International Women’s Day – Getting Girls into School

“Your help has infused us with boldness and courage…”

The Biro Girls

 

One March day in 2021, seven girls from Biro Junior High school packed their newly-purchased chop boxes (trunks) and set off on a journey they never thought they’d make – to Senior High School. Bright and hardworking, they’d been selected to be the first girls from their village to attend SHS.

Today, Action Through Enterprise supports 22 girls (from Biro and Karbo) at Senior High. In the run up to International Women’s Day, we asked them how attending SHS is changing their lives.

• All thought that girls who attended SHS were more likely to get better jobs and earn more
• All thought that girls who attended SHS were less likely to marry in their teens
• All said that girls who attended SHS had more confidence

 

That confidence is already being noticed. Edith Karbo, a teacher at Karbo JHS, says: “The scholarship program is really one that can have good future impact for these girls. When they come home from break, we see how good and decent they appear. They’re in school and they have hopes of a better life. They’ll have choices, professions and good families.”

 

The positive impact of keeping girls in education benefits not just the individual – it ripples through families and the whole community, as the global research confirms:

• For each additional year of schooling, a girl’s earnings as an adult will increase by up to 20 per cent;
• Educating girls means faster poverty reduction, better maternal health, lower child mortality, greater HIV prevention and reduced violence against women;
• Educated women will reinvest 90% of their earnings back into their families, compared with 35% for men;
• Girls’ right to education is integral to virtually every aspect of development, including economic growth and prosperity.

Sending girls to Senior High protects them from teen pregnancy and teen marriage, gives them choices about their work and opportunities to earn and develop – and helps them help their own families and communities.

Lucy was one of the seven girls from Biro who began her SHS adventure in 2021: “With the help of Action Through Enterprise, I can be a role model, because we are the first girls that have access to Senior High School. I want to be a midwife in the future so that I will help my village people. That is my dream.”

On International Women’s Day, we celebrate Lucy and all the ATE-funded girls at Senior High School. Thanks to their dedication and our brilliant donors, they are on the path to a life with decent earnings, good choices and security for themselves and their daughters after them.

If you’d like to help send more girls to SHS, please donate here: bit.ly/ATEIWD