Grand Mother for Change Project Uganda

The project activities focused on grandmothers as the agents of change for villages to address harmful practices and factors that escalate modern-day problems for adolescent girls. Grandmothers are trained and empowered to be the central figure in each village as the catalyst for changing thinking and customs at the village level.

Grandmothers are key to the program because they have respect in their villages, with both the village elders and with the younger women and children. They are the vessels that carry the traditional songs, dances and stories of the village, and they offer wisdom to the young women who are marrying or having children. They have the respect of their sons who will not refuse them. If grandmother leaders can see the harm of early marriage and the benefits of more education for girls, their voices will be heard.

This program is comprised of four activities:

Designed and developed leadership exercises to train grandmother leaders to train other grandmothers.

conduct workshop to train experienced grandmother leaders to lead groups and teach other grandmothers to be leaders and advocates for adolescent girl health and safety issues. Five experienced grandmother leaders, drawn from past projects and acting facilitators, and two women from the local teacher association will be brought to for the train-the-trainer session. Leadership topics include democratic leadership, role of effective leaders, conflict resolution and participatory evaluation techniques of community activities. Key issues addressed in the materials include menstruation, reproduction, contraception, early/forced marriage, teen pregnancy, FGM, adolescent nutrition and HIV/AIDS.

The project staff reassessed knowledge and attitudes of the participating facilitators to measure how much the project experience has changed how the grandmothers feel about harmful practices on adolescent girls.