Train 150 AGYW (10-24 Years) on Menstrual Hygiene

Summary

In efforts to increase the knowledge and bridge its gap and also improve attitude, practice and access to healthy menstrual materials, African Child has carried out a rally in one of the schools in Buwooya where over 1000 story books have been donated to the school. These books include but not limited to Menstrual health readers manuals, Adolescents and Growth in series books as well as early childhood books. These are going to be part of their library and can be accessed whenever the AGYW need them.

This will increase access to information on human growth process, menstruation, wetdreaming for boys and how all these are managed to reduce embarassment that would lead to school dropout and or frequent absenteeism thus improving the learner's performance sine they can concentrate in class.

Achievements/Actions taken

1. The school of Bukaali provided the space in for the library to for the assorted growth and health books will be kept and accessed by the users both from the school and the community hence increasing their knowledge.

2. 5 staff (3 from the school and 2 from the community) were trained on library and information basics to support the AGYW and other users from the school and community respectively.

3. 25 Adolescents (15F:10M) from the school's health club were re-oriented on Menstrual health management and support and reminded of their responsibilities in supporting their colleagues to avoid embarassment, encourage them to remain in school and to also cascade the information to their homes where the menstruating girls are more at risk of being married off by their parents when they start mestruating.

Challenges and suggested solutions

The number of AGYW both in school and from the community is too high compared to the books so far acquired. The organisation together with the school will need to continue mobilising for resources and lobbying for more dolecsents books for better coverage.

The reading culture isn't yet good in the local schools and these users may need to have frequent support. However, the trained 5 people will support to ensure the books users are guided always and also the trained 25 adolescents will support their classmates and those from the community to get the information they need regarding menstrual health management and growth.

Although training and informantion sharing has been on-going, accessing the materials to train the AGYWs on the real practicle making of re-usable pads and also for the communities hasn't been easy. Thus still finding it hard to access the cheap and hygienic pads.