EMPOWERING 800 SCHOOL GIRLS HYGIENE IN LILONGWE

INTRODUCTION

Go for girls project aims at Retaining girls in school by providing them with hygienic sanitary pads. Affordable and hygienic sanitary protection is not available to many girls in school. They resort to the use of unhygienic rags which puts them at risk of infections. Statistics shows that girls do not attend classes 4-5 days a month or dropout completely because they do not have good sanitary equipment which they can use and remain in school as they are menstruating

PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION

During the last quarter, the government of Malawi temporarily closed schools for almost 2 months due to the drastic rise in the number of Covid19 cases. This made it hard for us to execute the monthly planned activities because the activities that we conduct depend on the school calendar. As you are aware; Go for girls is a project that targets school girls to be in school even when they are in their menstrual periods by basically providing them with re-usable sanitary pads and having talks with them on issues that surround them. The girls also attend trainings on mask sewing so that they get the long term knowledge and skills in sewing.

Below is a brief summary of the activities that we managed to do.

Girl Talk

Girl talk is simply a focus group discussion with female students. During these discussions we tackle different issues such as HIV related issues, carrier guidance and counseling. During these discussion the students are given chance to ask questions that bothers them and issues that stresses them. The girl talk sessions are conducted in all the 8 targeted secondary schools from Lilongwe

The corona virus pandemic made some girls to give up on school as they were on a very long break that resulted in early marriages, unwanted pregnancies hence an increase in school dropout rate. This made BFM to schedule for Girl talk sessions.

In October and November, 2020 I had a girl talk session at Falls Secondary school. Most girls attended the session and they were very interactive through their openness in presenting situation they are going through and asking questions. Among other things, the session centered much on thanking them for taking care of themselves while schools were closed and encouraging them to work hard in school even if the schools have been on and off, career guidance and HIV related issues.

This is one of the activities where we provide carrier guidance, counseling health and HIV related issues amongst school girls in secondary school where the project is implemented.

In the Month of October we managed to visit Falls Secondary school where we had session with the girls. Their participation was very good; they were opening up, commenting and asking questions on different issues affecting a school girl child.

Assisting school girls at KAps with Sanitary pads

Go for girls’ project assist school girls at KAps Schools with Sanitary pads as others do come to school not well prepared for their menses. There is no need for them to go back home because their monthly period has started, we provide them with sanitary pads and let them continue to attend classes, this is One of the main goals of the project- attaining girls in school.

However, our main challenge is transportation since the targeted schools are in rural areas. Visiting them frequently has never been possible due to lack of resources to carter for that.

CONCLUSION

The programme of retaining girls in school is going on well and we would like to thank you so much for your endless support to Building Futures in Malawi that has fostered implementation of the project. You have changed lives for some Malawian girls and we hope to see the girls successful in future. Go for girls project will continue with its activities and we hope to reach as many girls as possible