Embrace Her Cycle: Pads to Keep Girls in School

Dear Partner,

Every girl deserves to sit in class, focus on her lessons, and participate in school without worrying about how she will manage her period. Yet access to menstrual products remains a challenge for most underserved girls in Tharaka-Nithi County.

Between July and September 2026, Village HopeCore International reached 70 schools with sanitary towels, distributed 91 annual kits and provided 1,381 students with menstrual hygiene management (MHM) education. Each activity addresses a different need: making supplies accessible, providing longer-term support, and helping students understand menstruation, practise safe hygiene, and challenge the stigma surrounding periods.

But how does access to menstrual products relate to school attendance? Our earlier survey of girls in Tharaka-Nithi County, Kenya offers an important perspective.

Earlier in 2026, our Monitoring and Evaluation team surveyed 385 girls in 72 schools across Tharaka-Nithi County. The survey compared girls who received a HopeCore kit with those who did not. These findings are separate from our July–September activities.

Among girls who had received a kit, 8.0% reported missing school because of their period in the previous three months, compared with 38.0% in the comparison group. Girls who received kits were also less likely to report running out of pads (14.9%), compared with 51.2% in the comparison group.

These numbers show the impact of our program. Reliable access to menstrual products can reduce practical barriers that interfere with girls’ attendance.

We are not the only ones asking this question. A 2026 study in Kilifi County, on Kenya’s coast, followed 300 girls in five secondary schools while testing different menstrual products. At the start of the study, 151 girls (50.3%) reported missing school because of menstruation.

Providing sanitary towels is one way to help girls stay in school. Education also helps students understand their bodies and manage menstruation safely. By combining supplies with menstrual health education, HopeCore addresses both access to products and the knowledge girls need to manage their periods.

If you believe every girl deserves the opportunity to learn with dignity, please share our GlobalGiving project with someone who may want to support this work. Thank you for following our work and for caring about girls’ health, confidence, and education.