Women's Empowerment in Africa

A training program to engage and prepare university law students to give supervised pro bono legal counsel to marginalized persons in Fez was launched during the second week of November.

An initial meeting with 37 masters level law students studying at University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah was conducted on Thursday, November 14. It was facilitated by Clinic Director Saïd and Assistant Clinic Director Bouchta, appointees of Dean Mohammed of the Faculty of Juridical, Economic, and Social Sciences, as well as HAF Project Manager Katie. The meeting included an overview of the goals of the clinic as well the structure of the 3-month training program.

Twenty-seven students, 14 female and 13 male, participated in the inaugural student workshop on Personal and Participatory Development which was held on Saturday, November 16. The workshop was primary facilitated by professional coach, Mohammed.

Students explored their own goals, investigated barriers to achieving those goals, and brainstormed strategies for overcoming those obstacles to achieve success in their personal and professional projects. Additionally, students discussed attitudes, energy levels, and how to manage our own responses and communication for better outcomes and success in our everyday life and work. Through group role plays, they applied a variety of communication styles based on energy level and common challenges in the context of legal aid delivery, project planning, and higher education.

A survey was conducted among all students to collect self-assessed baseline knowledge, skills, and relevant experience as well as community needs and inhibitors to local development and progress.

According to results, students want to be part of the program to “give legal help and guidance while developing [their] personality,” “develop [their] capacities and communication,” “grow [their] professional experience,” “ improve [their] legal experience, community service, and to help others, too,” and “focus on what is best for [their] career and contribute to something for [their] community.”

The next student workshop will focus on Interpersonal and Participatory Communication and will be held on November 30, 2019. It will be the second of a series of six student-focused workshops and trainings focusing on soft interpersonal and participatory skills, technical knowledge pertaining to migration, trafficking, and family law, and the application of both soft and technical skills in a legal aid setting. The goal of these trainings is to prepare students to give legal counsel to marginalized persons at the faculty-housed law clinic which is projected to open on a thrice-weekly basis beginning February 2020.

HAF gives thanks to Clinic Director Saïd, Assistant Clinic Director Bouchta, and Dean Mohammed for their commitment to the law clinic and legal aid program and to Mostafa, President of the Volunteer Experts for Development, who offered his guidance and expertise during the initial project and training planning process in October and November.

 The High Atlas Foundation is working in partnership with the University Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdellah (USMBA) in Fez to establish a Law Clinic and Legal Aid program which actively engages students in experiential and service learning for the greater good of the local community. The project is funded by the National Endowment for Democracy and aims “to foster greater cooperation among local civil society organizations and universities and promote service learning.”

Last Friday, we had the chance to try out some of the methods we use in our empowerment workshops ourselves. My internship colleague Yaniv conducted a half day workshop entitled “Masculinity and Feminism” for the whole staff in the office.

So, as the title of one of my last blog posts included “Women Power”, I find it thematically connected to call this one “Men Power”:

The objective for Yaniv was to try out a new concept of men’s empowerment before taking it to the field. This week he and project manager Errachid will conduct the workshop for two days in a village in Al Haouz province. Some months ago, one of the IMAGINE women’s empowerment workshop had taken place in the community and both men and women agreed that there is a big need for such workshops also for men - as peaceful relationships and good communication within families always need to include both wife and husband.

But the concept of the women’s workshops couldn’t just be transferred into a men’s workshop without modification. It needed to be changed and adjusted to meet the special needs of a different target group. The topics and issues of empowerment can be very different for men and women, for example when it comes to pressure in relationships or recognizing and potentially changing from traditional family roles.

The first weeks of the planning process Yaniv just spent reading and exploring the field: “We always have assumptions, so I had to learn what is the situation in reality,” he said.

His short input already made us think a lot about our roles in society and come closer together as a team. In gender equal groups of two or more we discussed what it means for us to be a woman or a man and where this can sometimes be difficult. Afterwards the results were shared and discussed with the whole group.

One exercise which was especially appreciated by many colleagues though was the carful-listening exercise. For two minutes one person had the chance to share a personal story and the partner was just listening without questioning, without judging, without giving advice. It showed us the importance of listening to others and we could feel in practice how beneficial such exercises can be for empowering men as well as women. Workshops like this can be an amazing way to foster peaceful relationships and a better understanding within families, peer-groups or colleagues.