Archive for category: Women

Information and news about woman issues

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Free High School in Nicaragua

High School in Nicaragua
In order to eliminate poverty, the impoverished must be educated. This is the philosophy practiced by Margaret Gullette, co-founder of the Free High School for Adults in Nicaragua. 12 years ago, Margaret, who resides in Newton, Massachusetts and is a resident scholar at Brandeis University, was volunteering in Nicaragua through the Newton-San Juan del Sur Sister City Project when she and another woman, Rosa Elena Bello, decided they wanted to start a literacy program.

“It’s a great story,” Margaret said as she recalled the details. “Rosa was working in a clinic for women and children, and infant mortality rate was not improving.” The two women believed that it would never improve without literacy. It is not enough just to donate money; the people must be educated.

In Nicaragua, one out of 10 people are illiterate, and this figure is even higher among women. The average Nicaraguan has less than five years of schooling and only 29 percent of children complete primary school. Much of this can be attributed to the poverty cycle. Until 1979 a dictator ruled Nicaragua, and dictators rely on ignorance to control the masses.  “Poverty and ignorance should always be put together,” Margaret explained. Because many adults who lived under that dictator’s rule and did not receive an education themselves, not only do they not have enough money to pay for school supplies and uniforms, but they often do not value education.

In order to begin the literacy program, Margaret applied for funding to 25 different grants. She received 24 rejections, but the one acceptance was all the two women needed. At first it was difficult to get Nicaraguan women involved in the program because their lives revolved around housework and children, but in the first three years nearly 300 women received certificates for the completion of sixth grade.

High school in Nicaragua runs from grade 7 to 11, so after the success with the sixth grade program, the next logical step was to continue the women’s education into high school. Once again Margaret found funding in America, and the following year (2002) a free high school for adults opened. 12 people graduated that year and the number has been growing ever since. The high school currently has 800 students and 616 graduates.

Eventually the Nicaraguan government took over the building of the schools, and the 12 communities that have these high schools have better overall health and fewer unwanted pregnancies. What makes the Free High School Program unique is the teaching model adopted by Margaret and Rosa. The schools use feminist textbooks and a modified version of twentieth century educator Paolo Freire’s teaching method.

Freire believed that education was vital to the liberation of the oppressed and did not support the method of teaching in which students are simply empty vessels to be filled with knowledge. For basic literacy, Freire believed in teaching language that is meaningful to people’s lives. He did not have a program for women, so Margaret and Rosa adapted his method to teach the women in Nicaragua. The first word the women learn is “fetus,” which Margaret says is a word every woman should know.

The Free High School program has continued to grow with a technical high school that opened in 2006 in which students can specialize in one of three fields: Management of Tourist and Hotel Enterprises, Accounting and Civil Construction. A number of graduates from both the Free High School and the Technical School have gone on to receive university degrees and other accomplishments.

Margaret believes that “there is always something to do in Nicaragua,” pointing to her husband David’s bio-sand filter project for contaminated water as an example. The next steps in the Free High School project are to buy new textbooks and construct an office building for the organization in Nicaragua. Go here (https://sanjuandelsursistercityproject.wordpress.com/) to learn more about the various Newton-San Juan del Sur Sister City projects, including the Free High School.

– Taylor Lovett

Sources: San Juan del Sur Sister City Project, Bless the Children, Interview with Margaret Gullette
Photo: The Random Act

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Narendra Modi Stands Up for Women’s Rights

During a speech on India’s Independence Day, India’s recently elected Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, called for gender equality.

In the past year, India has been plagued with a string of highly publicized gang rapes and violence towards women. As the country has been criticized by domestic and foreign critics for its safety and equality, Modi’s comments come at an unsurprising time. His words reveal the legacy Modi wants to create during his term as India’s Prime Minister. Modi is not particularly well known for women’s rights advocacy, but he has begun to align himself with activism groups recently.

Tackling long-standing patriarchal attitudes, Modi has encouraged parents to raise their sons and daughters alike.

Additionally, directing his attention specifically towards boys, Modi encourages families to raise their sons to respect women.

Though Modi’s advice is promising, the attitudes of many generations will not change after one speech.

Compared to the rest of the world, India’s gender gap is among the largest. With many sexual assault cases being improperly handled and survivors being blamed, attitudes toward violence have reflected India’s patriarchal culture.

Modi has described the violence as “India’s shame,” and has underscored the double standard of female and male children. Parents rarely scrutinize their sons to the same extent as they do to their daughters. While the law convicts the criminals, Indian society can help prevent the attacks.

The hope of women’s rights advocates and sexual assault survivors is that Modi will pursue justice for women in India. With his first Independence Day speech including comment on the struggle for women’s rights, it will be interesting to see how Modi rectifies the situation.

– ­Kristin Ronzi

Sources: India Times, The Guardian
Photo: Forbes

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Basketball Brings Hope to Mexico’s Triqui Tribe

The consequences of poverty are many: some impoverished people go hungry, others become ill and others are forced to take on informal jobs that rob them of dignity or safety. Yet, a widespread effect of poverty is the loss of hope due to a lack of resources, social status and opportunities. Poverty can be difficult to escape; accordingly, those who experience it often feel it will define the rest of their lives.

Basketball programs for children of the Mexican Triqui tribe have made the news in the last year – the chance to play the sport that’s become wildly popular throughout the Oaxaca region of Mexico is giving boys and girls alike hope that they may avoid the poverty and violence that plagues much of their tribe.

Despite the fact that many families are too poor to purchase shoes for their young basketball stars, these children remain committed to honing their skills on the court and many aspire to become local coaches or international athletes. In fact, some of their dreams are already coming true; last fall, a team of Triqui boys traveled to Argentina to compete in an international basketball festival and beat more than 50 other teams (while playing barefoot) to become festival champions.

Basketball isn’t just giving these children hope, it’s giving them opportunities. Triqui basketball players have the chance to travel outside of Oaxaca and learn about options for their futures. League rules require that players maintain certain grades, so the love of the game keeps kids in school as well.

Furthermore, girls participating in basketball programs are changing the ways that women are treated in their traditional communities. Though Triqui girls are often discouraged from pursuing education and are encouraged to marry young, the opportunities that basketball provides them pave the way for gender equality. When girls can hold their own against boys on the court, people – including the girls – see them as equals.

Basketball may not be the most customary method of eliminating poverty, but it’s one that may work in the long run for the Triqui people of Mexico. In the meantime, it’s giving the community hope for the future.

-Elise L. Riley

Sources: The Guardian, CNN
Photo: The Guardian

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The Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

In an effort to increase gender equality in China, at the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action was created. The platform sought, and still seeks to enact serious change to 12 areas of daily life. According to U.N. Women, the commitment to change spans the following 12 categories:

1. Women and the Environment
2. Women in Power and Decision-Making
3. The Girl Child
4. Women and the Economy
5. Women and Poverty
6. Violence Against Women
7. Human Rights of Women
8. Education and Training of Women
9. Institutional Mechanisms of the Advancement of Women
10. Women and Health
11. Women and the Media
12. Media and Armed Conflict”

Since the conference and the implementation of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, there have been major steps toward the advancement of women’s rights. Laws protecting gender-based violence, in general, have become stricter and more women are now serving as political officials.

As the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action is coming up on its 20th anniversary, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women is taking a closer look at how some of these changes are being implemented and working to enhance efforts where commitment appears to be lacking.

U.N. Women has discovered that “while today, equal number of boys and girls are receiving primary education in most of the world, few countries have achieved that target at all levels of education.” Moreover, the Millennium Development Goals Report found that worldwide, 126 million children and 781 million adults do not have basic reading and writing skills. Women make up over 60 percent of each statistic, indicating a problem in education distribution between the sexes and the need for greater dedication to the problems surrounding “the girl child.”

At this 20 year mark, in order to promote women’s rights in Beijing, it is crucial to reexamine the declaration and reignite the fire that sparked the dedication to enhancing women’s rights.

– Jordyn Horowitz

Sources: United Nations, UN Women, WNC
Photo: Reuters

Women with HIV Face Forced Sterilizations

Our knowledge of HIV/AIDS is continuously expanding 30 years into the AIDS epidemic. Researchers are discovering that–given the right treatment and precautions–people living with HIV can greatly reduce the risk of transmission to partners and can even safely conceive and give birth. Yet many health care providers in Central America are misguidedly pressuring HIV-positive women into sterilization.

Tamil Kendall, a Harvard School of Public Health research fellow with 10 years of experience in gender and HIV in Latin America, reports that “health care providers [in Central America] are expressing the view that living with HIV means that you don’t have reproductive rights, that you can’t choose the number and spacing of your children, that you can’t choose the contraceptive method that you would like to use.”

Kendall is the driving force behind a recently-published study on health care practices in El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico and Nicaragua, one which reveals antiquated attitudes toward HIV and troubling reproductive rights violations throughout the region.

The results show that, out of the 285 women studied across the four Central American countries, 23 percent have been pressured by health care professionals to go through a sterilization procedure. Rates in individual countries range from 20 percent in Nicaragua to 28 percent in Mexico. Additionally, only half of the women surveyed reported being told that an intervention in the form of antiretroviral drugs exists, which can reduce mother-to-child transmission of the virus by 98 to 99 percent.

Women with HIV are coerced by doctors and nurses unethically. Kendall reports that one Mexican woman was sterilized while under anesthetics during a Caesarian section. Another young mother from El Salvador claimed that doctors refused to perform a Caesarian until she consented to sterilization. Many women are told that another pregnancy will result in their own or their child’s death.

Kendall’s study reveals that socioeconomic status and ethnicity do not play a part in this kind of discrimination and that it is driven solely by an HIV-positive diagnosis.

Yet amid this troubling news, there is reason for optimism. As Kendall observes, “There is some promising research… indicating that health care providers are becoming increasingly aware of the possibility of preventing mother-to-child HIV transmission as well as sexual transmission with antiretroviral therapy—and that this knowledge is starting to transform attitudes.”

Moving forward, she recommends that health care providers be held accountable for their actions in courts, and that policy makers become aware of new research on HIV/AIDS and begin investing more in reproductive health and women’s rights.

– Kayla Strickland

Sources: Thomson Reuters Foundation, Harvard School of Public Health
Photo: Fabulous-City

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UK Summit: End Female Genital Cutting

The preacher has performed many cuttings like this before. He holds up some broken glass to the light – he will use this to cut out the clitoris of the young girl. No anesthetic will be used. The pain she endures is thought to be a sign of her strength.

The young girl screams out against this horrific abuse to her body.

Over 130 million girls and women have experienced some form of Female Genital Cutting in the 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East where it is most common, according to research from UNICEF.

The charity also estimates that 250 million women and girls alive today have been married since their 15th birthday.

In an attempt to highlight the issues of Female Genital Cutting and child, early and forced marriage, the UK government hosted the first international Girl Summit in London on July 22, co-hosted by UNICEF. Pakistani teenager Malala Yousafzai attended as well as women from across the world who have been affected by FGC.

The issue of FGC has been a growing concern in Britain where estimates from the Commons Home Affairs Committee reveal that 170,000 women and girls were living with FGC in the UK.

At the summit UK Prime Minister David Cameron revealed a £1.4 million prevention program aimed at ending the practice of FGC. New laws are set to come into effect, making it a crime for parents not to protect their children from female genital mutilation. Although illegal in the UK since 1985, no one has ever been convicted for FGC crimes.

The summit also revealed an “international charter” calling for the eradication of FGC and forced marriage within a generation.

Female Genital Cutting has no health benefits, is extremely painful and often leads to infections and in some cases death.

In its most severe form, the sensitive clitoris is completely or partly removed with crude and accessible implements in order to dull the sexual appetite of the girl. The genitals are then cut and stitched closed making sex impossible. Sometimes corrosive substances are poured in to scar and shrink the genitals.

Only a tiny piece of wood creates an opening so that urine and monthly blood can flow.

When the young girls are able to bear children they are un-stitched – and once the child has been born, stitched back up again.

The Girl Summit aims to raise the profile of this horrific practice which the Prime Minister has called a “preventable evil.”

He hopes that FGC can be ended in a generation. While so many of these types of summit fall short of meeting their goals, the issue of female genital mutilation and child marriage is finally being taken seriously by the international community. The new laws being introduced to the UK and the international charter raise the profile of this crime and may begin the process of eradicating this practice.

Female Genital Cutting Key Facts

· FGC Includes “the partial or total removal of the female external genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.”
· The procedure has no health benefits for girls and women.
· Procedures can cause severe bleeding and problems urinating, and later cysts, infections, infertility as well as complications in childbirth and increased risk of new-born deaths.
· More than 125 million girls and women alive today have been cut in the 29 countries in Africa and Middle East where FGC is concentrated.
· FGC is mostly carried out on young girls sometime between infancy and age 15.
· FGC is a violation of the human rights of girls and women.
· In December 2012, the U.N. General Assembly approved a resolution calling for all member states to ban the practice.

– Charles Bell

Sources: BBC 1, BBC 2, BBC 3, UK Government, WHO
Photo: FBNewswire

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Pakistan Women and Food Aid Violence

Over 40 tribal elders in the Bannu region of Pakistan voted to ban women from collecting food aid for Internally Displaced Persons fleeing the military offensive in North Waziristan, Pakistan. Witnesses report seeing men slap women who had joined the line for food rations. The women reportedly left quickly after experiencing such violence, but the question remains as to how widows or women unaccompanied by men will receive aid. One man distributed leaflets discouraging women from attempting to attain food rations with a warning to husbands who fail to keep their women at home. The Bannu region is especially conservative, where women wear full-length burqa robes and rarely venture outside their homes.

Violence and discrimination against women in Pakistan have plagued the country, as recently as on July 23 when unknown assailants threw acid at two women at a shopping center in Baluchistan. A similar attack occurred one day earlier when four women were attacked with acid. In both attacks, the perpetrators rode past on motorcycles spraying their victims with acid. Officials believe the crimes to be the work of religious extremists in the area.

In March, the Council of Islamic Ideology, a body that provides legal advice to the Pakistani government, said laws that ban child marriage are “un-Islamic.” Current laws require boys to reach the age of 18 before marriage, and girls the age 16. Chairman of the Council Maulana Mohammad Khan Sheerani continued, “Sharia allows men to have more than one wife, and we demanded that the government should amend the law.”

Child marriage in Pakistan, according to experts, explains the country’s high infant mortality rate, as early marriage results in frequent pregnancies with inadequate preparation. The country also has lower reproductive and maternal healthcare coverage for women than its neighbors India, Bangladesh or Nepal.

Over 990,000 people left the North Waziristan following the June airstrikes known as the Zarb-e-Azb operation, and 84 percent of these IDPs have fled to the Bannu District. North Waziristan has long served as a haven for militants in Pakistan and although the Pakistani government claimed to have targeted all militant groups equally, the U.S. and many locals say Pakistan protected the Haqqani group, which has been based in Waziristan for decades. Many accuse the Pakistani military of allowing Haqqani militants to escape before the operation began. The U.S. sees the Haqqani as a threat to stability in Afghanistan, and is withholding $300 million in aid to Pakistan until the Secretary of Defense determines Pakistan to have “significantly disrupted” the Haqqani network.

The Pakistani military has used militants as proxies in Afghanistan and India for decades. Experts believe the operation — which has killed over 450 since June — is intended to primarily target Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, central Asian and Arab militants in the region that militants have traditionally used to launch attacks on Afghanistan.

The U.S. military has since joined Pakistan with its drone strikes on Saturday that killed 15.

– Erica Lignell

Sources: Reuters, International Business Times, Business Standard, New York Times, Wall Street Journal
Photo: Reuters

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Pakistani Town Offers Sex Education Classes

Despite censure, a small village in Pakistan is defying social norms. Tucked away in the ultra-conservative Sindh province, the village of Johi is doing something extraordinary and radical: they’re providing sex education classes for girls.

To a Westerner this notion may seem far from revolutionary, but it is a gigantic leap forward for Pakistan. In the Muslim nation of 180 million people, sex education is taboo — in some places it has even been outlawed. Women who expose their sexuality in the slightest and most harmless of ways can be sentenced to death.

The pioneers behind the movement are bravely looking forward, teaching girls what they feel is just and necessary. They have established the Village Shadabad Organization where sex education classes are taught to girls starting at age 8. Thus far, there are 700 girls enrolled in eight different schools. The topics range from changes in the female body, to what a women’s rights are, to how she can protect herself. The lessons are an addition to regularly taught classes.

From the teachers’ experience, sex education is vital knowledge these young girls are deprived of. When they begin to menstruate, for example, they are ashamed and think they are sick. Pakistani girls are largely uneducated about puberty and do not know when they will begin to menstruate. Furthermore, many girls get married without understanding the mechanics of sex.

The lessons are not only useful in educating the girls about the natural functions of their bodies, but they are also a means of teaching self-defense. The girls learn that they have a right to their bodies; they learn how to defend themselves if someone violates their personal space; they are taught that even if they are married, their husband cannot force them to engage in sex if they are not willing.

Surprisingly, most families in Johi support the implementation of sex education in the public school curriculum. Unfortunately, the movement is far from reaching a national arena. In fact, the government recently shifted in the opposite direction, forcing the elite Lahore Grammar School to eliminate sex education courses from its curriculum. Many people argue that sex education is a violation of Pakistan’s constitution and an obstruction to their religious beliefs. For now, sex education in Pakistan is still a fringe idea, but nonetheless, the idea demonstrates an outward display of government defiance and a step in the right direction for women.

– Samantha Scheetz

Sources: UN Women, Huffington Post, Reuters
Photo: Wikimedia

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Women’s Education: Threat to Terrorism

The recent kidnapping of 300 Nigerian girls by the extremist group Boko Haram has sparked a global dialogue around the issue of women’s rights. Everyone seems to be wondering: why would an extremist group of alpha males feel so threatened by young, educated girls that they would be inclined to abduct nearly an entire village? The answer lies in the facts.

Around the world a vast portion of women are denied basic rights — that is access to education, jobs and health care — and are victims of sexual and physical abuse. According to USAID, 62 million girls are not in school. UNESCO’s latest statistics show that there are an estimated 862 million illiterate adults in the world, about two-thirds of whom are women.

The residual effects of an uneducated female population are far-reaching. There are social, political and economic consequences, there are health corollaries, but the common motivator seems to be to keep men in power.

USAID studies show that a girl who completes basic education is three times less likely to contract HIV/AIDS. An educated women re-invests 90 percent of the income in her family. A child born to a literate mother is 50 percent more likely to survive past the age of 5. Women with some formal education are more likely to seek medical care and ensure their children are immunized.

So, an educated female population would completely uproot a conservative, dictatorial society and act as a threat to terrorism. It is, therefore, entirely threatening to those men in positions of power. A literate woman does not simply read her children bedtime stories — she changes their conception of the world.

Various global efforts have been launched to ensure that women are granted access to education. Let Girls Learn is a new endeavor that provides the public with meaningful ways to help all girls receive a quality education. USAID has contributed $230 million in support of the cause and for new programs that promote universal education.

The United States government has intervened in the global arena as well. It has invested one billion per year through USAID in low-income countries to ensure equitable treatment of boys and girls, to establish safe school environments and to engage communities in support for girls’ education.

When delving into the facts, the answer seems clear. The prospect of an educated female population is extraordinarily threatening. Education is a fundamental tool and means for societal change. Thomas Staal, USAID’s deputy administrator, sees the issue plain and simple; education is essential in fighting poverty and its grim consequences — hunger, disease, resource degradation, exploitation and despair. And “women are the caretakers and economic catalysts in our communities. No country can afford to ignore their potential.”

– Samantha Scheetz

Sources: USAID 1, USAID 2, USAID 3, USAID 4, PBS
Photo: FT Magazine

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Remote Control Contraceptive

remote control contraceptive
In less than four years, women could be receiving a remote control contraceptive. The implanted microchip provides a reliable dose of hormones every day for 16 years, which could make family planning and contraception much easier for women in the developing world.

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation-backed project is based off of research done in the 1990s by Professor Robert Langer of MIT. Langer leased his technology to MicroCHIPS, a company currently developing implants to release osteoporosis treatments into the body over regular intervals.

The microchip, roughly the size of a Scrabble tile at 20mm x 20mm x 7mm, has wells filled with the hormone levonorgestrel. When activated, a small electric charge triggers every day, melting the covering of the wells and releasing 30 micrograms of levonorgestrel into the body. The wells are covered with a mixture of titanium and platinum, which causes no harm to the body when melted.

The chip can be implanted in the abdomen, upper arm or buttocks. The process to inject the contraceptive is fairly simple, taking less than 30 minutes and using a local anesthetic.

Since many women may want to take a break from the birth control before the end of 16 years, the remote control allows them to switch their treatment on and off themselves. This puts power in the hands of women. There are security issues, such as the possibility for hacking, which could be a major problem if women do not realize their dosing has been tampered with. MicroCHIPS has promised that the control must be used right next to the skin, so no one can interfere with a women’s contraception without her knowledge.

Another issue is that injectable contraceptives do not protect against STDs, and some have even been shown to increase the chance of contracting HIV. Also, becoming fertile again after using hormones can take a while. These issues have not been addressed by the company.

This is not the first injectable contraceptive, but it lasts the longest. The most durable contraceptive on the market right now lasts only five years. This microchip could simplify women’s lives all across the developing world. Injectable contraceptives are already popular in these countries, so making the switch would be easy to do.

Burkina Faso will soon implement the contraceptive Sayana Press, as will Niger, Senegal and Uganda. Sayana Press only lasts three months, and while the countries will provide delivery services for women who cannot come to hospitals or clinics every few months, it is still difficult to reach every woman in need of an injection. Some women may also forget to get a new injection.

South Africa currently has a system for a three-year contraceptive. The device is similar, except it cannot be remotely controlled and it must be replaced sooner. It is a Silicone, matchstick-sized implant made by Merck and marketed as Implanon. The Stanger Hospital in South Africa actually ran out of the implants and is struggling to provide enough for the women who want the contraception.

There is a large desire for this kind of contraceptive in the developing world, and a controllable device could be the key to making family planning easier for women.

There are also further applications for implantable drug dispensers beyond female contraception. The technology could be applied to other treatments, like MicroCHIPS’ work with osteoporosis treatment. If trials prove successful, it is possible that many other drugs could be put in the wells and released periodically.

The contraceptive will be submitted for testing in 2015, and by 2018 the microchips could be on the market. The claim is that they will be “competitively priced,” making the technology a real possibility for women around the world to have a worry-free method of birth control.

– Monica Roth

Sources: Elite Daily, Extreme Tech, The Guardian, CNet, Africa Science News, Daily Maverick, MicroCHIPS
Photo: The Telegraph