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Adolescent Sexual Reproductive Health programmes

Adolescence - Changes, Choices and Rights (ACCR)


Content:

Goal

Promoting the sexual and reproductive health and rights of adolescents and make a positive contribution to their healthy development into adulthood, particularly by providing accurate information to young people, supporting their advocacy activities for their rights and access to youth friendly services.

Objectives

  1. To provide accurate and comprehensive information on sexual and reproductive health to students and apprenticeship trainees to enable them understand the changes that take place in their bodies and make the right choices for the future.
  2. To support the Youth Harvest Clubs to undertake advocacy activities to highlight the sexual and reproductive health needs and rights of young people in northern Ghana.
  3. To support the Youth Harvest Clubs to advocate for access to youth friendly health care services.
  4. To provide comprehensive HIV/AIDS education to younger children age 10-14 who are not yet sexually active in a way suitable for their age group e.g.using the love.check games.

Brief Project History

The YHFG's first project entitled "HIV/AIDS and Healthy Sexual Life Campaign" was implemented from 2003 to 2004 with funding support from the Support Group of the Swiss Tropical Institute, Basel, Switzerland. An evaluation report of this first project in 2005 showed two issues as the challenges to youth development in northern Ghana:

  1. Many young people in the region lack the basic knowledge and skills needed to manage their sexual and reproductive life.
  2. Taboos about sexuality issues in general and social norms such as forced marriages and early sexual initiation in northern Ghana, poses strong challenges to providing young people with the right information and services they need to make the right decisions on their reproductive life.
Based on these findings, the YHFG got committed to the goal of promoting the sexual and reproductive health and rights of adolescents and make a positive contribution to their healthy development into adulthood, particularly by providing accurate information to young people and advocating for access to youth friendly services.

During the implementation of the first project of YHFG, Youth Harvest Clubs were formed in various high schools in the the Bolgatanga District. Though the project ended in 2004, the Youth Harvest Clubs have continued in youth activities and has become an important link between the YHFG and in-school youth. Even though without a sustained funding, YHFG and its partners have managed to continue impact oriented activities for young people going while developing further the Sexual and Reproductive Health project and submitting funding proposals.

Regular activities with school and community clubs included:

  • Counseling of young people in difficult situations.
  • Open discussion on various reproductive health issues.
  • A poster exhibition reflecting the youth's perceptions and ideas about sexual and reproductive health.
  • The annual youth parliament where members of the clubs meet to debate on sensitive topics that affects their sexual and reproductive life.
All these activities have not only broken the silence surrounding such topics but has also raised the self-confidence of the club members to take responsibilities towards their sexual life. The programme has also inspired many young people to aspire for greater academic achievements and is currently schooling in various tertiary institutions of learning. Currently, over 500 in-school youth are involved in the harvest clubs, 600 students are involved with Games for life project and 200 apprenticeship trainees are involved in the community clubs.

With the programme entitled "Adolescence - Changes, Choices and Rights" (ACCR), the YHFG is working with both youth in-school via established Youth Harvest Clubs and out-of-school youth through a system of community clubs.

Projects of the ACCR programme

Changes project with apprenticeship trainees and school clubs

Here, the objective is to provide accurate and comprehensive information on sexual and reproductive health to apprenticeship trainees, organised in community clubs, and students (Harvest Clubs) to enable them understand the changes that take place in their bodies and make the right choices for the future.

We have developed a one year curriculum educational seminars, that are held in Harvest Clubs and community clubs on a weekly basis. Information on sexually transmitted diseases, family planning methods and access to services are shared and interactive discussions are held in small groups. One-on-one confidential counseling services are also extended to these community clubs where young people with specific and peculiar challenges can arrange to meet an adult counselor in the SKILL Centre. Under this project, community talk shows are planned for the near future.

Choices project with 10-14 years groups (games for life project)

The YHFG believes that keeping children HIV-negative is vital to future generations, but this is impossible unless they understand how the virus is transmitted and how to protect themselves. YHFG also believes that HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention education should be done during early adolescence (ages 10 to 14) because a study published by Advocates for Youth, have shown that this is the best time to establish enduring patterns of healthy behavior.

It is against this background that a volunteer from Holland who was coming to work with YHFG in 2006, introduced the love.check game as tool that could help take the HIV message down to young people. These games were piloted with selected youth groups within the Bolgatanga Municipality. The positive effects of these games on the youngsters encouraged the YHFG to scale up the project to cover more young people, particulary in Junior High Schools and Upper Primary schools.

The Objective of Games for life Project is to provide comprehensive HIV/AIDS education to younger children who are not yet sexually active using the love.check games. Love.check is an educational game that has been developed by the WEB.foundation (http://www.lovecheck.org/) for children in countries where the risk of HIV and AIDS is high. It is an awareness game consisting of 70 cards and the cards carry four story lines. One story is about a family in which a number of members are HIV+ or have AIDS. Another is about falling in love, friendship, sexuality and HIV/AIDS. Yet another story speaks of a girl that is in danger of getting raped and a fourth story line shows the prejudice and stigma's that exist around getting infected. It can be played by children who cannot read or write. The game which is supplied in printed format by the WEB.foundation based in Holland is designed to stimulate children to learn to talk openly about HIV/AIDS and sexuality. It is also designed to inform them about the risks of sexuality, particularly infection with the HIV virus. The risks of unsafe sex are dealt with in a friendly manner and become discussable in an expressive way. It will therefore also combat the stigmatization and discrimination of people living with the sickness.

Rights project with Youth Harvest Clubs in schools

With a growing confidence in discussing sexual issues over the years, the YHFG objective is to support the Youth Harvest Clubs to undertake advocacy activities to highlight the following rights of young people with respect to their sexual and reproductive health as defined by the International Planned Parenthood Federation in accordance with international human rights law:
  1. The right to be yourself - to freely make your own decisions, to express yourself, to enjoy sex, to be safe, to choose to marry ( or not to marry) and plan a family.
  2. The right to protect oneself and to be protected - from unplanned pregnancies, STIs/ HIV and sexual abuse.
  3. The right to have healthcare - which is confidential, affordable, of good quality and given with due respect.
  4. The right to be involved - in planning programmes with and for young people, attending meetings/seminars etc. at all levels and trying to influence Government through appropriate means.
The second objective is to support the Youth Harvest Clubs to advocate for access to youth friendly health care services. Thirdly, in the framework of the Youth Center (LINK) the Youth Harvest Clubs will be supported in the production of a newspaper magazine as an opportunities for young people to share their experiences and exchange ideas on their reproductive and sexual life with their peers and enable a direct youthful participation which is key to the success of the ACCR programme.