Operations Research on Keeping Girls in Schools to Reduce Child Marriage in Rural Bangladesh

  • R Research Project/Report/Study

I Inactive

Key Information

The Population Council, with UNICEF funding, implements an intervention research study to test a life-skills and tutoring support model to reduce school drop-outs among secondary-school girls and build aspirations for livelihood skills of unmarried girls who have dropped out of school with the goal of delaying marriage in Bangladesh. This project is part of UNICEF’s “Education for Adolescents” and “UNFPA-UNICEF Global Programme to Accelerate Action to End Child Marriage”. The Global Programme promotes the rights of adolescent girls to avert child marriage and pregnancy and enables them to achieve their aspirations through education and alternative pathways. The research study is intended to test for scale-up the success of BALIKA project2 in the intervention schools along with a control group to reduce school dropouts.: The study implications will be monitored systematically throughout the period for future scale up of intervention components. In the intervention schools, a blend of remedial educational support to in-school girls, skills-based livelihood training for out-of-school girls, strengthening school management committees (SMCs), community mobilization, and school improvement activities are being tested in contrast to the control groups where no interventions will be introduced. The program is being implemented in three districts of Bangladesh during the period of year 2018- 2021.

Lead Implementing Organization(s)

Location(s)

South Asia

Bangladesh

Activity URL

https://www.popcouncil.org/research/balika-bangladeshi-association-for-life-skills-income-and-knowledge-for-ado

Government Affiliation

Non-governmental program

Years

2018 - 2021

Partner(s)

Not applicable or unknown

Ministry Affiliation

Unknown

Funder(s)

COVID-19 Response

Unknown

Geographic Scope

National

Meets gender-transformative education criteria from the TES  

Unknown

Areas of Work Back to Top

Education areas

Attainment

  • Secondary completion

Other

  • Transition from school to work

Other skills

  • Financial literacy
  • Life skills/sexuality education
  • Rights/empowerment education
  • Social and emotional learning
  • Vocational training

Quality

  • Curricula/lesson plans
  • Teacher training

Skills

  • Civics education
  • Literacy
  • Numeracy

Cross-cutting areas

  • Adolescent pregnancy/childbearing
  • Community sensitization
  • Early/child marriage
  • Empowerment
  • Gender equality
  • Menstrual hygiene management
  • Mentorship
  • Other aspects of sexual and reproductive health
  • Sexual harassment & coercion
  • Social and gender norms and beliefs
  • Violence (at home, in relationships)

Program participants

Target Audience(s)

Girls (both in school and out of school), Youth

Age

12 - 19

School Enrolment Status

Some in school

School Level

  • Lower secondary

Other populations reached

Not applicable or unknown

Participants include

Not applicable or unknown

Program Approaches Back to Top

Access to school

  • Alternative learning centers/mobile schools/home schools
  • Extending school hours

Community engagement/advocacy/sensitization

  • Community mobilization

Life skills education

  • Gender, rights and power
  • Negotiation skills
  • Sexual and reproductive health (including puberty education)

Mentoring/psychosocial support

  • Adult (non-teacher) mentors

Reducing economic barriers

  • Financial literacy training
  • Income-generating activities

Social/gender norms change

  • Engaging parents/caregivers of students or school-age children/adolescents
  • Group activities with students or school-age children/adolescents

Tutoring/strengthening academic skills

  • Literacy - in the classroom
  • Literacy - outside the classroom
  • Numeracy - in the classroom
  • Numeracy - outside the classroom

Women's empowerment programs

  • Empowerment training
  • Leadership training
  • Self-help groups (non-financial)

Program Goals Back to Top

Education goals

  • Improved academic skills (literacy and numeracy)
  • Improved social and emotional learning/skills and mindsets
  • Increased grade attainment
  • Increased progression to secondary school
  • Increased secondary school completion
  • Increased years of schooling
  • Reduced grade repetition

Cross-cutting goals

  • Changed social norms
  • Improved critical consciousness
  • Improved financial literacy and savings
  • Improved sexual and reproductive health
  • Improved understanding of sexual harassment, coercion, and consent
  • Increased agency and empowerment
  • Increased employment/job-related skills
  • Increased knowledge of HIV, puberty, and sexual and reproductive health
  • Increased knowledge of rights
  • More equal power in relationships
  • More equitable gender attitudes and norms
  • Reduced adolescent pregnancy/childbearing
  • Reduced child marriage
  • Reduced school-related gender-based violence (SRGBV)

Additional Information Back to Top

Primary Contact

Sigma Ainul
Population Council
Senior Program Officer
sainul@popcouncil.org