International Day of the Girl Child

Girls’ Progress = Goals’ Progress: What Counts for Girls
The world’s 1.1 billion girls are part of a large and vibrant global generation poised to take on the future. Yet the ambition for gender equality in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) highlights the preponderance of disadvantage and discrimination borne by girls everywhere on a daily basis. Only through explicit focus on collecting and analyzing girl-focused, girl-relevant and sex-disaggregated data, and using these data to inform key policy and program decisions, can we adequately measure and understand the opportunities and challenges girls face, and identify and track progress towards solutions to their most pressing problems.

With this in mind, the theme for this year’s International Day of the Girl (11 October) is Girls’ Progress = Goals’ Progress: What Counts for Girls. While we can applaud the ambition and potential of the SDGs for girls, and recognize how girls’ progress is good not only for girls, but also for families, communities and society at large, we must also take this opportunity to consider how existing gaps in data on girls and young women, lack of systematic analysis, and limited use of existing data significantly limit our ability to monitor and communicate the wellbeing and progress of half of humanity.

Much more can and needs to be done to harness the data required to ensure programs, policies and services effectively respond to the specific needs of girls. When we invest in girls’ health, safety, education and rights – in times of peace and crisis – we empower them to reach for their dreams and build better lives for themselves and their communities. Only when investments in programs for girls on issues that particularly affect them – due to both their age and gender – are complemented with corresponding investments in data on girls, can we make real progress towards greater accountability in domains of critical importance to them.

http://www.un.org/en/events/girlchild/index.shtml

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Strengthening Support to LGBTIQ Adolescents

Policy Report on the Rationale and Scope for Strengthening Support to Adolescents Who Are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Intersex or Questioning

About this Report:

This policy report forms one part of a broader scoping exercise on why and how Plan International could strengthen its programme, advocacy and institutional support to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex and questioning (LGBTIQ) adolescents.

The scoping exercise also included mapping and analysing the legal, social and other challenges and opportunities facing LGBTIQ adolescents in the world.

During the process, many of the findings from this broader scoping were found to have meaning and value for other organisations and institutions who are considering how to progress in relation to LGBTIQ adolescents.

This policy report is presented with the intention of sharing learning and promoting discussion amongst CSOs, NGOs, Governments, Donors and the international development community at large.

Methodology:

1. Literature review: A web-based review was conducted of over 100 resources (such as research papers, toolkits and policy reports) of relevance to LGBTIQ adolescents and the work of Plan. They were sourced from Plan and a range of other organisations, including international NGOs, United Nations (UN) agencies, research institutions and LGBTIQ groups.

2. Stakeholder interviews: A total of 41 interviews were carried out. These targeted: 31 representatives of Plan (from Country Office, Regional Office, National Office and International Headquarters); and 10 of external organisations, such as the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), Care International, Stonewall and the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DfID).

3. Plan workshop: A one-day workshop was held at Plan UK in October 2014. It involved over 25 (in-person and virtual) participants from within Plan (Country Office, Regional Office, National Office and International Headquarters), as well as selected external organisations. The day included presentations from Plan office in Brazil, Central America, Geneva and Thailand and provided opportunities for open discussion and debate.

Read the full report here…

A cluster randomized-controlled trial of a community mobilization intervention to change gender norms and reduce HIV risk in rural South Africa: study design and intervention

Abstract
Background: Community mobilization (CM) interventions show promise in changing gender norms and preventing HIV, but few have been based on a defined mobilization model or rigorously evaluated. The purpose of this paper is to describe the intervention design and implementation and present baseline findings of a Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) of a two-year, theory-based CM intervention that aimed to change gender norms and reduce HIV risk in rural Mpumalanga province, South Africa.

Methods: Community Mobilizers and volunteer Community Action Teams (CATs) implemented two-day workshops, a range of outreach activities, and leadership engagement meetings. All activities were mapped onto six theorized mobilization domains. The intervention is being evaluated by a randomized design in 22 communities (11 receive intervention). Cross-sectional, population-based surveys were conducted with approximately 1,200 adults ages
18–35 years at baseline and endline about two years later.

Conclusions: This is among the first community RCTs to evaluate a gender transformative intervention to change norms and HIV risk using a theory-based, defined mobilization model, which should increase the potential for
impact on desired outcomes and be useful for future scale-up if proven effective.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02129530

 

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