We are ABLE: Promoting Gender Equality and Girls’ Education in the Ethnic Minorities Areas of Viet Nam

The project aims to improve access and retention of ethnic minority children, especially girls in lower secondary schools, and to improve the employment opportunities among ethnic minority women and girls. The project will address: (i) the issue of out-of-school children and dropping out from schools, especially for ethnic minority girls, by (a) raising awareness of the importance of education, particularly for girls, among communities, (b) providing training on school counselling work, which deals with SRGBV, for lower secondary school teachers and education administrators, (c) supporting lower secondary school teachers in delivering school counselling work to lower secondary school students, and (d) organizing dialogues and meetings with parents, family members and students to enhance their understanding and knowledge on SRGBV; and (ii) the issue of limited employment opportunities for ethnic minority girls and women, by (e) providing improved career orientation programmes for lower secondary school students, especially ethnic minority girls, and (f) providing training courses for community members, in particular female members, to enhance knowledge and skills on income-generation and job opportunities. The direct beneficiaries include ethnic minority girls and boys, secondary school students, teachers, principals, education administrators and officials from the provincial and district authorities, parents and community members in the 3 provinces. The estimated number of the direct beneficiaries is 16,400 people (9,790 female). Of this total, about 9,260 female persons are from ethnic minority groups, including 6,000 female students aged 11-14 from 24 lower secondary schools.

The first phase of the project was implemented from 2019 to 2022 in 12 districts of three provinces - Ha Giang, Ninh Thuan, and Soc Trang, reaching about 16,300 students including over 8,000 girls.