Girl Rising India: Schools Campaign

Growing up in India as a girl has never been easy. India ranks 129 out of 146 countries on the gender inequality index, and discrimination starts early on. Often losing out to their male siblings, girls have 75% less chances off survival within the first five years of life; one third of child brides (girls married under the age of 18, some as young as 6 years old) are from India. In school, 41.34% of girls do not make it to class 8, and nine out of ten girls enrolled do not complete secondary school.

The perception of girls’ primary role being that of wife, caretaker, mother-in-waiting leads to unequal and inadequate resource investment on the part of parents and families and unequal treatment by teachers, thereby seldom allowing them to reach their full potential. Educators often endorse cultural gender stereotypes (e.g., math is easier for boys than girls) and prejudices. What’s particularly challenging is that these barriers are often deeply rooted in the way that families, communities, teachers and even girls themselves value girls’ education.

Girls taking a pre-assessment before starting the curriculum

Girl Rising is an international movement that started in the United States and has led to the creation of Girl Rising movements in other countries. It is a film that personalizes stories that barriers girls’ face to education using celebrity voice-overs and creates a movement for social change. PaperSeed partnered with Girl Rising India to implement a comprehensive multimedia module in schools to teach and sensitize students, teachers, and parents about gender roles/stereotypes, and to encourage them to challenge these norms. The stories and activities they engaged with aimed to make the issues personal and engaging: helping teachers, students, and parents better identify the issues, understand the role each plays in upholding/dismantling gender stereotypes, and how each can take action in their community. 

Girl Rising India has successfully completed pre-assessments and launched the campaign in the fall of 2017. We look forward to sharing updates as the curriculum concludes and post-assessments are made available.