Girl’s Education Movement (GEM) Clubs

Background

The school sanitation program is designed to protect the rights of girls, boys and women to improved sanitation, hygiene and safe water in realization of the rights of children to learning, survival and development. The program aims at contributing to the national priority of improved water and sanitation coverage and girls’ enrolment, and reduced drop out rates. This includes reducing the pupil / stance ratio, separate facilities for girls and boys, in primary schools from 328:1 to 40:1, ensure that at least one female and one male teacher in every school facilitates hygiene behaviour and; ensuring that child- to-child activities on sanitation and hygiene take place in primary schools.

The convention on the rights of the child (CRC), which has been ratified by most of the world, including Uganda, provides that children have a right to safe environment for enhanced learning, health and development of good citizens. To date over 260 schools have been reached with over 600 children so far trained and up to 2500 GEM members in 16 districts.

The inputs required are training of children, giving a water tank, bathroom and sanitary towels to the school after training has been done for 3 days.

Methodology

Child participation is key. Various means of involving the young people are used. Children need to get involved in the issues that concern them because they are the experts in this. Various health clubs are being promoted like school health/ sanitation clubs, child rights clubs and Girl Movement (GEM clubs.

GEM is a child-centered, girl- led global movement of children and young people whose goal is to bring about positive social transformation in Africa by empowering girls through education. It is a movement and operates through groups of children and young people in schools and communities with girls taking the lead; boys acting as strategic allies while the adults –women and men-provide the wisdom of age .It is these groups that subsequently make the decision on how to interact with and help one another at community, district, national, regional an international levels in co-operation with appropriate government, civil society and donor organizations.

From the start, young people were involved in different activities of the GEM launch conference. Fifty of these boys and girls from various schools and institutions of learning were equipped with exciting and highly creative facilitation skills that prepared them to play a leading role in the activities of the launch.

The Girls Education Movement (GEM) in Uganda has become a highly child-centered, girl- led grassroots movement for addressing barriers to girls’ education in Uganda. Girls have characteristically taken the lead in expanding school/ community strategies for getting girls into schools and have co-opted boys as strategic allies.

Peer Guidance and counseling

With the advent of GEM, another important aspect of pupils’ relationships has emerged. This is peer guidance and counseling and mentoring Girls who need counseling about issues like menstruation for example, find a willing ear in their peers. Children, especially those in leadership avail themselves to others for counseling.Older children have also taken on the responsibility of mentoring younger children, helping them cope with situations that would otherwise have been hard for them to deal with.

GEM income generating activities

Children have realized that they need a certain degree of self-reliance and have therefore taken to growing of vegetables, which they sell to get money to support their clubs activities. They also stage drama and music performances for the communities and these too earn them some incomes.

Outcomes

Improved facilities: As a result of GEM in action, schools are also increasingly providing special facilities for girls such as, separate latrines, bathrooms and sanitary materials and the government recently allowed schools to use part of the UPE funds for this.

Health has improved: The GEM clubs carry out hygiene education through training they receive from teachers. There the girl is taught proper ways of how to handle menstruation, good hygiene and they are expected to pass this information to their own daughters in future and thus prepare them to cope better as they grow up and therefore not to drop out of school.