Racial Justice Guatemala Project #8967

Supporting indigenous mentors to reach more girls

by Population Council

Supporting indigenous mentors to reach more girls

Project Report | Sep 27, 2017
Biking to school and more autonomy

By Paola Broll | Senior Program Officer

Learning to bike

The Population Council is building a new component to test the effectiveness of bicycles to increase school attendance among girls who enroll in the alternative model of secondary education. Adolescent girls often cite distance and cost of transportation as the principal barriers to enroll in secondary school. Most rural communities lack these services, leaving girls with no options. With the support of UNFPA, bikes were provided to adolescent girls to ride to school. Many of them had never riden a bike, so learning was an experience that also allowed their fathers and brothers to show their support. So far, we have noticed that girls with bicycles continue their school attendance, have reinforced their social assets as they ride together -as much as 8km- to go to school with other girls, and have increased their mobility visiting other communities to buy and sell products on market days.

Biking in Chisec

Testing the roads

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