For the 1st time ever, this year four girls will sit the end of primary education exams in Kassala state in Eastern Sudan. They are the first ones in the area to do so.

One year ago, the community allowed the first girls school ever to be opened. But there are still challenges to ensure every girl gets an education.

No girls allowed

Here, tradition is an obstacle to girls attending school.

“In our tradition, we do not send girls to school,” says one woman from the area.

But girls in the girls’ education club have a vision of a life different from that mandated by tradition, for example: early marriage, a young family and subjection to the rule of male members of family.

Girls say: Stay in school

The members of the girls education club have an important mission: to encourage their peers to stay in school. They do this by intervening every time a girl drops out. Sometimes by exerting gentle but persistent pressure on parents they have been able to get girls who dropped out of school to get married to return.

The members have become role models to other girls.

The girls tell me they would like to become doctors and engineers when they finish schooling. Their eyes shine with determination.

Half a door

There is only one problem though. These girls are in primary school. There is no secondary school and unless one is built nearby their dreams will die.

Plan and other partners have done a really good job in opening the door of education opportunity for girls. But for these girls, it may turn out that we have only opened half a door.

– Ndungu Kahihu

Change happens slowly, but it happens. We hope that as these girls become more empowered, they themselves will be the ones to ensure they gain access to secondary school education.

Do you have a teacher or mentor who encouraged you in school to achieve and succeed? Share you story here!

I wondered about girls in other parts of the world. There exists already a disparity in the access to education for girls. Girls who are also mothers don’t have the opportunity to re-enter the education system like the girls I knew in the home. There is no one to care for children in a single parent home if the girl is an orphan and taking care of her siblings. There is no one to watch over the children while the girl goes to school or work. Being forced into marriage at a young age forces a young girl to become a woman much too soon and takes away her chances at a bright future.  From the words of one of the girls in the Because I am a Girl study,

“I wish I had not married so young and had babies so young. For me it is too late now, but my message to all teenage girls is do not marry before age 20 and wait to have children until you are 22 that is the right age for childbearing, when a woman is mature and can look after herself and her baby.” Ganga, Nepal.

Plan is helping girls by investing in education so that they don’t have to become young mothers and so that they have better resources to help their families. The BRIGHT Project has helped girls in Burkina Faso go to school who would not have otherwise had access. BRIGHT, or the “Burkinabé Response to Improve Girls Chances to Succeed…achieves high levels of school enrolment and graduation rates for girls by creating supportive learning environments in 132 communities across 10 provinces.”

By supporting Because I Am A Girl, I know that we can make a difference in the life of girls.  I’ve seen what education and support can do for girls in Canada and so lets encourage our government and our peers to do the same for girls in other parts of the world who are in desperate need of equal access to education.