Supporting Transition Retention and Training for Young Girls C-19 - 2020 to 2024

The project aims to strengthen the capacities of adolescent girls and young women and the broader education system that supports them. The project targets socio-economic barriers that are worsened by the lingering crisis in Zimbabwe prohibiting girls’ sustained engagement in secondary education and/or training and their successful transition into adulthood. Project activities include: (1) establishing mechanisms to spread awareness and information campaigns such as Social Analysis Actions groups and peer platforms; (2) facilitating safe spaces in schools and communities for girls to discuss adolescent sexual reproductive health; (3) developing a women and girls mentorship program and network for career academic psychosocial and leadership support; and (4) strengthening advocacy skills and capacities for girls and boys to engage school authorities’ response to their needs and rights including those of girls and boys with disabilities. The project works to bring together the school community system (schools school development committees parents women and male learners local leaders authorities at the local and national levels) to define their own vision and plan for building resilient schools and systems relevant to the Zimbabwean context that are risk aware safe and innovative. The project received additional funding to address keys issues and barriers worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic. This includes an increase in unequal distribution of unpaid care work; barriers to girls’ education and risk of non-return after school closures; loss of income opportunities; an increase in gender-based violence and intimate partner violence; limited and unequal access to health care and sexual and reproductive health services. Access to the additional COVID response activities seeks to directly reach 5 750 people including 1 250 secondary school girls 1 250 women parents and guardians 1 000 young women teenage mothers and people living with disabilities and 2 25

The expected outcomes for this project include: (1) increased support through educational materials and menstrual hygiene supplies to ensure learners especially girls and those living with disabilities go back to school; (2) improved health and psycho-social support for COVID-19-affected young women and girls; (3) increased economic opportunities for young women including those living with disabilities to lessen the effects of unpaid work; and (4) increased awareness of social norms regarding unpaid work and the impact of COVID-19 on vulnerable young women and girls.