Sierra Leone finally reopened classroom doors after a nine-month school closure during the Ebola outbreak. Unfortunately, the government also announced a ban on all visibly pregnant girls in the classroom. An initiative has since been launched in collaboration with the government to encourage new and expecting teenage mothers to return to school, in response to the spike in pregnancies observed during the Ebola crisis.
Shristi KC, the founder of ‘Blind Rocks!’, an organization with a purpose to change the way society and individuals portray disabled people. Shristi shares how losing her sight at the age of 16 gave her a vision in life.
Two high-school students, Andrea Gonzales and Sophie Houser, created their own game that combats the stigma surrounding feminine hygiene. The pair met in the summer of 2014 when participating in a Girls Who Code summer program. For their final project, they developed Tampon Run.
In refugee camps across Jordan — which house just over half a million refugees — permanent schools are being built to help ensure children are able to succeed. The majority of refugees live in small, poorly built tents, but architects have partnered with nonprofits to design and implement new, innovative buildings that will not only last, but help improve livelihoods.
In Nepal, a country where girls’ voices are traditionally not heard or valued, young women are speaking up and stopping practices of human trafficking, child marriage, abuse and discrimination. Her Turn is at the helm of this transformation.
When school girls in Tanzania are forced to end their formal schooling because of issues such as pregnancy, bullying, or family discouragement, new and innovative BRAC study clubs step in to help young women complete their education and reach their potential.
Syrians flooding into the Za’atari refugee camp have made it Jordan’s fourth largest city, with over 83,000 displaced residents. They are victims of the worst humanitarian disaster of our time and face an uncertain future as the civil war continues to drive more people from their homeland. While resources in the camp are often scarce, a new project from the Fab Foundation helps residents share experiences, learn new skills, and connect with a global network to tackle daily challenges.
A study by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that there will be 1.4 million new technology jobs by 2020, and many of those jobs will go unfilled. In her home of Des Moines, Iowa, Nancy Mwirotsi noticed the needs of local African refugee families were enormous. Knowing the need for STEM training to fill future jobs, and the need to support struggling local refugee children, she decided there must be a way to do both.
World Environment Day (WED), observed annually on June 5th, strives to increase awareness about issues facing the environment. Sponsored by the United Nations Environment Program, WED has been celebrated for decades. This movement encourages individuals to take an active role in cleaning up their communities and help preserve natural resources for future generations.
In Lesotho, only one in three children who start primary school end up completing secondary education. Repetition rates remain high, classrooms are crowded, and teaching resources are limited. Teachers are overburdened and do not have time to hand out homework assignments, resulting in low learning rates outside of the classroom. Sterio.me aims to address these challenges with their new mobile homework program.