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Description
School violence in Romania is in the top 5 countries in Europe with similarities in terms of types of violence with countries such as Lithuania, Bulgaria, Ukraine and Republic of Moldova. In order to change the school climate and reduce GBV the project will address its structural causes: social norms, stereotypes, prejudices, lack of institutional intervention procedures.
The project aims at tackling the issue of gender based violence (GBV) in schools through situational analysis that will be carried out in each partner country focusing on the situation in the selected schools, by means of consultations with children and teachers. It will address 375 teachers and 250 students from schools in Romania, Republic of Moldova and Ukraine. Based on the gathered data, good practices will be selected from the partner countries that respond best to the identified needs and intervention strategies will be proposed to address the need to reduce the GBV phenomenon.
In each school a Child Advisory Board will be set, meeting on a monthly basis. Based on their activities and discussions they will develop and implement child-led initiatives in each school in order to raise awareness of GBV in their schools and communities.
Given the similar problems faced by partner countries, the added value of the project partners consist in sharing their best practices and developing knowledge on school violence with the aim of adopting the appropriate ones according to the targeted school environments.
Summary of project results
The project aimed to alleviate the problem of gender-based violence in schools in Romania, the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine through specialized activities and collaboration with the beneficiaries to improve the situation of the targeted communities.
Among the accomplishments was a situational analysis of gender-based violence in the targeted schools in the 3 partner countries regarding gender-based violence in schools. Through this analysis, it tried to understand the legislative framework specific to each country that regulates the intervention in situations of gender-based violence in schools, the existing research with reference to the given field, relevant statistical data, reports of state institutions regarding the documentation of cases of violence as well as existing of good practices. A methodology for teacher training, a methodology for conducting CABs (Children Advisory Boards) and a series of detailed intervention strategies for each school were also developed, focusing on the particular situation of each school and the specific axes of intervention where the need for a greater effort to conceptualize the phenomenon of violence and gender-based violence.
An exchange of experience regarding good practices was also carried out, during which the partners discussed on the basis of the finalization of the methodologies to be applied.
230 teaching staff from Romania and 78 teaching staff from the Republic of Moldova participated in trainings in order to develop the capacity to prevent gender-based violence by addressing a positive non-discriminatory attitude during classes and breaks and to address aggressive attitudes through participatory actions. 20 CABs were established (15 in Romania and 5 in Republic of Moldova) which held at least 14 meetings/school during which they discussed methods of preventing gender-based violence, but also methods of addressing current problems regarding the issue.
20 local campaigns were initiated by students in order to increase awareness and combat gender-based violence in the school environment in Romania and the Republic of Moldova took various forms: exhibitions, plays, debates, flashmobs, creative projects, watching thematic films and discus based on it.
For the organizational development component of the Applicant, a training took place and a fundraising strategy was developed. It also was organized a fundraising event in December 2022.
The communication of the project was carried out through constant posts on the Facebook channels of the partners, as well as on their websites and on YouTube. The posts made had a reach of 17,716.
Before their work on the project was stopped due to the conflict on the territory, the separate Division of the Terre des hommes foundation in Ukraine took part in the exchange of experience and carried out the situational analysis on gender violence in the targeted schools.
In the end, the impact of the project was considerable, reflected in the materials developed and in the effective involvement of teachers and children in the actions of the project.