Empower African Girls and Women as Global Leaders

Introduction

This report seeks to provide an update of the She is Empowered (ShE) Program, one of Africa Matters Initiative’s flagship (AMI) programs. She is Empowered aims to upskill and empower young Africa Women with the skills and knowledge they need to be able to conquer various challenges, to succeed career-wise and to impact their communities positively. 

As Feminists, Mubaiwa and Olivier, the Co-Founders of AMI, believe in women’s rights and human rights. We believe that women should be able to exercise political, social and economic rights to the same extent as men. As such, Africa Matters through the ShE program, aims to empower African women and even teach them about African feminism. Feminism is still believed to be a Western concept, and yet the word feminism is Western like the rest of the English language, but the behaviour of African women rising up and opposing patriarchy is the norm. Through the She is Empowered program, Africa Matters empowers African girls and young women (AGYW) to claim and exercise their rights - boldly and unapologetically.

Key highlights

We are happy to report that ShE is definitely Empowered. We thank you for your contributions to the ShE is Empowered  program. Your valued and appreciated donations totalling $4 188 resulted in 12 Leaders successfully completing the program. We started off, on the 20th of January, with 20 ShE Leaders aged 15-29 from Zimbabwe, Morocco, Senegal, Angola, Nigeria, Uganda, Tunisia, Botswana, Ethiopia, South Sudan and South Africa. Unfortunately, we had some drop-outs and dismissals due to non-performance in 2021. Our graduation and completion rate is at 60% and we hope to improve this in the year 2022.

Staffing and Modules 

In terms of staffing, the program was led by 2 program assistants and a program manager. The ShE Leaders completed all the ShE modules, namely: Personal Development; Soft Skills Building and Career Development; Introduction of the Community Project; African Identity and African Leadership & Youth Activism; African Feminisms; Cultural Differences & Similarities; Financial Literacy in Africa; Social Entrepreneurship; Community Projects Planning (1&2); Global Citizenship; African Youth Advocacy; Community Projects Planning (3-Challenges & Solutions); and Community Projects Execution. Additionally, our youngest ShE leader, Leonah Miniyothabo, aged 16, held an amazing webinar series on “Youth Leadership in the African Context'' on 15 September 2021. This session was very insightful and inspiring. 

Each module session ran for 2 hours and 2 modules were presented each month. At the end of each session, links to the videos or articles presented were made available to the ShE Leaders for further learning and development. Assessments and evaluations were given and collected from the ShE Leaders at the end of each module where they got the opportunity to share their reflections on the module presented.

Mentorship Program

ShE program has a mentorship component whereby we search for and pair our Leaders with mentors in the community who will journey with them throughout the program. We assigned each ShE Leader with a mentor by the end of February 2021. The carefully selected mentors provided career guidance, and shared their own challenges and experiences to equip the ShE leader with valuable, practical knowledge. The ShE team organised a meet and greet with the mentors on 30 April 2021 to give them an insight of the program and an understanding on how they were paired with their mentees. We are happy to report that all the ShE Leaders were paired with a mentor accordingly.

Community Impact Project

The community impact project is an essential component of the program which ensures that the knowledge ShE Leaders gain is disseminated into the community for greater empowerment. Each project is expected to impact at least 30 community members and have a significant impact which can be evaluated. The Leaders and 2 volunteers from their team were provided with free AMI T-Shirts “We are the ones we have been waiting for”;  as well as a sum of 120 USDollars to each Leader to support their project. By the end of September, 2021, 3 Leaders had completed their community project on Gender Based Violence (GBV), Women Hygiene and on Career Development respectively, and they shared some amazing pictures with the team which were later added to the AMI social media platforms.

Few others were delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic due to the different restrictions implemented by different regions and countries.  Moreover, of particular note was the community project carried out by Leonnah, the youngest ShE leader who completed her project (Project Jabula) on Women Hygiene. She has been running this project as an organisation where she educates women and young girls and provides them with sanitary pads and all the knowledge needed. This project even had its cohort where they did a graduation ceremony on 30 November 2021. 

Total expenditure on community projects: $1440 impacting approximately 360 individuals in the community. 

In November 2021, the exceptional ShE team was also compensated for their great work with an amount of $25 per session facilitated.

Graduation Ceremony 

The ShE Leaders had their graduation ceremony on Thursday, 2nd December 2021. This was a very powerful and emotional event. The virtual graduation made the ShE team understand the power of community we have created with the ShE Leaders. Next year we were hoping to host a residential program, where we can host a few of the Leaders and a few of their mentors in one country and have them physically connect with each other and also with the ShE team. We understand this would require additional funding to cover the costs of transport and accommodation. We would really appreciate your consideration for an in-kind donation for this in 2022. In particular, we are hoping to raise funds for a 4-day workshop and we anticipate that we would require at least  $25 680 for the full program, including a residential component. For now, please find more details on the virtual graduation below:

More details on the ShE Graduation - https://www.linkedin.com/posts/africa-matters-initiative_uganda-zimbabwe-southafrica-activity-6872478493427408896-eyPJ 

The ceremony marked the closing of a year of learning through facilitation of module content, thought-provoking conversations and the planning and execution of the community projects. During the ceremony, a speech was made by a representative of the ShE Team, one of the Africa Matters co-founders and two ShE Leaders reflecting on their time in the program. The names and reflective quotes of each ShE Leader were shown in the presentation and they were then inducted as alumni and informed of the possible ways they could continue their relationship with AMI in different capacities.

Only the ShE Leaders who completed both the modules and community projects components by the time of the ceremony graduated received acknowledgement for their completion. 12 ShE Leaders in total graduated on that day. We lost 4 ShE Leaders during the course of the year who either dropped out or were dismissed. Two (2) were dismissed on the week of the graduation as they had shown no evidence of having completed their community project. Two ShE Leaders had started their projects but had not submit their reports or update the ShE Team of their progress before the graduation and thus did not make the ceremony but will receive certificates of completion once their reports are received. Some of the projects completed include:

1- Zimbabwe ShE Leader: Training youth in Zimbabwe on Agribusiness

2- Zimbabwe ShE Leader: Project Jabula which aims on addressing social ills in Southern Africa

3- Botswana ShE Leader: Gender Based Violence (GBV FREE BOTSWANA) 

4- South Sudan ShE Leader: Career development workshop

5- Nigeria ShE Leader: Menstrual Hygiene Workshop

6- Angola ShE Leader: Kiapembe Energy

7- South Africa ShE Leader: Online platform to connect youth to job opportunities 

8-Zimbabwe ShE Leader: Providing legal services to refugees

9- Uganda ShE Leader: Menstrual Health

10- Uganda ShE Leader: Mental Health Awareness

All Leaders were grateful for the opportunity given to them to be part of AMI, for all the skills and knowledge they acquired throughout the program and for all the support they received from the ShE team, both professionally and on a personal level with their own development as young women.

Concluding remarks

We are grateful to you for the support provided to the ShE is Empowered Program in 2021. We are hoping that you will be able to continue supporting us in 2022.  Please continue to share details of this program among your networks to raise the full $5 000 needed for 2022. https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/she-is-empowered/

If you have any questions, concerns or suggestions, please feel free to contact us at she@africamattersinitiative.com

Links:

• Amina Mubarak's Menstrual Hygiene Project
• Kubepo Saul's GBV Free Botswana Project