Tostan, Inc.

The Community Empowerment Program (CEP) is an integrated, multidimensional development approach that has reached 5 million people so far. To bring about transformational, systemic change that generates outcomes for people at all levels of the community the CEP sets in motion new social dynamics. Separate sessions for adults and youth take place three times a week over three years. Held in the local language, these sessions are guided by a local, trained facilitator who lives in the community.

The first part of the program focuses on visioning, human rights, democracy, problem solving, and organizational skills, and how these topics relate to everyday life. Participants discuss and define their vision for the future of their children and their community, aligning it with their fundamental values reflected in religion and in human rights. Values relating to peace, non-discrimination and participation are made explicit and agreed upon collectively. Building on this foundation, the second part of CEP covers health and nutrition (with particular attention to child health), reproductive health (covering key issues of priority concern for youth), child protection, literacy, and economic empowerment. Inspired by new knowledge and agency, and in the context of their human rights-based vision and reaffirmed shared values, participants reinforce existing positive behaviors. They also identify harmful social practices, finding their own solutions to change them. Newly-adopted behaviors, conducive to improved well-being of children and youth, are reinforced by new social expectations, creating a new equilibrium.

The program has impacts across the five key areas of Governance, Education, Health, Environment and Economic Growth, while other key results of the holistic program include the abandonment of female genital cutting and child/forced marriage, dramatic improvements in maternal and infant health, increased school registration, especially for girls, and the empowerment of women and girls. Participants of the program are encouraged to ‘adopt’ other members of the community in order to share what they have learned, providing an opportunity to include the whole community in discussion.