Universal Children’s Day

Nov. 22, 2010 –This past Saturday, the world celebrated Universal Children's Day. For more than 55 years, November 20 has been a reminder of the obstacles that girls and boys face to living healthy and productive lives, and the need to improve their living conditions.

Recent figures from UNICEF show that the global attention to children has made a difference. There is marked improvement in the welfare of children around the world. Polio is close to eradication, 74 percent less children are dying from measles and the percentage of 15 to 24 year-old pregnant women living with HIV has gone down. Many governments, such as South Africa, have adopted legislation that protect the universal rights of children.

These changes demonstrate that improving the lives of children is an attainable goal.

Since 2006, CEDPA has provided non-formal education to girls and boys in southern Africa through the Towards a Better Future program. The central goal of the program is to develop a cadre of empowered adolescents—educated, healthy, gender-sensitive, and capable of making good decisions in life—by exposing them to better life options to make choices and creating an enabling environment to help them translate their choices into action.

Girls enjoy a "getting to know you" game in Zambia.

The program uses CEDPA’s proven Better Life Options model and the Choose a Future! curriculum. The curriculum contains 14 modules covering 114 hours and focuses on setting goals, values, communication skills, building healthy peer and family relationships, puberty and reproductive health, gender-based violence, community participation and the environment.

The curriculum is adapted to the region where it is implemented. In southern Africa, among other things, Ubuntu, a traditional African philosophy focusing on respect and compassion for others, has been incorporated as a module.

With enhanced knowledge, girls and boys enrolled in the CEDPA program are able to make positive changes in their lives. Study results show that participant reproductive health knowledge increased by 27 percent, and participants that planned to continue their education through university increased from 81 to 90 percent.

Community members, parents and teacher also notice changes among the program participants.

“My class–grade 6A–has benefitted so much by the program,” says local grade-school teacher, Ms. Dickson. “There has been a marked difference in their perception of sexuality, their self-esteem and interaction with one another in class and in the playground.”

The program has produced both sustained and unintended benefits. For example, one of the schools in Swaziland where the program was implemented won a national debate on gender-based violence. And many participants said that the communication with their parents and family members has increase by 34 percent.

For more than two decades, CEDPA has empowered hundreds of thousands of youth to equip them with specific skills, knowledge, and attitudes to be able to exercise informed decision-making regarding their futures.

Read more about CEDPA’s work with youth programs and our work in South Africa.

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