#ShiftthePower Pilot Project Kenya

Hello World Pulse Sisters, long-time.

So I was previledged to be among the World Pulse REG members who were piloting the ShiftthePower Voice Bridging project.

In my proposal, I intended to reach a target of 30 women and girls given the place I was going to work for my first time. I managed to get 45 people in my first Venue ( Sirari along the Kenya Tanzania Border) and 18 girls in Vware Migori.

These were purely Women and Adolescent Girls aged between 9-45 years old with no digital devices ( smart phones to be specific) as this was our primary consideration. We started with a digital storytelling literacy session and how we reached there to hear from them.

These are remote areas in the ASAL communities in Kenya without access to electricity, quality education, modern healthcare services ( 90% of them still rely on traditional herbs).

To further be specific on our target groups, We the BrightHarriet Foundation in partnership with Forgotten Voices, Rafiki Yetu , Community Care Collective (CCC) focused on survivors of FGM, Early Forced Child Marriages, Domestic Violence and School Dropouts or those who have never attended school at all.

We started with a digital storytelling Sensitization program. Explained to the participants the sim of the program, asked the participants what ShiftthePower means to them, how they believe the agenda for ShiftthePower can be achieved inorder for them to be included in the socioeconomic development programs.

We received amazing responses both on voice, storytelling notes, videos on what they need, how they feel and what can be done to meet their needs.

While this was a group of low level literacy, most don't know how to write. So we recorded on writing boards in most cases . For those in early marriage expressed their urgent to go back to school and get training programs to cater for their livelihoods with self employment, the teen moms (12-19 years) felt they need to go back to school and the structure should be built for them, have trained teachers from the community to help them further their education including those of their children. Some have 2-6 children aged 10 and below who have never stepped in a school because they lack funds for school fees.

They don't have trust in the government scholarships known as bursaries as they believe from their previous attempts to secure the same that it is only clustered for a certain group of people well known to the people responsible.

To them, ShiftthePower means having donors bring the funds directly to grassroots organisations and not through external or top down approaches . They want their Local leaders to take charge of solutions tailored to solve their problems.

They need their own modern community solutions like community schools ( not under trees as seen in the materials shared, local healthcare centers with local healthcare service providers trained from them and not necessarily those outside their communities. This is because they are normally in some cases assigned some pre-qualified doctors due to the nature of their community.

They also expressed that FGM is outdated with some who really need to be rescued from the same as the season is coming. And that will mean the end to their dreams, for they'll be married off. They need advocates amongst themselves( we managed to get) who should be trained and empowered to say no to FGM and Early Forced Marriages, Call for funding for education and healthcare Rights in their community. They felt that since they are the ones directly impacted, they ShiftthePower means they should be the ones who receive resources channeled directly to solve challenges affecting them.

Challenges encountered will be shared in the next update