Building demand for reproductive health awareness among adolescent girls in conflict-affected districts of Nepal.

From 2004 to 2006 CEDPA joined with local partners in the Baglung Mohottari and Udayapur districts of Nepal to improve adolescent girls lives through a non-formal education program. The program reached 3200 adolescents between the ages of 10-19 with literacy and critical life skills training that improved participants reproductive health knowledge and strengthened their self-confidence. Recognizing the need to work with boys as well as girls to change community norms school-aged boys were included in year two of the program. CEDPA and its partners-Aamaa Milan Kendra Nepal Technical Assistance Group and the Nepal Red Cross Society-also addressed family and community factors to provide support for changes in attitudes and behaviors. An impressive 45 percent of the out-of-school girls who completed the literacy training component enrolled in primary schools as a result of the project. (excerpt)