Strengthening Adolescent Girls with Sex Education

Four Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights workshops for adolescent girls were completed between January 2022 and March 2022 at four different locations; Chitpore, Sickine and Khidirpore in Kolkata and Jonha in Jharkhand. Kolkata Sanved collaborated with three NGOs, Hope Kolkata Foundation, DIKSHA and Aahan Foundation to facilitate the above mentioned workshops. The workshops were facilitated with the youngsters with the aim of creating awareness on gender, sex, sexuality, safe sex, and safe and healthy relationships. A total of 69 youngsters participated in the workshops. The participants were mostly adolescent girls, however their overall age ranged from 11 to 20. The participants came from marginalized communities, residing in urban slums of Kolkata and tribal villages in Jharkhand. The workshop gave the participants an opportunity to discuss many taboo subjects like menstruation, sexual organs, sexuality, safe sex and romantic relationships and learn correct information about these topics which will help them to understand and look after their sexual and reproductive health. The workshops also gave the participants an understanding of gender, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation. During the sessions the participants reflected on their own lives and questioned the existing gender norms and were sensitized about diverse gender identities and sexual orientation. The workshops received positive feedback from the participants who shared that they learnt many new things from the sessions and will share their knowledge with their peers. 

Participants at khidirpore doing an activity on identifying safe space

Participants at Jonha doing a body mapping exercise