Ambassador Girls scholarship Program

1. Ambassador Girls scholarship Program Presentation by Daphne Johnson AGSP Intern

2. AGSP

3. General Objectives of Study • To document lessons learned in implementation. • To identify and document AGSP’s best practices.

4. General Methodology • Interviews • Review of project documents. • Questionnaires to IPs including: FAWE Zanzibar, FAWE Uganda and Lead Chad. • Questionnaires issued out to junior mentors and mentees.

5. Summary of AGSP’s Successes

6. Objectives of the Lessons learned document • A document that summarizes the AGSP program. • Informs projects working in similar contexts. • Identifies lessons learned in implementation. • Identifies challenges that still remain for intervention.

7. LL Findings cont’d • Girls’ scholarship program is necessary for increased school access and success. • A scholarship program for girls must consider and target the myriad of obstacles that collectively discourage girls’ education. • Leveraging community and religious leaders’ local power reduce cultural paradigms that impede girls’ education. • The selection process of beneficiaries must be transparent and inclusive of communities to minimize threats to successful implementation. • Scholarship program implemented in partnership with the communities yields sustainable outcomes.

8. LL Findings cont’d • Mentoring has a profound sustainable impact on girls and boys and this impact extends beyond academic success. • It is imperative to strengthen local partners’ capacities for successful implementation.

9. LL- Challenges for action • There is a need to shift focus to quality education. • Full scholarship packages are needed to increase girls’ retention and completion levels. • Exit strategy must be incorporated into scholarship program design and implementation. • Inadequate baseline and subsequent impact data may hinder future investments in girls’ education.

10. Best Practices Identified • Creation of economic opportunities for parents in Tanzania and Chad to sustain girls’ education post AGSP. • Establishment of a Junior Mentoring component in Uganda to complement adult mentoring. • Collaboration with mothers in Chad, the DRC and Tanzania to eliminate socio-cultural barriers to girls’ education and foster girls’ active participation in school.

11. Best Practice Topics • Dare to Hope: How Mothers in Zanzibar Are Giving Girls the Opportunity to Dream And to Hope. Status of girls’ education in Zanzibar • Net primary enrollment close to parity at 80 percent. • High repetition and dropout rates and low attendance rate among girls especially at the upper primary and secondary levels. Reasons • Poverty. • Early marriages and early motherhood. • Heavy reproductive responsibilities. • High opportunity costs.

12. Best Practice cont’d • Income generating activities started in 2005 among parents of AGSP scholars. • Activities include: petty trading, ferry ride and micro-credit. • Trainings were conducted in book-keeping and management prior to the start of the activity and seed funding of 200,000 Tzs ($132) was provided. • Groups doing well: Micro-credit group presently has almost a thousand dollars in savings and some members of the group have started their own micro-enterprises. The group operating the ferry has paid off the loan acquired to purchase the boat and similarly has significant savings in their account.

13. Best Practice Continued Outcomes: • AGSP scholars who will be in school after the program ends can continue their education till completion. • Proceeds from the activities complement families’ income and welfare. • School materials and uniforms are awarded to non-AGSP scholars to motivate them to stay in school. • Extra school costs that are not incorporated into AGSP’ scholarship packages are now being paid for from proceeds from the income-generating activities. • Practice of early marriages is almost non-existent among AGSP scholars.

14. Best practice continued • AGSP Junior Mentors Motivate Girls to Accomplish Their Goals. Status of girls’ education in Uganda • Girls’ secondary school enrollment lag behind girls’. • Highest school dropout rate in East Africa. Reasons • Poverty. • High priority for early marriages. • High percentage of teenage pregnancies

15. Best Practice cont’d • FAWEU established the Former FAWEU Beneficiaries Association (FFBA) in 2003. Referred to as the AGSP Alumni since 2006. • Comprised of university graduates and young professionals. • The goal include: “guidance in career choices, support of the mentoring program and promoting the education of disadvantaged girls”. • Trainings were conducted by FAWEU in: mentoring, behavior change strategy and HIV/AIDS knowledge. • Their activities include: mentoring, school visits, psycho-social support and local advocacy.

16. Best practice continued Outcomes • Girls are informed about relevant issues. • Mentees’ leadership capabilities are emerging. • Junior mentors are perceived as role models and they inspire girls to accomplish their goals (“although my mentor is more business-minded which is not my orientation, I like the way Grace (junior mentor) uses the circumstances around her and turn them into opportunities…if she could make it despite the hardships, I will make it as well”) • The junior mentors serve as support pillars to the girls which enable girls to share their difficulties and junior mentors to advise and support. • Together with other components of AGSP, junior mentoring has contributed to high completion and performance outcomes for girls. • Junior mentoring and its outcomes will be sustained through diverse fundraising activities undertaken by the AGSP alumni.

17. Best practice continued • Mothers’ Associations Influencing Leaders, Parents and Systems to Advance Girls’ Education in Chad. Status of girls’ education in Chad: • Girls’ net enrollment, attendance and completion ratios are lower than boys’. • The demand for girls’ education is less than the demand for boys’ education due to socio-cultural and economic reasons like: poverty, interpretations of religion to impede girls’ education, early marriages, high opportunity costs and weak institutional incapacities. • Mothers determined to support education but with inadequate resources.

18. Best practice continued • Presently, there are 63 mothers’ associations working with Lead Chad to eliminate the socio-cultural barriers that limit girls’ active participation in education. • The mothers’ were trained by Lead Chad in management, advocacy and book-keeping. • Have been empowered to address the multifarious socio-cultural, economic and institutional barriers to girls’ education. • Advocate at the leadership, community and household levels to change attitudes, reduce early marriages, decrease heavy female domestic burdens and increase girls’ enrollment, attendance and completion.

19. Best practice continued Outcomes • Public declaration of support for girls’ education by local and religious leaders. • Household campaigns result in reduced early marriages and domestic burdens and improved attendance. • Management of schools in the communities with an impact on demand for girls’ education. • Creation of income-generating enterprises to sustain the activities of the AMEs and to sustain girls’ education post AGSP.

20. conclusion Comments or Questions? Thank You