Girls' Education and HIV/AIDS Awareness, Mozambique
Young girls putting on an educational play. Photo: Karen and Bill Butt, UCC/Canada missionaries/CCM, in Zambezia province. |
The Christian Council of Mozambique (CCM), is a Christian humanitarian organization founded in 1948, made up of protestant Churches whose vision is to promote sustainable community development. Countrywide, it is composed of 22 churches and three religious associations. The Christian Council of Mozambique Zambézia (CCM-Z) is one of ten provincial offices, and has existed since 1986 with six member churches and one association. Within the policy of decentralization, CCM-Z works independently from the national headquarters and is capable of identifying needs and designing and implementing projects with its own administration and financial control. After the peace agreement in 1992, CCM-Z worked in the resettlement of refugees and the rehabilitation of social infrastructures in Milange and Namarrói districts.
In Mozambique, few girls go to school, and those who do stay for significantly less time than boys. Although the government encourages girls to attend school, a widespread traditional rural belief is that a woman’s work is domestic and child-care only, and in a typical rural Zambézia school, of 50 girls who start 1st grade, only about half complete it. In 2002, it was estimated that in Mozambique 13 percent of the adult population is HIV+. The rate is highest in the central region of the country (including Zambézia province) where the detected rate is 16.5 percent, a figure probably low because of reluctance of many people to be tested. About 200 previously uninfected persons per day in Zambézia contract HIV, predominantly via unprotected sex. Over 55 percent of these are women. More than 1/3 of them are between 15 and 24 years. There are an estimated 84,000 orphans who have lost parents to AIDS in Zambezia. Many orphans drop out of school, especially the girls, to care for the sick, perform domestic chores, look for food, and to earn money for family survival – all of which makes girls especially susceptible to exploitation and sexual abuse.
The PEDRA program (Pedra is Portuguese for stone) seeks to build a solid foundation of intellectual, emotional, and spiritual health for young girls in Mozambique. Among its various virtues, stone often signifies a firm foundation for building, and PEDRA aims to do just that. Its mission statement is: "To develop in girls of Zambézia the learning skills and love of learning that will encourage them to stay in school and develop their God-given talents, so that they grow into creative, self-sustaining, community-oriented Christian adults." Statistically, the incidence of HIV infection is negatively correlated with level of education: the better educated have lower infection rates. Similarly, the girls that PEDRA's mission statement envisions also will be much better able to avoid HIV infection: they will have both the knowledge and the mental strength necessary to make informed decisions about their sexual behavior, and to act on them. The PEDRA program encourages girls to attend school, provides after-school programming, and provides HIV/AIDS awareness education – thus providing girls with the knowledge and mental strength necessary to be self-confident and to make informed decisions about their behavior and future.
PEDRA classes are held in Regone Sede, Maquiringa, Mucisse, Moriamuendo, Milange, Molumbo, and Quelimane. All centres except Quelimane and Molumbo have a maximum of 20 girls, taught by two trained volunteers, totally about 178 girls. Approximately 150 families are affected by the programming, since some girls are siblings. The average family size is five. Thus, the total indirect participants would be about 750 persons. The girls' classmates (male as well as female) benefit indirectly because the girls are encouraged to take their various achievements (artwork, etc), as well as their attitudes to share with their schoolmates and peers, with 1,500 students potentially affected. Selection Criteria for the PEDRA program includes: 1) girls must be aged ten–to-fourteen years old; 2) the girls must be attending school; and 3) the girls must have an interest in participating in an after-school program. The CDC members, the schoolteachers, and the chief collaboratively choose the girls who meet the above criteria. Since CCM member churches know their surrounding communities well, they also recommend some girls who perhaps do not go to a church but live in the area and are in need of PEDRA’s programs. Since there is no cost to the girls, there is no problem of only the more affluent girls participating or of poorer churches not being a part of PEDRA.
The PEDRA program includes structured learning activities in art, hand sewing, embroidery, music, drama, art, crafts, and Bible study, all of which help them to express themselves and discover and develop their various talents. Through the practice of these skills the girls learn to work both independently and in groups, to persevere, to produce work of high quality, to enjoy learning, and to develop confidence in their ability to learn and achieve. The girls who have been in the program for longer periods become teachers and mentors of newer girls, and develop leadership skills. As much as possible, the program uses recycled and locally available materials, such as banana leaves and glue from a local plant called topossi. An additional program component beginning in 2004 is to invite guest speakers to speak to the girls. These will be women from the respective district who are involved in different professions – doctors, administrators, senior civil servants, etc – who will talk to the girls about their jobs, the training required, the activities involved, and the satisfactions. These will provide excellent role models for the girls, and concrete examples of what is possible for each of them, if they stay in school and stay HIV-free. CCMZ already has personnel experienced in HIV/AIDS education, and close-working connections with others, which the PEDRA project will make use of. In each PEDRA center, on the first day of training, a group of four actors will present a play about HIV/AIDS adapted to the specific local reality, and teach the PEDRA girls the basics of creating and performing a play. On the second day, a Corridor of Hope representative will conduct a training session about HIV/AIDS aimed at the age level and social environment of the PEDRA girls. Then, under the supervision of the actors the girls will begin to create their own mini-plays about HIV/AIDS. Subsequent training sessions will build on this initial exposure with follow-up activities such as the making of posters and banners (drawing on their art and sewing experience in PEDRA), which can be placed in their schools, churches, and other public community sites. The girls’ knowledge of HIV/AIDS will have deepened and widened, and so they will be ready for further theatre experiences, which they will present in their own schools and other community venues.
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Updated 9/23/04
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