As my assignment in Afghanistan was coming to an end, I found myself reflecting on two years in this beautiful and troubled land. If there is a common theme from my many missions and discussions, it’s the strength, resilience and selflessness of women here. The mothers and grandmothers and daughters who remind me, in so many ways, of… Read more →←
Topic: Insider
How can we positively impact the self-perception of millions of adolescents in Brazil? I confess that Dove’s call for proposals aimed at strengthening adolescents’ self-esteem and body confidence as part of the Skills4Girls initiative gave me butterflies. The challenge seemed harder considering my country’s racial and ethnic… Read more →←
About two years ago, I was meeting a group of adolescent girls and boys in Aravan, a rural area in the southern part of Kyrgyzstan, to talk about their lives, their plans and visions for the future. Something that struck me was that girls were very keen on continuing education, learning new skills and building a professional career. They… Read more →←
Cookbooks and sanitary pads are not the first things that come to mind when thinking about ways to support women and girls who have survived violence. But for a group of female innovators in Ecuador, these low-tech, yet innovative, “secret women’s codes” could combat the COVID-19 pandemic’s hidden crisis – increasing rates of… Read more →←
When Pakistan’s polio vaccination campaigns were suspended in late March due to the COVID-19 pandemic, my work researching vaccine acceptance in the country was also suspended. Lockdowns made it difficult to continue working with local communities about their vaccine beliefs, misconceptions and concerns. Soon after, Deepa Pokharel,… Read more →←
The COVID-19 lockdown spelled disaster for Emiliya*, a refugee and married mother of two living in Bulgaria. She was already struggling to assimilate to a new life with lower paying jobs, fewer social opportunities, and a language she still hadn’t mastered. Then the pandemic hit. Schools closed and her son and daughter were learning… Read more →←
I never expected Malaysia or the world to be thrown into such a unique and stressful situation as the COVID-19 pandemic. What a shock for us all both professionally and personally. The standard programming for UNICEF Malaysia is mostly: upstream work with the government, advocacy with civil society and research with academic institutes.… Read more →←
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, Afghan women and girls were hard to reach. With no or limited access to telephones, radio, television and the internet, the most common way to spread information was through women going door-to-door or attending women’s groups. When lockdowns started, traditional forms of communication were further… Read more →←
COVID-19 has upended everything in Timor-Leste, but it has also been a catalyst for experimentation and rethinking how the education system works. It’s been the most exciting time of my career, to seize the opportunity to do so much to transform how the education system works in just a few short months. I feel like the country has… Read more →←
COVID-19 has jolted a South African education sector that has not seen a mass disruption of learning on this scale. An immediate, coordinated response was required. The strategic relationships we had built with key influencers in government and quasi-government bodies came in handy. Through a phone call with the CEO of the National… Read more →←