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Greetings from at the Forefront!
As August draws to a close, join us as we recap the past month and what's to come next. In this issue, we will revisit the vibrant critical conversation on COVID-19's impact on Black adolescent girls globally, and the key evidence that anchored the discussion.
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ATF CRITICAL CONVERSATION ON: COVID-19'S IMPACT ON BLACK ADOLESCENT GIRLS GLOBALLY
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On 3 August 2021, at the Forefront co-hosted a critical conversation on COVID-19's impact on Black adolescent girls globally with Akili Dada and The Action Foundation Kenya.
The critical conversation featured at the Forefront's Evelyn Sallah (CEO), Lucie Amadou (Youth Lead), and Nana Apenem Dagadu (Health Equity Lead). We were also joined by special guests, Caroline Sankara (Executive Director, Akili Dada), Wanjiru Mbugua (Programs and Advocacy Coordinator, The Action Foundation), and Nsofwa Petronella Sampa (Founder & Executive Director, Positive Movement Zambia).
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UNDERSTANDING THE CHALLENGES FACED BY BLACK ADOLESCENT GIRLS GLOBALLY
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From September 2020 to March 2021, AMPLIFY Girls conducted a qualitative study, "Understanding the Barriers to Girls' School Return" in Kenya, Rwanda & Uganda to understand the barriers adolescent girls face when returning to school post COVID-19 and ways to overcome those barriers. As supported by the study's findings, this past year has seen heightened risk of gender-based violence, teenage pregnancy, and mental health challenges exacerbated by COVID-19 isolation measures. Read the full report here.
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In 2017, Georgetown School of Law published a groundbreaking study, Girlhood Interrupted: The Erasure of Black Girls' Childhood, which applied statistical analysis to a national study of adults on their attitudes toward black girls and findings showed how adults view black girls as "more adult-like and less innocent than white girls"—this is the foundation of the adultification bias they face. Read the full study here.
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At this point, you may have heard of the Girls of Color (GOC) Project we are launching soon. It will be an avenue for atF to directly interact with young black girls across the globe facing disparities in gaining access to quality education, career-building opportunities, and mentoring. We aim to provide platforms encouraging young black girls in the program to uplift their voices and strategize their own solutions to the growing challenges they face. Oftentimes spaces for dialogue drown out the voices of those most closely affected by the issues but, with GOC Project's focus on black girls from the US and Sub-Saharan Africa, we aim to give them an opportunity to spearhead the discussions they want to have on the issues they are most concerned about with peers and mentors alike.
Learn more about our aims with the GOC Project and further research here.
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