Empowering Women and Girls

 

Women who have participated in the Tostan program have become leaders both on a local and regional level. Among Tostan-trained Community Management Committees (CMCs) in Senegal, over 80% are coordinated by women and composed of at least nine women members. With those experiences, women are able to go on to roles in local councils and regional federations or associations. As they participate in the Tostan program, women:

• learn to make important decisions for themselves and their children concerning education, health, hygiene, and their families' expenses;
• become active members of CMCs engaged in creating positive social change;
• run small businesses and participate in microcredit activities to raise money for their families;
• organize and lead campaigns for increased birth registration, vaccinations, pre- and postnatal consultations, and girls' enrollment in school;
• emerge as leaders on a regional level by creating associations to safeguard human rights and traveling to raise awareness in other villages.

In an area of the world where women have often struggled to make their voices heard, female participants in the Tostan program are proving that women can break gender barriers and take active leadership roles in their families and communities. Tostan classes foster dialogue in which men and women contribute equally to discussions regarding community affairs. For many female participants, these classes represent the first opportunity they have had to voice their opinions before a group of men and women. Not limited to adults, adolescent girls lead movements for the protection of their human rights and speak out in public against female genital cutting and child/forced marriage.