By Erica Stone | AHF President
This young girl is part of our Stop Girl Trafficking partnership. She’s one of 10,500 girls in 519 schools across Nepal who’s no longer at terrible risk of being sold, forced into slavery or child marriage. What will her life be like after graduation?
We have been sending at-risk girls to school long enough now that we are seeing many of them finish and graduate – and that’s very exciting. So I was curious to spend time with some of the new grads and girls in their last year. They came into Kathmandu by bus from all around and we gathered for a few hours to drink tea, eat sweets (very important!) and talk about their lives.
I was knocked out by their knowledge and their confidence. They were not afraid to speak up, they knew the fate they had avoided and they were volubly thankful. About half wanted to teach, to turn their education into something that could help other girls; some wanted to be nurses; and a surprising number would opt for being entrepreneurs if they could manage it. It was interesting to hear their hopes and dreams, and what the shadows were in their lives.
Their lives are still not easy. But they have skills and they are not afraid of the future. They understand that, as almost always the first generation of girls in their villages to be educated, they are at the leading edge of change for women in Nepal. And they take that responsibility, and that chance, seriously.
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