Daily Times

In response to the issue of Gender-Based Violence and gender disparity in education, Rozan, in collaboration with the Elementary and Secondary Education Department, Government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and SPO, announced the launch of a comprehensive project titled “Gender Mainstreaming & GBV for human capital investment project (KP-HCIP)” with the aims of mitigating GBV and violence against children in 1000 schools in 13 districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

While sharing opening remarks, Shazia Ata, Deputy Secretary of Elementary and Secondary Education Dept. KP provided an overall view of the project. The general aim of the project is to create a safe learning environment for children. The project aims to reach 1000 schools by conducting comprehensive training sessions with school teachers, representatives of Parent Teacher Councils (PTCs), Village Network Forums (VNFs), and Village Education Committees (VECs). These sessions will focus on addressing issues of Gender Based Violence, Violence Against Children, Sexual Harassment, and Sexual Exploitation and Abuse with sensitivity and efficiency. The training will empower the 1000 GBV Focal Persons to effectively address GBV, VAC, SH, and SEA, ensuring the implementation of the code of conduct and Grievance and Referral Mechanism. Additionally, interactive sessions with children from each of the 1000 schools will also be conducted. 10,000 to 15,000 children and school staff, including teachers, administrators, and community representatives from each school, will gain awareness of these policies and actively contribute to their implementation.

The Transforming Education, Emerging Issues of Gender-Based Violence and Child Protection seminar concluded on Thursday, 28 December 2023. The meeting was attended by Representatives of Government, Civil society, local community, school management and students from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Islamabad

During the presentation, Ms. Fouzia Yasmin, Dy. Director Program Rozan added that Rozan is a nonprofit organization focused on mental and emotional health and committed to working for a violence-free society while employing strategies like awareness raising, research, counselling, advocacy, training, and capacity building. Rozan has worked extensively on children’s emotional health through programs like Aangan since 1998. Rozan’s Children program started as the first initiative of its kind to institute debate on the issue of violence against children with a focus on child sexual abuse in Pakistan. For the past 25 years, Rozan has been working to enhance child safeguarding and emotional well-being (boys & girls) through strengthening institutions and communities, developing understanding and skills on safe programming and referrals, manuals on life skills education, and creating age and culturally-appropriate material for providing information to children on protection issues.

School teacher and member of the Protection Committee in Kuri Islamabad, Ms Ishrat Shaheen, emphasizes the importance of working with children and empowering them to raise their voices against violence. While appreciating Rozan’s work in the context of child protection in schools through life skills training of children, teacher training, and building connections with support services for survivors of violence, she stressed having the same approach all over Pakistan to ensure a safer environment for children in schools.

The project launch seminar was mainly organized to share the Project Overview with all stakeholders, including senior management and Officers from (Education and other relevant departments/attached departments), civil society, print and electronic media and community focal persons from project target districts to enable them to prevent and address the GBV, VAC, SEA. It was also aimed and expected to set a road map for agreed-upon next steps and gather participant feedback about project initiatives and objectives.

Chief Guest of the event, Ms. Nilofar Bakhtiar (Chairperson NCSW), said, “Let’s begin by recognizing the context we are addressing-the widespread gender disparities and the issues of gender-based violence and child protection. Statistics are alarming—according to International and national reports, every third of women face violence, and a child is abused every two hours. It is also a fact that reported cases are just the tip of the iceberg. So the project we launch today directly responds to these challenges.” Furthermore, she added, the collaboration between the government, education department, CSOs like Rozan, SPO, and the World Bank signals a commitment to a multi-faceted approach. This approach aims to not only address gender disparities and GBV but also to integrate solutions within our educational institutions, aiming to mitigate issues of violence against children and gender mainstreaming in 1000 schools in 13 districts of KP. Today’s seminar is pertinent to engaging the stakeholders and seeking their input and commitments to provide a safer environment for children in school settings. Rozan, with its expertise in promoting gender equality and violence prevention, brings a critical perspective to the project. SPO, strengths in social mobilization, adds insight into creating a sustainable change. The World Bank’s involvement underscores the global importance of this initiative and recognizes education as a critical driver of progress.

During the discussion on “Unveiling Strategies for Child-Friendly Learning in the GBV Mainstreaming Era. Social and political perspectives, how the curriculum is addressing CP issues. How the government addressing the issue regarding policies and structure was discussed” by the panellists, Shazia Ata, Deputy Secretary Elementary and Secondary Education Dept: KP, Dr Ambreen Ahmad, founder of Rozan, Bella Raza Jameel, CEO of ITA.

The launch marks a crucial step towards combating GBV, Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (SEA), and Violence Against Children (VAC) and fostering a safer environment in KP, ensuring the protection and empowerment of women & children.