Beyond Borders: Building Safe Spaces for Girls and Improving Education at the Border

This project aims to improve the realization of the right to safe gender-responsive quality learning for girls between the ages of 5 and 18 affected by the crisis and conflict in the Colombia-Venezuela border. This project responds to two major humanitarian crises facing Colombia the migratory crisis caused by the arrival of millions of Venezuelan mixed migrants; and the internal armed conflict which has existed for over 50 years and resulted in more than 8 million internally displaced people. Project activities include: (1) promoting community social and behaviour change communication and enrolment campaigns to promote girl’s education; (2) supporting community clubs and safe spaces where out-of-school girls can build positive social life skills and facilitate a transition to education institutions; (3) providing training to girls on socio-emotional and like skills gender equality gender-based violence (GBV) participation and educational rights; (4) distributing essential resources needed to access education such as menstrual hygiene management kits; (5) mapping referral routes to child protection and adolescent sexual and reproductive health services; (6) providing training to teachers on gender-responsive teaching and learning strategies; and (7) developing local and national public awareness campaigns to address xenophobia and discrimination. The project’s primary beneficiaries are crisis-affected girls between the ages of 5 and 18 in and out-of-school and at risk of not realizing their right to education and learning. This project expects to reach 30 403 direct beneficiaries including 1 022 women 746 men and 28 635 children between the ages of 5 and 18 (of which 15 755 are girls).

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) increased equitable access to safe quality gender-responsive and inclusive education for crisis and conflict-affected girls adolescent girls and women along the Venezuelan border region of Colombia; (2) improved equitable provision of innovative gender-responsive and evidence-based formal and non-formal education for girls and women along Colombia-Venezuela border; and (3) improved policy planning implementation and coordination at local and national levels for safe quality and gender-responsive education for crisis and conflict-affected girls in the Venezuelan border region of Colombia.