On Tuesday, 19th March, 2019, Visuals for Gender paid a visit to Luom Presby Basic School, in the Shai Osudoku District in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana. The theme for this year’s International Women’s Day was ‘balance for better’, hence the purpose of the visit was to empower girls to excel in all areas of life including their academic and career
endeavors . This initiative was in partnership with Citizens for Better Africa (CBA, USA) and Visuals for Gender, Ghana.
The Chief of Luom, Nene Tettey Kwao I, hosted the team and showed his appreciation to the team for reaching out to these young ones. He also highlighted the state and progress of the school, as it is still in its developing stage and needs more assistance to make these young ones reach their full potentials. The outreach program comprised of a series of talks, an interactive session and a donation to the girls.
The first session of talks was done by Florence Toffa, Director of Mobile Web Ghana and project coordinator for Visuals for Gender. She encouraged the girls to take their education seriously and also aim to rise to leadership positions. She admonished them to strive to contribute to changing their own lives and that of their communities, regardless of the circumstances they find themselves in now. The girls mentioned that their parents do not support them in furthering their education beyond junior high school. The chief has taken this feedback and will organise community outreach to educate parents on the need to send both the girl and boy child to school.
The second speaker was Patience Quaye, who spoke to the girls on the need to have self confidence and high self esteem. She encouraged them to be bold in their decisions and choices and not allow anyone to lure them into conducts, which will jeopardize their future. Patience Quaye went on to encourage them to open up to their teachers and any trusted person if they had concerns or issues bothering on their sexuality and relations with the opposite sex.
After the talks, the girls were presented with some sanitary pads. Often times, these girls miss school during their menstrual period. They were very elated about it and expressed their gratitude.
Visuals for Gender is looking forward to partnering with other organisations such as Citizens for Better Africa, to equip girls with the needed resources, knowledge, skills and exposure they need to excel in life.