Our Themes
EMPOWERED TO EMPOWER
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Empowering girls to stay in school, enjoy education, and excel academically to their desired dreams.
The girls in the program teach, share their experiences, strength, challenges and what they have learnt and how they have applied it in their personal lives, academics and their communities to other girls in school and in their communities.
They do this during seminars, community outreach and events, by having small businesses during holidays, vegetable gardens, improved academics, and peer pressure resistance, standing against negative cultural practices and improvement in self-awareness and self-esteem are some of the areas in which the girls testify.
EMPOWERED TO INSPIRE
Empowering girls to live their dreams, lead their lives and communities to change.
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By inspiring girls to get their dream jobs, starting their own businesses, helping their families and inspiring their communities, success becomes contagious. The Empowered Girls alumina keep the torch burning wherever they go.
They have a responsibility of informing, inspiring and imparting other girls surrounding them.
They come back to their former schools to share their experience and testimonies of how the knowledge they received has helped transform their lives. These inspirational young women hold good jobs, go for further studies, take challenging courses, help their families, give back to their communities, and live their dreams. They are also given the opportunity to give back to their communities through EG through volunteering and internship.
MY STORY YOUR STORY
Involving the community in empowering girls, making everyone responsible and shaping their perception about girls’ value.
Women and youths from the community share their stories of success and their experience to inspire and encourage the girls. The stories are shared in accordance with the EG topics to help girls put into reality the theoretical part of our capacity building. Guest speakers bring expertise to shed more light and drive home the points from our lessons and seminars.
During the sessions the girls ask lots of personal, academic, spiritual, medical and life experience questions, which the experts answer. The guest speakers include gynecologists who talk about reproductive health, dermatologists who talk about skin problems and solutions, and elderly women who reinforce positive culture and traditions and advise on how to go about the negative ones.
COMFY PERIODS
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Empowering girls to know their bodies and how they work, and to have the sanitary supplies for comfortable menstrual health management.
Girls learn to appreciate and accept themselves as girls. The availability of sanitary pads enables girls to attend classes on a daily basis, boosts their self esteem, confidence and gives them a better chance to compete favorably in class – hence improved academic performance.
Each girl in our rural partner schools and all those who cannot afford pads in our urban schools get a monthly supply of pads. Girls are able to attend school each school day, be comfortable in class and concentrate more on their academics. Girls are also taught to make reusable pads to help their peers in the villages who do not have access or cannot afford to buy pads. As one of the members said, “I have a big smile on my face because I know I have pads each month, I do not have to check myself all the time and worry about shaming myself.”
CAPACITY BUILDING
​Enlighten, Equip and Empower girls to thrive through learning.
Enlighten girls about their bodies, worth, value, rights and potential.
Equip girls with tools to excel academically, to become leaders and to overcome the different challenges they face in their societies.
Empower girls with the courage and confidence they need to compete favorably and thrive.
We do this through weekly seminars on topics including personal health, study skills, life skills, culture and traditions, leadership, mindset, goal setting, healthy relationships, coping skills, and more.
The seminars are led by the EG mentors in coordination with the program director, the mentors led the girls to analyze the lessons, understand them so that they can relate and apply the lessons in their day today lives. The lessons are made fun with different activities and role-playing by the students.
EMPOWERED TO EXCEL
Stay in school, Enjoy school and Excel in school
Education is the greatest weapon against poverty and in order for the girls to live their dreams, they need to excel in their academics. With so many challenges, obstacles and hindrances to the girls like negative cultural and traditional practices, unhealthy relationships, limited cooperation from parents, lack of goals, and fixed mindset, school can become unpleasant.
We enlighten girls about having a growth mindset, goal setting, achievement and visioning to help the girls to keep focused, work hard and not give up on their education. The girls are shown techniques of reading and preparing for the exams; we also encourage the girls to form academic discussion groups where they help each other. Through the school's academic department, the girls who are not doing well are noted. We sit with the girls and try to find out what the problem is and then advise and find solutions accordingly. Academic achievements are celebrated, and girls who graduate top in their class are rewarded during the annual EG graduations.
EMPOWERED TO CONFIDENCE
When a girl knows her worth and value, she will take control of her life and nothing can stop her.
Lack of confidence, self awareness and low self-esteem limits girls from participating in class, making the right decisions, becoming leaders and living their full God-given potential. Topics like self-esteem, self-awareness, problem solving, critical thinking, conflict and resolution and peace building are a great catalyst in boosting the girls’ confidence and living in harmony with others.
Music, Dance, Drama (MDD) and fashion shows are an exciting part of the program.
Through MDD and fashion the girls express what they feel, how they want to be treated, the things they appreciate about themselves and in their society, and those that bring them down.
As girls show their creativity, confidence and self-expression is developed. The girls from the different clubs record audio albums, which are played on radio to send the message home in the society. As one of the girls puts it “Music and dancing makes me so happy, I can be myself when I sing or dance, above all, it makes me forget my problems and enjoy the moment.”
EMPOWERED GIRLS EVENTS
Celebrating girls and keeping them updated on women issues in the world makes them understand they are part of something bigger.
The girls are able to know about women and girl child rights, gender equality and the place of women in economic growth and development. Graduations, International Women’s Day, and International Day of the Girl are some of the events that EG recognizes.
Empowered Girls graduation ceremonies are the highlight of the year. The girls on that day celebrate the achievement of accomplishing the EG curriculum with the benefits of enlightenment, being equipped with knowledge and being empowered to thrive.
They share with other girls from other schools their stories of success, creating opportunities to learn from and inspire each other. The graduates are given certificates for their commitment and hard work during their time as members and others are rewarded for their extra effort in academics, discipline, creativity, commitment and leadership.
Celebrating International Women’s Day and International Day of the Girl keeps our members informed about women issues in the world.
EMPOWERED TO ENTREPRENEURSHIP
Empowering girls with skills to engage in activities that support their basic needs and livelihoods, and to start a lifetime of wise financial decisions.
Poverty is one of the biggest challenges in our communities. It deprives girls of the basic needs of life and distracts them from academics. From entrepreneurship training, some of the girls go on to train their parents who start up small businesses that hold families together and others go on to be great innovators. The clubs invite experts who train them on income generating activities that they can do even without big capital, using locally available materials. Big things start small.
MY COMMUNITY, MY INSPIRATION
Involving the community is an essential aspect in the empowerment of girls.
Every community has its culture and tradition. Members are enlightened on how to deal with the harmful cultural and traditional practices, and embrace the beauty of the positive aspects of their culture that make them who they are. Gender violence, gender discrimination, gender inequality have their roots in harmful cultural beliefs. Enlightening communities on the importance of educating, valuing and giving girls opportunities is very essential.
The school: The school plays a vital role in ensuring the program runs smoothly.
It provides us with the club guardians or matrons, allocates us time every week to work with the girls, discloses the girls academic results so that we can work with those whose performance is low, reinforces what has been taught to the girls, helps with monitoring and evaluation.
Parents: Through the Parent-Teacher meetings, we are given a chance to voice out the girls’ concerns to the parents in a way that makes the parents understand the girls. Parents sometimes need encouragement to provide their school needs, give moral support and take responsibility by being involved in the girls education – all this while avoiding the negative cultural practices that hinder the girls from performing well in school like taking dowry on girls while the girls are still in school, marrying them off when they don’t do well in school, and neglecting them. Parents are also very important in evaluation by giving feedback on the change in girls’ behavior at home and in their communities.
Government: The government plays an important role in giving us permission to work in the different schools and to make sure the program runs smoothly in accordance to the government rules and regulations and also to make sure that what we are teaching is in line with the government policies and our curriculum approved by the ministry in charge.
Community leaders: Religious leaders and cultural leaders play an important role in making sure the program succeeds to a great extent. They can help gain the acceptance of the change that we seek in society – that all can see the value and potential in girls, and become advocates for their empowerment.[1]
Enlightened boys: As a companion program to Empowered Girls, boys are enlightened on how to live with girls in harmony, about stereotypes, gender sensitivity, positive relationships, healthy competition, mindset and visioning. Boys come to see the girls as equally capable, valuable and worthy of respect.
Understanding what we do, accepting it and supporting it is very important.