October 11th is International Day of the Girl-Child. This annual event started in 2011 with the mission “to help galvanize worldwide enthusiasm for goals to better girls’ lives, providing an opportunity for them to show leadership and reach their full potential.” Worldwide there is a large gender disparity in accessing education (girls face cultural and institutional barriers to formal education, resulting in much lower rates of participation in school and educational outcomes than boys). In Moldova girls and boys access and complete mandatory schooling at similar rates. School is mandatory through the end of 9th grade and approximately 4/5 of youth succeed in completing this. Research shows that while Moldovan girls are generally succeeding in overcoming the barriers they face around education, when they graduate they are not yet succeeding in overcoming barriers to employment, government leadership (though, Moldova has more women in elected office than the US), and wage discrimination. Peace Corps Volunteers throughout Moldova organized events and activities around International Day of the Girl to encourage conversation and leadership around gender inequality here and globally. At Boris Dînga Middle & High School, I posted and encouraged conversation about a display featuring global statistics about the status of girls and featuring photos of girls from our school participating in a Let Girls Learn photo project. In our local English club called ”Let's Talk" we watched and discussed this video. In particular, we discussed the issues of gender-based violence and how child marriage shows up in Moldova (content heads-up in link: sexual violence). A popular activity led by Volunteers was to invite girls to finish the sentence "I'm proud to be a girl because..." This picture is from a middle & high school in the village of Sărătenii Vechi.
You can read more about how International Day of the Girl was recognized in the US here. Check out these five recommended articles for US Americans to read about why this day matters.
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Rebecca LehmanHealth Education volunteer serving at Boris Dînga Middle & High School in Criuleni, Moldova. Archives
May 2017
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