food and non-alcoholic drink. Most of all there will be lofty speeches and lots of extremely late-to-arrive important men.

Why organize such a protocol headache instead of just giving out LOTS of books and girls soccer balls as gifts? Sustainability. (Here’s hoping!) This workshop will be designed to showcase our “pilot program” before potential collaborators, donors and advocates. It will provide an opportunity for the people I have worked with to connect with other organizations with similar missions and interests.

The day will include presentations on our pilot project; a short peer-educator skit performed by students; two ice-breaker/ group challenges demonstrated by select apprentices; and the main event – a two hour debate (round table discussion?) on how Life Skills educators and attending organizations can collaborate.

I am excited about the project’s end and hoping hard that the event will be great. The people I’ve worked with are enthusiastic and generous but it is difficult to maintain motivation without some outside influence. They could teach Life Skills, or not. Frankly it’s easier to have a free period.

But if we get people talking, if Peace Corps gives this town volunteer replacements, if the trainers develop relationships with Population Services International, UNDP, Plan International and UNICEF… maybe this “pilot” education project will make a long-term dent.

Facts & Figures on Girls' Ed

Out-of-school children

• There are 115 million children out of school – the majority of them, 62 million, are girls – and 77 million children not enrolled in school. The difference represents the millions of children who are enrolling in but not attending school.

• Children from the poorest household are three times less likely to be in school than their counterparts in the richest households.

Gender parity

• There are now 94 girls in primary school for every 100 boys, up from 92 in 1999.

• Of the 181 countries with 2004 data available, two thirds have achieved gender parity in primary education.

• The gender gap remains particularly large in Afghanistan (44 girls in school for every 100 boys), the Central African Republic, Chad, Niger, Pakistan and Yemen.

Illiteracy

• There are 781 million illiterate adults, two thirds of them women, worldwide.

Early childhood

• Children whose mothers have no education are more than twice as likely to be out of school as children whose mothers have some education

• In developing countries, 75 per cent of the children not in primary school have uneducated mothers

• One additional year of schooling for 1,000 women helps prevent two maternal deaths.

• Early childhood care and education establishes a solid foundation for learning and makes both girls and boys ready to attend school at the right age. It also improves parents’ and caregivers’ readiness to send their children to school by equipping them with deeper knowledge and skills.

• More girls can attend and complete school if other children they need to care for are receiving early childhood care and education; this is particularly crucial for children affected by HIV and AIDS.

HIV and AIDS

• If all children received a complete primary education, around 700,000 cases of HIV in young adults could be prevented each year.

• Women represent 62 per cent of the 15- to 24-year-olds living with HIV and AIDS globally

• The burden of AIDS care falls especially heavily on women, and can limit educational and economic opportunities for women and girls.

• Higher education levels for girls are associated with a reduced risk of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

• 15.2 million children under age 18 have lost one or both parents to AIDS; 12 million of these children live in sub- Saharan Africa.

Violence

• Girls between 13 and 18 years old constitute the largest group exploited in the commercial sex industry. It is estimated that around 500,000 girls below 18 are victims

of trafficking each year.

• Female genital mutilation/cutting affects 130 million girls and women globally and places 2 million at risk annually.

• In some cultures, the preference for boy children results in prenatal sex selection and infanticide of girls. In India, there are 933 Indian women for every 1,000 men,

reflecting 40 million ‘missing’ women.

Emergencies

• More than 80 per cent of the world’s 35 million refugees and displaced people are women and children.

• Emergencies put women at risk of extreme sexual violence and abuse. In Rwanda, 2,000 women, many of whom were survivors of rape, tested positive for HIV during the five years following the 1994 genocide.

In addition to its benefits for girls and women, education is a uniquely positive force with a wide-ranging impact on society and human development. Educated girls can better protect themselves against HIV, trafficking and abuse, and are more likely to grow up to have healthier families and send their children to school.

From United Nations Girls' Education Initiative