Free, Educate, and Empower Girls in Haiti

You are Mobilizing Communities to Prevent Violence Against Women & Girls (VAWG)

Thank you for your generous support for Beyond Borders’ Free, Educate, and Empower Girls project on GlobalGiving. I am grateful for your generosity and solidarity -- especially as you navigate the uncertainty of this global pandemic.

Creating lasting change to prevent gender-based violence requires a broad social movement that transforms the way people think about and react to violence, discrimination, and inequality. Your generous support means that you are part of this movement too.

582 Activists and 35 Organizations Trained to Prevent VAWG

Thanks to you, more than 35 Haitian organizations and 582 newly minted activists are part of this movement too, benefitting from technical support training conducted by Beyond Borders' Rethinking Power team -- the team that is leading this movement-building effort.

These activists are from all walks of life -- grassroots community leaders, religious leaders, health workers, women’s response organizations, Girls’ Group mentors, journalists, women leaders, and school personnel are just some of those trained.

Your generous support is also making it possible for the Rethinking Power team to continue with the combined implementation of three programs to prevent VAWG: SASA!, Power to Girls, and the all-new Safe and Capable* resource pack to prevent VAWG living with disabilities.

The implementation entered the third of four phases, engaging residents living in eight communities in Haiti’s Southeast Department. Through competency-based training and ongoing mentoring support, staff accompanied a network of 582 activists to facilitate social norms change to prevent VAWG.

*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.

Created by Beyond Borders’ Rethinking Power Team, 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.

Also created by the Rethinking Power Team, ‘Safe and Capable: Haitian Communities Preventing Violence Against Girls and Women with Disabilities’ is designed to change how people see women and girls living with disabilities and to increase their social inclusion and better protect them from violence. 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. Safe and Capable includes a five-part introductory guide, training curriculum, theater plays, dialogue-based posters, “quick chat” sessions, and learning and evaluation guides.

Encouraging Communities to Change How They Think About Emotional Violence and Victim Blame

Based on research and evaluation, BB's Rethinking Power team is also focusing on working towards improved community knowledge on emotional violence, attitudes around victim blame, and domestic roles of girls versus boys.

Activism networks are receiving targeted support to strengthen their capacity to lead and organize community-driven advocacy efforts on these topics.

Implementation was delayed due to political unrest, and then further due to COVID-19. After a gap period, during which support for community activism is being delivered primarily at a distance due to COVID-19, the team will complete the full implementation cycle, leading communities to complete phase four by June 2021. Your continued support will make this goal a reality!

Girls Are Creating Change in Their Communities and Schools

The Power to Girls and Safe and Capable programming that your support makes possible is already generating many positive outcomes within Girls’ Groups:

• Six girls living with disabilities have been integrated into existing Girls’ Groups,
• The startup of at least three new girls groups is underway, with efforts being led by graduates of existing Girls’ Groups; these motivated girls were trained as mentors; they have secured financial support from their own connections and have requested materials from BB to start new groups. BB will continue to support and mentor these young women in their initiative to bring Power to Girls programming to more girls in their communities;
• One Girls’ Group (ages 10-14) participant took the initiative to facilitate Power to Girls activities in her school. She used Power to Girls communications materials and reported back to her Girls’ Group Mentor every month;
• Older Girls’ Group participants are acquiring crafting and livelihoods skills and are beginning to sell their products;
• Girls’ Groups created six soccer teams, and a girls’ soccer tournament was held in 2019; and,
• Girls’ Group participants have mastered the game of Chess and were planning a Chess tournament for Summer 2020, but have postponed this until public health conditions allow.

One of the Greatest Successes So Far: the Haiti VAWG Prevention Coalition

One of the greatest successes so far has been the launch of the Haiti VAWG Prevention Coalition. This nonhierarchical cohort model engages six organizations who are receiving training and technical support as well as funding to implement SASA! (three organizations) or Power to Girls (three organizations).

The coalition launched programming in July 2019 and is composed of eight partner Haitian organizations, including Beyond Borders. Pwojè GEM, Centre d'Orientation et de Soutien à La Famille Haïtienne, and Fondasyon Toya are receiving training and technical support to implement Power to Girls over three years. Three other organizations – Association Femmes Soleil d'Haiti, Mouvman Peyizan Papay, and Initiative pour un développement equitable en Haiti – are receiving training and technical support to implement SASA! over three years. 

While Beyond Borders provides training and technical support on the methodologies, the Haiti Development Institute is evaluating and designing needs-specific organizational development training to strengthen each organization’s capacity to manage projects and financial accountability.

We are very excited about how this cohort-based technical support model will contribute to BB’s successful scaling of VAWG prevention methodologies in Haiti while also providing a funding model for other grant makers to support effective scaling through non-hierarchical technical support provision.

Building Strategic Connections with Haitian and Regional Feminist Movements

Your generosity is also supporting Beyond Borders’ efforts at cultivating strategic alliances within Haiti to network with and influence the feminist movement -- and their is significant progress to report!

A protocol was established and signed with Haiti’s Ministry for Women’s Affairs, and a protocol for collaboration with Haiti's Secretary of State for the Integration of Persons with Disabilities was drafted and is pending signature for collaboration on preventing violence against women and girls living with disabilities.

The Rethinking Power team also began developing plans to rollout use of the Movement Capacity Assessment Tool with other organizations when funding and public health conditions allow. Plans have also been made for BB's participation in upcoming regional activities organized by the Coalition of Feminists for Social Action.

All of these advances are strengthening the movement to prevent violence against women and girls -- and they are made possible by you!

Positive Shifts in Community Members’ Beliefs and Knowledge about VAWG and Power

A Rapid Assessment Survey conducted by local researchers found positive shifts in beliefs and knowledge. Data was collected via a quantitative survey involving 209 community members (108 women/ 101 men) and eight focus group discussions were conducted with 66 women and girls and 39 men and boys.

Results revealed several positive shifts in community members’ beliefs and knowledge about VAWG and power, and their capacity to support community actions to prevent and respond to violence.

• 97.6% of community members do not believe a husband has a right to slap his wife.
• 97.6% of community members understand that if a man has multiple partners, he has an increased risk of contracting HIV.
• 98.1% of community members believe it is equally important for girls and boys to go to school.
• 96.6% of community members believe a man does not have a right to beat, humiliate or refuse economic support to his partner if they have an argument.

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 and women in Haiti are living free from violence, discrimination, and inequality. 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:

• Follow us on Twitter for the latest from Haiti.
• We are committed to financial transparency and accountability.
• Watch a video about Power To Girls!

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.