Gender Sensitivity Training for Khud Students

Background and Inception

Transforming the country’s education system, diminishing disparities in access to education and alleviating poverty through the power of digital are all agendas of seismic proportions. There lie a thousand steps between us and these feats; non-linear and even labyrinthic. Yet what we know for certain is that a huge part of solving this enormous puzzle is always centring the communities we serve. To always have a finger on the community’s pulse and work in tandem with them towards our mutual goals. 

Karina Nehra, Khud Intern, beaming in from the States to conduct the discussion

 Over the years Khud educators have flagged school dropouts for young girls as an increasingly threatening trend. Engaging community leaders and parents we have gathered that young girls are dropped out chiefly because of two reasons; early marriage and child labour. Both these problems are symptoms of the same mindset that undervalues girls' education and views them as suitable only for the domestic sphere and nothing else.  

For the past 5 years, Khud has been heavily invested in countering such perceptions and the ongoing gender sensitivity training is one of many upcoming initiatives planned in this regard.

Gender Sensitivity Training: Session 1

In the first session, the aim was to sensitize the students about gender disparities and inspire them to think about the ways in which these manifested around and the reasons for their continued existence. Following a visual approach, students were shown videos and later asked to discuss the content of the video.

Detecting discrimination

The first video showed children doing simple tasks and being paid back in candies. The boys got considerably more candies than girls for doing the same basic task. The children in the video thought it was unfair and that both girls and boys should be paid equally. We posed questions to our students asking what they thought about the situation and whether they see this kind of discrimination happening around them. Responses categorized a wide variety of injustices amongst siblings, extended family and the neighborhood. As expected, girls were considerably more cognizant of these injustices and related to the video on a personal level, far more profoundly than the boys in the audience

Girls not Brides

The second video was more direct and discussed the issue of early marriages amongst young girls and explored how pressures to marry off young girls stifle dreams and lead to an uneducated society as a whole. Students vehemently opposed early marriages and also went on to devise strategies to stop parents from marrying their daughters before their 18th birthday. 

8th Grader Alisha said: “I’ll come to talk to Principal Yasmin if I see someone marrying their daughter at a young age, we can even talk to the Police if they don't listen”. 

The session concluded on the note that we all must recognize and talk about practices that discriminate against girls, especially in accessing education, and must not let anything slip just because the people around us (“muhalay walay or neighbors and relatives in this case) will take offense on such a step.