WOMENS CAMPAIGN INTERNATIONAL

In rural Liberia, 1 in 5 deaths are related to unsafe water or poor sanitation. Through our experience and established networks across Liberia, WCI has seen the severe impact limited access to water continues to have on many of the communities in which we work. Moreover, as research and field experience has shown, this limited access disproportionately affects women. The burden falls on women and children, at times under dangerous conditions, to haul clean water every day in Liberia.

WCI built a hand pump and latrine in Bong County's town center, serving 1,800 people who are now trained on the importance of proper sanitation and hygiene. Following the successful completion of the first WASH project, WCI is now reviewing more communities in need like Bong County. Later this year the WASH initiative will be implemented in 2 more communities.

GALS program equips underserved young women in WCI’s home community of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with the leadership skills, confidence, and connections necessary to effect true social change in their communities. Over the course of the program , participants are trained in public speaking, financial literacy, self-empowerment and advocacy, social media and messaging, and team building. With the support of local community partners, WCI is currently offering the GALS program to teens twice per year, during a Spring and Fall session. The proven GALS model includes six to eight workshops held on consecutive Saturdays. Workshops are designed to introduce skills that build upon each other to promote community advocacy, as well as bolster confidence and capabilities to support future leaders’ academic, personal, and professional success.

In partnership with the U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and Instituto del Desarrollo de la Juventud in Puerto Rico, Women’s Campaign International (WCI) created a mental health toolkit for intermediate, high school students and their teachers within the Puerto Rican education system. The mental health toolkit is based on peer reviewed, positive psychology principles that are proven to enhance resilience. The toolkit has three components: A workbook for students, a students’ guide, and a teachers’ guide to help teachers support their students and themselves in improving mental health and resilience.

Since 2006, WCI has hosted a series of programs in Afghanistan focused on economic empowerment, entrepreneurship, and media in several areas across the country, including Kabul, Parwan, Panjshir, and Bamyan. WCI programs have included workshops, trainings, and dialogue on the Afghan Constitution, civic
participation, human rights, inter-gender communication, and leadership. Our Afghanistan initiative focuses on women’s political participation at national and local levels and mobilization of women in rural outreach projects, which aim to build the capacity of women in politics. Though our office in Afghanistan is currently closed as we work to help evacuees, we look forward to continuing programming when it becomes possible.

WCI partnered with Winam Green Ventures (WGV), a nonprofit organization based in Kenya, to implement the RAP initiative in Kisumu, Kenya, for a four week-long pilot program. The RAP initiative covers 4 main themes - pregnancy and STD prevention, COVID-19 safety and information, menstruation and reproductive health, and safe sex education. Four months after the pilot program, all 60 participants prevented pregnancy, remained healthy, and returned to school safely. Building off the success of RAP Kenya, in the spring of 2021, WCI partnered with Ukani Malawi and TraumaVenture to implement a six week RAP program in Malawi: three weeks outside the city of Blantyre and three weeks in the rural town of Balaka. Six week-long cohorts of 15 girls were trained, engaging a total of 90 participants over the course of the project.

Tapping into our youth engagement framework and building off of our COVID-19 programming in Kenya, in fall 2021, WCI began co-creating a virtual workshop series with health professionals focusing on vaccination education along with advocacy trainings facilitated by Temple University professors from the Klein College of Communications and student leaders in Temple’s Public Advocacy Club. Through this initiative, WCI trained Philadelphia youth ambassadors about the importance of the COVID-19 vaccine, debunk vaccine myths, and equip these ambassadors with the advocacy skills they need to make a difference in their communities. These COFAR Ambassadors are equipped with the knowledge, outreach strategies, and support they need to share accurate information with their communities.

For the past two decades, Women’s Campaign International (WCI)’s has collaborated with grassroots partners to create and facilitate training in skills development centered around providing women and girls with the leadership and advocacy tools they need to thrive as business leaders. WCI in collaboration with Sigma Labs are in the process of creating an entrepreneurship-based course for women in East Jerusalem. WCI will provide Sigma Labs with materials for entrepreneurship training, and Sigma Labs will be responsible for selecting curriculum topics that will benefit the end users. Sigma Labs will also provide WCI with the cultural information necessary to adapt our training to meet the needs of the population we are serving.