2022 Annual Report

To make schools safer and more welcoming for girls, thousands of Girls’ Education Program participants across India conducted safety assessments of local schools — more than 100 in total — documenting accessibility issues and thinking critically about what makes a space safe and welcoming for girls trying to continue their education. More than 179,000 Girls’ Education Program students and a group of more than 40,000 educators, caregivers, community leaders and government officials across nine states in India used these findings to advocate for the implementation of national laws and policies to support child protection in educational settings, with an emphasis on the importance of creating spaces for girls to flourish.

Hundreds of Room to Read Girls’ Education Program students and educators from schools across Laos and Vietnam attended end-of-year life skills camps in 2022, each focused on helping girls cultivate a set of key life skills, such as collaboration and critical thinking. Lessons were incorporated into interactive games and role-play activities that offered students real-life scenarios to navigate in groups, helping to deepen the girls’ understanding of particular life skills while emphasizing the importance of attributes such as teamwork, persistence and self-confidence.

Radio remains one of the most accessible communication channels for communities across Nepal, making it an ideal platform for Room to Read’s 'Road to Equality' radio drama series, which premiered in December  2022. More than 60 radio stations in Nepal partnered with Room to Read to broadcast the series, allowing households across the country to access important messages about gender norms and equality, gender-specific discrimination in the classroom and the critical role of girls’ education.

Despite being one of the wealthiest countries in the world by Gross Domestic Product, Italy ranks fourth among the 34 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries in unemployment rates among women. According to studies, paid employment rates among women and girls in Southern Italy have been around 25 percent while only 50 percent of girls complete high school. Based on these findings, we identified a unique way to support girls in the region: life skills lessons provided through young adult graphic novels, along with school-based curriculum. Graphic novels are particularly popular among adolescent girls across Italy, and through partnerships with local book creators, our team developed four engaging titles, each offering educational lessons — including those focused on digital and financial literacy, as well as entrepreneurship, which support girls’ future education and employability. We also are collaborating with government and education leaders, as well as local partners, to create and implement a school-based curriculum for girls in Naples and Palermo, in addition to holding regular symposiums on gender equality issues in education. The first symposium was held in October and included speakers from the European Parliament and Ministry of Education.

In March, we published our Adolescent Life Skills Assessment (ALSA) with an accompanying in-depth technical report chronicling five years of development, testing and adaptation in seven countries. ALSA was curated and adapted by Room to Read and measures competencies in nine life skills, including relationship-building, self-confidence and decision-making. Additionally, we published a best-practices guide for other organizations to contextualize and pilot the life skills assessment in their own programs.