Uganda Evaluation - United Nations Girls' Education Initiative

schools in the municipality in 2010. In addition, KAGEI/KALI‐supported training workshops were
conducted for parent‐teacher associations and SMCs in 2010 in 21 of the 28 sub‐counties. In Kyenjojo,
the committee identified girls who had dropped out due to pregnancy and advocated for their return to
school. Furthermore, during the recent launch of the girls’ education programme in May 2011, which
was sponsored by DfID, former child mothers from different districts were given the opportunity to
share and learn from each others’ experiences.
Further, district and sub‐county UNGEI committees, together with the district education office,
mobilized and participated in ‘Go Back to School Walks’, which are described in Box 2.
Box 2: School walk
The ‘school walk’ initiative employed in Abim District aims to counter reluctance to observe the timely
return to school at the start of each school term found among children and even teachers. School walk is
also intended to sensitize key community members on the importance of girls’ education, and to
mobilize them to support policies and programmes that will ensure quality education for girls and other
vulnerable children. It is also aimed at encouraging girls who have dropped out to return to school.
The initiative is typically undertaken a week before the commencement of each school term. It is
organized by the district education office, in collaboration with UNGEI district and sub‐county
committees. Community mobilization is undertaken by the UNGEI committee, while the school
community is mobilized by the district education office. In addition political leaders also participate, and
a band is hired to lead the walk so that both children and adults are attracted to the activity.
During the walk, children carry placards with messages such as ‘Send your daughter to school’, ‘School
starts on Monday’ and ‘School is good’, to mention but a few.
The walk starts from a selected central point, passes through the surrounding villages and ends at a
venue where district education officials, politicians and NGOs address the people. During the rally, pupils
present songs, plays and dramas. The key message in all of the presentations is the importance of
education and the need to send both boys and girls to school.
Further, through mobilization by district UNGEI committees, the returnee child mothers are now actively
involved in counselling and encouraging the other colleagues who dropped out to return to school. This
is also done through radio talk shows, as described in the box below.
Box 3: Radio talk shows
Radio talk shows are one avenue for reaching out to communities in hard‐to‐reach areas, such as
mountainous areas characterized by poor and sometimes impassable roads. Radio shows make it
possible to reach out to many people at a minimal cost, and are being used in Kasese District in
Western Uganda.
The talk shows are organized by the district UNGEI committee using local FM radio stations. They are
facilitated by child ‘returnees’, female role models from the community, or UNGEI district committee
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