Consider
Women Win, in partnership with Standard Chartered, developed a fifth module of the Goal Curriculum, called Be Independent, which is a 12-session module that builds off basic financial literacy by introducing adolescent girls and young women to themes, topics and skills related to entrepreneurship and employability.
Be Independent includes four introductory sessions, which cover a range of general economic empowerment topics that will lay a foundation for employability and entrepreneurship. During these four sessions, participants reflect on what skills they would like to further develop (entrepreneurial or employability skills) and will then make their choice in session 4. Sessions 5 – 10 are then specific to either one of these pathways, depending on what participants choose. The last two sessions, Session 11 and 12, are joint sessions that bring participants back together from the two separate pathways.
Organisations, depending on their human resources and capacity, can choose to provide participants the choice, and then facilitate both pathways simultaneously to the two separate groups. Organisations can also choose to choose one pathway and facilitate only that pathway to all the participants (and potentially offer the other pathway at another time). For more information on this module, please contact learn@womenwin.org.
Apart from basic life and financial literacy skills, girls and young women can benefit from a variety of transferable skills that they can use in the marketplace. Progressive skill building creates pathways for AGYW to prepare themselves for lives and livelihoods of their own choosing. Women Win has identified the employability skills in three core competency areas that are often most valued by businesses and organisations. To be prepared for employment, entrepreneurship, or excel in school, girls need to develop skills in these overlapping areas. Coaches and programme leaders will recognise these skills as learning already embedded in sports:
Self: Skills focusing on personal responsibility, self-esteem and integrity – the foundation for personal growth and development.
People: Skills related to leadership and teamwork.
Process: Skills often related to technical competencies gained by learning to think critically, leading to thoughtful decision-making and the ability to work towards set outcomes.
Mastery of Self and Process, plus the ability to work with People, are skills that can be developed through participation in a sport programme and later applied in any work setting. Practice sessions and competitions can be used to call attention to and build the skills of AGYW in these areas.
This is not intended as a rigid linear framework, but rather as a reference library, since we know that leadership is developed in a holistic, iterative manner. For a better understanding of how these skills link to different peer leadership levels within an organisation, download the LEEP Framework by clicking on the pdf link. LEEP Matrix.pdf
One great example of how an organisation provides opportunties for participants to learn valuable transferrable skills is Moving the Goalposts, in Kilifi, Kenya. Moving the Goalposts (MTG) Kilifi works with over 5,000 young vulnerable women in Kilifi County, Kenya engaging them through soccer. Soccer provides a unique entry point for MTG’s reproductive health, human rights and economic empowerment initiatives. As a Youth to Youth Fund (Y2YF) grantee, MTG works with 23 young women as apprenticeship beneficiaries, providing them with the experience and knowledge to become successful entrepreneurs and to create jobs for others. The Y2YF is a competitive grant scheme implemented by the International Labour Organization-Youth Entrepreneurship Facility and an in-country implementing partner in Kenya, the Ustadi Foundation.