Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti

Thank You for Your Generosity and Solidarity

Thank you again for your generous support for Beyond Borders' Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti project on GlobalGiving.

Your investment in this work means that girls, women, boys and men in so many more communities than before now have the skills they need to balance power between the sexes, prevent domestic violence and ensure equality of opportunity for every girl and woman.

As we take action to prevent any spike in violence against women and girls during the COVID-19 pandemic and help families protect themselves from this deadly virus, your solidarity and continued generosity mean more than we can say. Thank you again!

COVID-19 Emergency Response

Here are some of the special COVID-19 Emergency Response activities that your support is making possible right now:

• Public service announcements sent via text message, Whatsapp, and other social media to raise awareness about the risk of increased violence against women and girls and violence against children during crises.
• Continued accompaniment and support for survivors who report cases of abuse to our networks.
• The distribution of family hygiene kits via our Girls Clubs and other networks that include soap, bleach, and a bucket with an on/off valve to conserve precious water.
• Sharing critical virus-prevention educational materials about hand-washing, mask wearing, and social distancing.
• Awareness-raising campaigns to encourage communities to think about what they can do to support family, friends, and neighbors who may need extra help during the pandemic (i.e.- women or girls experiencing violence, the elderly and women and girls living with disabilities).

You are making all of this work possible with your generous gift. Thank you again!

You can get the latest on all that Beyond Borders is doing to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in Haiti on a special website we've created: www.Haiti-Covid.org.

Safe and Capable: Preventing Violence Against Girls and Women With Disabilities

Your gift is also supporting the work of our program known as Safe and Capable: Haitian Communities Preventing Violence Against Girls and Women with Disabilities.

Created with funding from the UN Trust Fund/UN Women, the program is being integrated in communities alongside our SASA! and Power to Girls programming.

The goal of the project is to change how people in Haiti see women and girls living with disabilities and to increase their social inclusion and better protect them from violence. Safe and Capable includes a five-part introductory guide, training curriculum, theater plays, dialogue-based posters, “quick chat” sessions, and learning and evaluation guides.

While the pilot is still ongoing, our colleagues are reporting progress. A number of changes in pilot communities are being observed and recorded. In addition, many network members who previously believed disability was caused by a curse or as a result of a parent’s wrongdoing have changed their beliefs.

Here’s a look at some of the highlights of what Beyond Borders, together with our partners Pazapa, Productions Théatre Toupatou (TTPT), and the Global Women’s Institute at the George Washington University have achieved so far:

• Delivered multiple days of training and ongoing technical support to multiple groups within the volunteer activism network to build their capacity to use the Safe and Capable communications materials and guides. The volunteer activism network led conversations with thousands of community members on themes that included: promoting balanced power and violence prevention in couples, building skills to prevent violence against women and girls living with disabilities and to provide support to activists and to women and girls experiencing violence.
• Celebrated 16 Days of Activism to Prevent Violence Against Women and Girls in November-December and International Day of Persons with Disabilities on 3 December. During Carnival season, some special mobilization activities were held to promote the prevention of violence against women and girls with disabilities, including a float in the 2020 Jacmel carnival, though many activities had to be cancelled due to political protests. 
• TTPT continued popular theater programming around preventing violence against women and girls with disabilities, holding three performances that drew large crowds, despite frequently blocked travel due to political protests.

A Community Begins to Change How it Sees Women and Girls with Disabilities

Some of the major successes have come in the form of community reactions after engagement with the Safe and Capable materials and a dialogue-based process to encourage change.

A new recognition among members of the community of the inherent right to personal power that women and girls with disabilities have and the positive belief that they have a right to live without violence -- as all women do -- began to lead to positive outcomes that included:

• The participation of girls with disabilities in the girls’ group soccer championship tournament organized over the winter break.
• A rejection on the part of members of the community of previous stereotypes, the past use of verbal abuse and demeaning language, and the past belief that violence was not a problem in their community.
• Community members began to speak out, inviting others to discuss issues like accessibility of services and other ways to ensure that women and girls with disabilities have access to balanced power with other members of the community, including their partners.

Here’s a look at some other outcomes from the work of this program that are either on-track to be fully achieved or have already been fully achieved:

• One hundred percent of staff from eleven Haitian organizations we are working with now demonstrate increased awareness of the issue of violence against women and girls and its impact on women and girls with disabilities, and have developed the skills to effectively implement inclusive prevention activities and dialogue within their respective communities.
• Eight pilot intervention communities in the Southeast of Haiti are on-track to successfully demonstrate new knowledge and skills and a change in attitudes and behaviors that promote the rights of women and girls with disabilities to live a life free of violence.

Powerful Impact: One Girl’s Personal Testimony

The impact that programming like Safe and Capable can have in the lives of individual girls is often powerful. Here’s one girl’s personal testimony:

“Because every day my situation gets worse, my parents said I couldn’t keep coming to the girls’ groups. I told my mother and begged her until she couldn’t stand it anymore; I told her that by whatever means possible she should ensure I go to the girls’ group because the girls’ group is the first thing I’ve had that has helped me have confidence in myself. It has helped me gain knowledge about girls’ power and allowed me to develop my capacity. It’s the place where I learn many things like how to crochet, how to understand that all people are people, that life isn’t over because you’re living with a disability. The other girls play with me and laugh with me, without seeing my disability. They pass by to get me on the way to the girls’ group meetings. My mother came to understand me, and she let me keep coming to participate with all of my friends.” - Malorie, girls’ group participant with a physical disability

Thank You Again

Thank you again for all that you do and all that you are making possible through your generous support for Beyond Borders' Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti project on GlobalGiving. We are deeply grateful for your solidarity in these challenging times.

You are building the movement to prevent violence against women and girls and ensure that every day more and more girls in Haiti are growing up free, educated, and empowered. If you have any questions about what you read in this report, please contact Brian Stevens, Beyond Borders’ Donor Engagement Director, at (305) 450-2561 or b.stevens@beyondborders.net.

Links:

• Check us out on Facebook for the latest from Haiti!
• We are committed to financial transparency and accountability.
• YouTube: Watch a video about our Girls' Clubs in Haiti.

Your Generous Support is Building a Movement

You are building the movement to free, educate, and empower girls in Haiti by preventing violence against women and girls and balancing power between women and men and girls and boys. Thank you!

Creating lasting change requires broad social movements that transform the way people think about and react to injustice. Your support for Beyond Borders’ ‘Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti’ project is helping to build a Haitian-led movement to ensure that every woman and girl lives free from violence, discrimination, and inequalty.

Activists Like Jesula are Changing Minds

Your support means that activists like Jesula are able to engage people from all walks of life in the movement to prevent violence against women and girls and balance power. Here’s what one Evangelical pastor said about Jesula’s work in the community of Lavale, where she and her fellow activists also organized a community-wide rally:

"Before, I thought [they] had come to split up families, but after they invited me to a meeting, I realized [they] help women and men live better. Now, Jesula I’m extending to you a standing invitation to do activities in my church anytime you want."

The Impact We’re Seeing in Communities

Measuring the impact that activists like Jesula are having as they build the movement to prevent violence against women and girls and balance power is a top priority.

A multi-year collaborative effort between Beyond Borders’ Rethinking Power team, which leads the work that your generosity is supporting, and the Global Women’s Institute at the George Washington University to measure the impact of our movement building work that is employing the SASA!* methodology is currently underway.

Initial results indicate a more than 38% decrease in controlling behavior by men, a more than 45% decline in economic-based intimate partner violence (a male spouse or partner taking money from and/or refusing to share household economic decision-making with a female spouse or partner), and a more than 30% decline in physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence.

Researchers have also found “significant results as related to the social norms that should favor more equality between boys and girls.”

*Created by our friends at Raising Voices, SASA! (Start, Awareness, Support, Action) is a ground-breaking, internationally-recognized model of community-mobilization to stop violence against women and the spread of HIV. Engaging all actors in the community — women, men, cultural and religious leaders, local officials, police, health-care providers — SASA! fosters critical reflection on gender and power and instigates local-level activism.

A Husband Shares How SASA! Changed Him

“Before I became involved in SASA! activities, I would not give my wife money to go to market on Saturday if she did not have sex with me on Friday night. Now I recognize she has the right to say no if she does not want to have sex.”

The Movement Building Work That You Make Possible

Here's some of the movement building work that your generosity is making possible in Haiti:

Trainings for Community Activists, Health Workers, Journalists, and Girls’ Club Leaders

• 40 Community Activists spent three days in training to better understand the Action Phase of SASA! and Phase 4 of Power to Girls* and the kind of activities they have to facilitate (with the support of the Rethinking Power team) during these phases.
• 15 health workers participated in two days of training on the Action Phase of SASA!
• 16 journalists participated in a one-day training on the Action Phase of SASA! and Phase 4 of Power to Girls. This training helped them understand the objectives of these phases and the ways to address the subject of violence against women and girls in their reporting.
• 15 health workers, 26 members of organizations that respond to incidents of violence against women and girls, and mentors from Girls’ Clubs launched by Beyond Borders were trained in the Safe and Capable module to help them better understand the reality of women and girls living with disabilities and the high risks of violence (compared to women and girls who are not living with disabilities) that they face. This training equipped them with the skills they need to help ensure women and girls with disabilities live free from violence and discrimination.
• Meetings to gather feedback from leaders and mentors in 16 Girls’ Clubs, and community activists and leaders were held, and a new supervisor for Girls’ Club mentors was hired. 

*Power To Girls includes a complete, three-year methodology to integrate lessons on equality and preventing gender-based violence into the school curriculum, including sample lesson plans for social science, biology and language teachers. Power To Girls also includes a guide to help schools and communities create and support local girls’ groups, and a set of community organizing tools designed to create deep and lasting change among adults too.

A Girls’ Club Mentor Shares How the Safe and Capable Training Changed Her

“I’m a mentor and I always tell the girls not to hurt children living with disabilities, but, after this training, I’ve come to realize that I marginalized my younger sister who is living with a disability. Now, I’ve invited my sister to be a member of the club and she is doing well. One day, the girls had to walk to go somewhere for an activity. I was embarrassed because I thought my sister would not be able to make it, but she did better than many of the girls. I realized that my attitudes toward her were marginalizing her and that she is able to do more than I thought.” 

House Gatherings, Community-Wide Rallies, Theatre Performances, and Radio Programs to Raise Awareness    

Thanks to your support, the Rethinking Power team -- in collaboration with local Community Activists -- organized seven house gatherings and community-wide rallies to raise awareness about violence against women and girls. More than 170 community members joined the efforts to discuss and learn about concepts from SASA! and Power to Girls.

The Rethinking Power team organized four theatre performances on preventing violence against women and girls and balancing power between women and men and girls and boys. More than 150 people participated in discussions after the performances.

For the International Day of Persons with Disabilities on Dec. 3, the team organized a radio broadcast to highlight the increased rate of violence women and girls with disabilities face.

To launch the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence from Nov. 25-Dec. 10, the team organized a press conference and public demonstration in the community of Lavale. More than 50 Community Activists participated.

Technical Support for Partner Organizations Working to End Violence Against Women and Girls

Demonstrations throughout Haiti made it difficult for the Technical Support team to travel, so the team kept contact with partner organizations through telephone calls and Skype, even holding a training for members of one partner organization through Skype. During the month of December, the team organized three in-person three-day trainings from Dec. 11-13, 17-19 and 27-29 for partner organizations.

Thank You Again

Your continued support and solidarity are building the movement to prevent violence against women and girls and ensure that every day more and more girls in Haiti are growing up free, educated, and empowered. If you have any questions about what you read in this report, please contact Brian Stevens, Beyond Borders’ Donor Engagement Director, at (305) 450-2561 or b.stevens@beyondborders.net. Thank you again!

Links:

• Get the latest on our work in our newsletter.
• InterAmerican Development Bank on our work using SASA! in Haiti.
• Check us out on Instagram!

Thank You for Your Generous Support to Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti!

Your generous support is expanding the use of innovative strategies to prevent violence against women and girls (VAWG) and balance power between women and men and girls and boys, improve girls' access to educational opportunities and make schools safer, and end child slavery, which disproportionally traps girls.

Thank you again for your kind and thoughtful gift!

A Particularly Challenging Moment in Haiti.

You may have heard that this is a particularly challenging time in Haiti. A massive protest movement is demanding the resignation of the president, who has been implicated in a corruption scandal. Much of the country has been paralyzed by protests. 

Our team is feeling a heightened urgency to their work, as the extreme stress of a prolonged and seemingly unending political crisis like this often contributes to a spike in domestic violence, particularly against women and girls. 

I’m proud of my colleagues in Haiti who are doing everything they can to continue our work in this difficult time. They believe deeply in our mission and they are responding to the challenge of this crisis with courage and commitment. Your continued solidarity and generosity strengthens and fortifies them in their work.

You are Making a Difference for Girls Like Abi.

Despite the current crisis, your support is making a difference for girls like 12-year-old Abi. She's in the sixth grade at a school on Lagonav Island that is part of Beyond Borders' Schools Not Slavery network. Thankfully, schools on Lagonav Island like Abi’s have remained open during the current political crisis.

"I love mathematics," Abi told us just last week when we visited her school. “I want to work in a bank when I grow up,” she added.

Your generous support is expanding initiatives to increase access to quality schools for girls like Abi and make schools safer, organize communities to end child slavery, and balance power between women and men and girls and boys too.

The kinds of initiatives that you are making possible include: training for teachers in nonviolent classroom management techniques; support to train and organize Child Protection Brigades and chapters of our Adult Survivors Network; and the continued expansion of Beyond Borders' SASA! and Power To Girls programming, to equip schools, parents, and grassroots leaders with the skills they need to organize their communities to prevent VAWG and empower girls to be at the forefront of the change process.

We’re Growing the Movement to Prevent VAWG -- Thanks to You!

With your generous support, Beyond Borders has delivered short and long-term training and technical support to more than 30 Haitian human rights organizations in the last year and a half on the Power to Girls and SASA! methodologies, and printed SASA! and Power to Girls toolkits and communications resources for use by organizations.

Created by our friends at Raising Voices, SASA! (Start, Awareness, Support, Action) is a ground-breaking, internationally-recognized model of community-mobilization to stop violence against women and the spread of HIV. Engaging all actors in the community — women, men, cultural and religious leaders, local officials, police, health-care providers — SASA! fosters critical reflection on gender and power and instigates local-level activism.

This training is building the capacity of local organizations to organize communities to prevent VAWG, and ensure that women and girls live free from discrimination and inequalty.

Here’s some of what your generous support has made possible in the last year and a half:

1. Short courses -- Five short courses delivered to staff of more than 30 organizations working in the fields of women’s rights and/or human rights, providing 21 days of workshops. Organizations select from various training offerings, including community mobilization, the various phases of SASA! or Power to Girls, or other themes related to preventing VAWG and HIV.
2. Training for long-term technical support partners -- Seven capacity-building workshops delivered over 24 days to five long-term technical support partners in varying stages of acquiring, implementing, and evaluating SASA! in their communities. Workshops supported capacity building in Awareness, Support, and Action Phases, and on advocacy techniques as well as monitoring and evaluation, specifically database management.
3. Ongoing long-term technical support -- Ongoing technical support provided to five long-term technical support partners, including countless coaching phone calls, 16 days of site visits to coach partners and support training of community activists in their communities.
4. Exchange visits -- Four exchange visits facilitated for technical support partners to promote learning and network building. Visits were hosted by Beyond Borders in Jacmel and Lavale, where technical support partners learned about their roles as Local Activism staff by shadowing BB staff in community activities and also sharing experiences and challenges.
5. Communications materials -- Thousands of pages of Power to Girls and SASA! Communications Materials, including toolkits, posters, and Quick Chat tools printed and distributed to technical support partners to facilitate activities in their own communities.
6. New technical support partner prospecting -- Methodologies and technical support programming promoted with a view to recruit prospective technical support partner organizations. BB sought to identify at least four new long-term partners ready to use SASA! or Power to Girls in their own communities. In addition to short courses which serve as targeted publicity for long-term partnership, BB used radio and BB’s Rethinking Power Creole-language website to publicize the opportunity. The team also finalized a video explaining the two methodologies and the technical support opportunities. Additionally, staff travelled to Jérémie and Les Cayes in the south and southwest departments of Haiti to introduce the two methodologies and technical support opportunities to women’s organizations and coalitions.
7. SASA! Faith adaptation for Haiti -- SASA! Faith materials to engage religious leaders in the movement to prevent VAWG were co-created by Trócaire and Raising Voices and co-authored by Beyond Borders’ Sara Siebert in her capacity as a Technical Advisor with Raising Voices. BB began testing sermon guides with Christian religious leaders with a view to revise, adapt and finalize for use in Haiti in coming months.

Thank You Again!

Your continued support and solidarity are building the movement to prevent violence against women and girls and ensure that every day more and more girls in Haiti are growing up free, educated, and empowered. If you have any questions about what you read in this report, please contact Brian Stevens, Beyond Borders’ Donor Engagement Director, at (305) 450-2561 or b.stevens@beyondborders.net. Thank you again!

Links:

• Read our latest 4-Star rating from Charity Navigator
• Learn more about SASA! Faith on the Raising Voices website
• View all of our preventing VAWG communications materials

Your Generous and Thoughtful Support is Creating Lasting Change for Girls

Thank you again for your generous and thoughtful support for Beyond Borders’ Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti project on Global Giving. We are so grateful!

Your generous support is expanding work to improve access to educational opportunities for girls’ and make schools safer; end child slavery, which disproportionately traps girls; and train and mobilize activists in communities across Haiti to prevent violence against women and girls. Thank you for making this work possible!

You are Making School Safer for Girls Like Selimene

Today, girls in Haiti are more likely to experience sexual violence than to enroll in high school. Your gift is changing this for girls like Selimene though, reducing the risks they face by expanding our Power To Girls programming to reach more schools, more communities, and more girls.

Through your generous gift, you are joining Selimene, girls like her, and Beyond Borders’ Rethinking Power Team in building the movement to prevent violence against women and girls, to balance power between women and men and girls and boys, and to ensure that every girl lives free from violence and inequality. Thank you again!

Power To Girls Puts Girls at the Forefront of the Change Process

Selimene is a senior at a Catholic high school in southern Haiti. She remembers the day when Beyond Borders’ Rethinking Power Team held a meeting for parents about the Power To Girls program.

“At first my parents didn't understand what Rethinking Power and Power To Girls was about,” Selimene said. Then they went to a meeting organized by Beyond Borders and afterwards they said they that I could participate in Power To Girls.”

Power to Girls recognizes schools as institutions with both power over girls’ lives in the here-and-now and the power to shape future social norms in a community.

Beyond Borders created Power To Girls to put girls at the forefront of the change process, and to help boys become key allies.

A Toolkit Designed to Create Deep and Lasting Change in Schools and Communities

To do this, Power To Girls includes a complete, three-year methodology to integrate lessons on equality and preventing gender-based violence in to the school curriculum, including sample lesson plans for social science, biology and language teachers.

Power To Girls also includes a guide to help schools and communities create and support local girls’ groups, and a set of community organizing tools designed to create deep and lasting change among adults too.

By equipping girls and boys and school and civic leaders with the knowledge and skills they need to influence attitudes and behaviors related to girls’ safety and voice, schools and communities can address the root cause of violence against women and girls: gender-power imbalances.

“Once we started using Power To Girls at my school, things started to change.”

“Before Power To Girls came to our school, neither boys nor girls understood how to use their power -- and we girls didn't even think we had any power,” Selimene said. “There was an inequality between girls and boys. Once we started using Power To Girls at my school, things started to change.”

Power To Girls understands that boys have a role to play in the change process too. By actively engaging boys through Power to Girls, they are learning how to balance power with girls and treat them with respect.

“This is how girls can build power,” said Wesley, a classmate of Selimene’s who also takes part in Power To Girls. “The Power To Girls program at school is a good initiative … for all students.”

Thank you again for making the work of Power To Girls possible!

30 Girls and Boys Freed From Slavery and Brought Home by Their Parents

Your support is also making the work to end child slavery, which disproportionately traps girls, possible. Thanks to the community mobilization and intervention work of Child Protection Brigades and Adult Survivors of Child Slavery groups that you help make possible in 16 communities, 30 girls and boys were freed from slavery and situations of abuse and reunited with their families in the past three months. Thank you!

More than 500 Activists Trained to Prevent Violence Against Women and Girls

Your gift is also supporting training for activists throughout Haiti who are working to prevent violence against women and girls (VAWG). From April through June, a total of 534 activists received technical support training to engage their fellow community members in conversations to promote balanced power and to prevent VAWG.

On Lagonav Island, five communities – Bouziyèt, Masikren, Fonnèg, Chenkontan, and Gransous – continued their work in the Awareness Phase – the second of the four phase program we use to balance power between women and men known as SASA!*

A total of 420 SASA! activists (215 women) were trained in these five communities. We are now preparing to conduct rapid assessments to gauge these five communities’ readiness to enter the third phase –the Support Phase.

In two additional communities on Lagonav Island – Nan Kafe and Matènwa – Beyond Borders continues to support 114 community activists and network members to conduct VAWG prevention activities as part of the Action Phase – the fourth and final phase of SASA!

Thank you for making the work to prevent violence against women and girls possible!

*Created by our friends at Raising Voices, SASA! (Start, Awareness, Support, Action) is a ground-breaking, internationally-recognized model of community-mobilization to stop violence against women and the spread of HIV. Engaging all actors in the community — women, men, cultural and religious leaders, local officials, police, health-care providers — SASA! fosters critical reflection on gender and power and instigates local-level activism.

Thank You Again!

Thank you again for your generous support for Beyond Borders’ Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti project on Global Giving. You are building the movement to prevent violence against women and girls in Haiti through your generous and thoughtful support. We are grateful for your generosity, your care, and your concern. If you have any questions about what you read in this report, please feel free to contact Brian Stevens, Beyond Borders Donor Engagement Director, at b.stevens@beyondborders.net or at (305) 450-2561.

Links:

• Watch the all-new Power To Girls video on our YouTube page!
• Follow us on Instagram!
• Get the Preventing Violence Against Women & Girls Fact Sheet.

Thank You for Your Generous Support

Your generous support for Beyond Borders’ Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti project on GlobalGiving is making a difference for girls like 12-year-old Ketly.*

“Our school fees are paid, the roof on our house doesn’t leak anymore, and we don’t fight anymore,” Ketly said in describing how life has changed thanks to a Beyond Borders’ initiative that is equipping moms like hers with the skills, training, and resources they need to lift their families out of extreme poverty.

Empowering moms to break the cycle of extreme poverty means that they can afford to send their daughters to school -- and girls like Ketly, who previously missed school because her mom couldn't afford school fees, now gets the chance to go to school and become a powerful force for change.

Globally, an extra year of primary school is proven to boost girls' eventual wages by 20%, and an extra year of secondary school adds 25%, making economies more fair and prosperous for all. Research shows that educated girls like Ketly become empowered women who reinvest 90% of their income in their families, paying school tuition, buying food, books, and medicine.

“Our future is going to be good because we’re in school,” Ketly said.

*We’ve changed her name to protect her privacy.

You are Building a Movement in Haiti to Empower Girls

Building the movement to empower girls requires multiple approaches, from efforts designed to end violence against girls and the exploitation of girls in schools, to initiatives that equip families with the skills and resources they need to provide for themselves and send their children to school, to trainings that organize communities to stop the flow of children in to domestic servitude and balance power between women and men.

That’s why with your generous support we are expanding work to improve access to educational opportunities for girls’ like Ketly and make schools safer; end child slavery, which disproportionately traps girls; and train and mobilize activists in communities across Haiti to prevent violence against women and girls. Thank you for making this work possible!

Highlighted Achievements Made Possible with Your Support

Your generosity made the following achievements possible from January-March 2019:

Improving Access to Educational Opportunities for Girls and Making Schools Safer - Unschooled children are among the most at-risk of being sent away to live with other families and becoming trapped in slavery. Child Protection Brigades provided financial support to 51 girls and boys in this period to ensure that they could go to school.

But ensuring access to school for unschooled children is only part of the solution.

Your gift also continues to support efforts to expand the use of our Power to Girls toolkit. Designed for use by schools and communities to prevent violence against girls, Power to Girls is increasing girls’ safety, voice, and agency by supporting schools and communities in an effort to rethink power imbalances between men and women, and girls and boys, creating new social norms around gender equality.

“Sometimes we find instances of boys harassing girls,” said Sister Marie, the principal at St. Paul Catholic School in Jacmel, which is using Power to Girls. “Now we can stop it in its tracks. We know how to talk to them.”

Marie-Carmel is a teacher at St. Paul and attended school there herself as a child. “In that time there was no equality in power between girls and boys. Boys were always valued more than girls,” she said. Today Marie-Carmel uses Power to Girls in her classroom. “I see so much change that’s happened now.”

Lydia*, a student at St. Paul’s and a member of one of 16 Girls’ Clubs launched by Beyond Borders, shared what Power to Girls has taught her. “Power to Girls taught me that I have rights, that I have power, and that I have the same rights as boys,” Lydia said. “Before I participated in Power to Girls activities I didn’t think I had any rights.”

Power to Girls also understands the importance boys play in the change process. By actively engaging boys through Power to Girls, they are learning how to balance power with girls and treat them with respect. In school, boys are learning that when girls live free from violence boys benefit too!

*We’ve changed her name to protect her privacy.

Preventing Violence Against Women and Girls - Thanks to your support, seven communities on Lagonav Island continue to work through the SASA! community mobilization programming to prevent violence against women and girls. This quarter, the communities of Nan Kafe and Matènwa entered the Action Phase, the 4th and last phase of SASA!. Masikren, Fonnèg, Chenkontan, Gransous and Bouziyèt moved into the Support Phase (the 3rd phase of SASA!).

Specific achievements include: Support Phase training held with 210 Community Activists and network leaders in Masikren, Fonnèg, Chenkontan, Gransous and Bouziyèt; Action Phase training held with 33 Community Activists in Nan Kafe and Matènwa; quarterly meetings held with participation of 86 Community Activists; and, field visits conducted to observe and support 114 Community Activists as they conducted SASA! activities with community members to advance violence against women and girls prevention efforts.

Ending Child Slavery, Which Disproportionately Traps Girls - With your support, the community mobilization and intervention work of Child Protection Brigades and Adult Survivors of Child Slavery groups continued throughout Haiti. As a result, 26 girls and boys were freed from slavery and situations of abuse and reunited with their families.

In this three month period, more than 1,500 women and men began receiving training on the dangers of sending children away to live with others -- the primary way that children in Haiti become enslaved -- different forms of child abuse, child rights, and how to take action to ensure that the rights of children are respected, including in situations of violence against children.

Additionally over the last three months, 13 workshops were conducted with Child Protection Brigades and Adult Survivor groups to test an assessment tool designed to make these groups more effective in their work to protect children from slavery and abuse and change the way that adults think about the rights of children.

Thank You Again

Your support makes the work to free, educate, and empower girls in Haiti possible. We are grateful for your generosity, your care, and your concern. If you have any questions about what you read in this report, please feel free to contact Brian Stevens, Beyond Borders Donor Engagement Director, at b.stevens@beyondborders.net or at (305) 450-2561.

Links:

• We've earned Gold status with GuideStar. Read our full profile.
• Follow us on Twitter!
• Visit our YouTube page to see videos direct from Haiti.