The TEA Project has worked at a local Girls Home in Kandy
for 2-years; in recent months we've become concerned at the sudden
change in behavior of the girls. Generally engaging, energetic and
outgoing the girls have become isolated and detached. There has
been a suicide attempt, bullying, severe infighting and an
increasing lack of motivation to participate in our weekly ‘Girls
Group’. This raised alarm bells and inspired us to plan a tailored
training programme facilitated just for the girls. 'Girls
United'.
We ran 2-days of our
leadership programme, ‘L.I.F.E Training’. Over a weekend 16
girls aged between 9 and 16 years attended. A local school from
The TEA Project's ‘School Network’ kindly donated the facilities
helping to create a positive training environment away from the
orphanage. The training was delivered by two strong female role
models; a professional volunteer TEA-cher and our Project
Worker; both local and able to deliver the programme completely
in native ‘Sinhala’.
The training aimed to empower and
en-skill the girls with leadership qualities. The girls worked
in unity planning presentations and role plays, learnt about
international children’s rights, qualities needed for being
‘strong women’, they set personal goals, talked in depth and
openly about difficult personal experiences and the trials of
life at the orphanage.
The girls commented they had
never shared experiences with one another before, how they felt
“relaxed” after being given the opportunity to talk openly and
felt “listened to for the first time”. Shared personal stories
and enabled the girls to understand and appreciate each other.
They talked about sisterhood and developed a list of basic rules
to work together on to help one another.
A number of serious concerns
about the girl’s home including physical and mental abuse came
to light. These concerns were logged; the stories and incidents
will be related directly to senior managers at the girl's home.
The TEA Project saw that issues were addressed effectively and
that the girls were heard.
The training helped us to
re-shape the projects weekly girls group into a 'focus group'
aimed at giving the girls a platform to talk, be heard and make
positive change.
