Stop Violence Against Girls in School : A cross country analysis of baseline research from Ghana, Kenya and Mozambique

This report presents findings from baseline studies carried out in three districts in Kenya, Ghana and Mozambique for Stop Violence Against Girls in School, a five year project (2008-2013) led by ActionAid. The study aimed to provide a baseline with which to measure and evaluate change over the course of the project, as well as building in depth knowledge of gender, violence and education in the project areas in order to inform decision making about community intervention, advocacy and research priorities in the project, and contributing to the international literature on gender violence in schools. Data was collected in 2009 in 13 primary schools and communities in Ghana, 16 in Kenya and 15 in Mozambique. A total of 2757 respondents participated in the baseline study, including girls and boys, teachers and head teachers, parents, SMC members, community leaders and women’s group leaders, District Education Officers, District Health Officers and Police. The studies combined quantitative and qualitative methods, and a desk review of the legal and policy frameworks. The baseline study confirmed that primary schoolgirls in the project areas experience multiple forms of violence in their schools, homes and communities. Gender violence is closely linked to poverty, with forms of punishment, early marriage, and transactional sex related to the demands on girls to provide support for their families in a context of economic hardship. Across the three project sites, we see disconnects between legal and policy change and local implementation. While Education For All messages are clearly impacting at local levels with increasing access and reducing gender gaps at school, attitudes to and action on gender and violence seem harder to shift. There is some evidence of change (possibly related to recent NGO work in the areas), but apparent changes in awareness or knowledge are often not matched by changes in behaviour. For example, teachers condemning corporal punishment in Kenya and Mozambique, and girls speaking out against female genital cutting and other forms of violence against girls in Kenya may be influenced by policies and interventions, yet these seem to be having little impact on changing practice. Whilst girls being able to openly condemn violence, at least with each other, is an important step in challenging violence in schools and communities, without wider change girls may be placed at increased risk of violence by speaking out in an unsupportive environment. Opportunities for reflection on deeply ingrained beliefs about gender and violence and on how these beliefs relate to practice, as well as opening spaces for different groups at different levels to come together in dialogue and action is likely to be needed to effect wider change

Childrens engagements with violence : a study in a South African school

This thesis is an account of a qualitative study which set out to explore the meanings for\ud children of living with violence. Using a social constructionist epistemology, I examine\ud how, through social relationships, children (co-)construct beliefs, values and practices in\ud relation to violence, and consider the implications for violence prevention.\ud Set in the changing context of post-apartheid South Africa, the study was located in a\ud primary school in a township of Cape Town, where gangsterism, criminal and domestic\ud violence were rife. With 36 children (aged 8, 10 and 13 years), I carried out a series of\ud semi-structured interviews and group sessions, using participatory data-gathering\ud techniques to explore themes of relationships, conflict and violence. Further\ud ethnographic data was gathered through playground observation, working as a\ud classroom assistant, and parent and teacher interviews. Forms of discourse analysis,\ud blending frameworks from developmental psychology, social psychology and\ud sociology, were used to analyse children's talk, thus creating a fine-grained analysis\ud which is sensitive to children's creative engagement with multi-layered social relations.\ud This emphasis on children's active construction of meaning differs from much of the\ud social science literature, which assumes a uni-directional relationship and casts children\ud as passive victims, sometimes caught up in a 'cycle' of violence.\ud The study reveals some of the complex, contradictory and shifting ways in which\ud children engaged with violence in the social fields of the neighbourhood, peer relations\ud and in adult-child relations. Three psycho-social processes were central to these\ud engagements: control (agency), connection (inclusion) and coherence (sense making).\ud But striving for control, connection and coherence generated tensions and conflicts. In\ud managing these tensions, children sometimes colluded with and perpetuated forms of\ud violence, but they also found ways to contest violent social relations. I construct a\ud framework to illustrate these relationships, and consider how interventions, using this\ud framework, can work with children to reduce the possibility of violence

How do extreme weather events contribute to violence against children?

BACKGROUND: Only recently have research and policy begun to shine a light on the magnifying effects of EWEs (Extreme Weather Events) on children's exposure to violence. However, the links between EWEs and VAC (Violence against Children) remain under-theorised, poorly understood and often unacknowledged in policy and practice. OBJECTIVE: Identify, synthesize and analyse available evidence on the central characteristics and factors influencing the relationship between VAC and EWEs. METHODS: We conducted an extensive scoping review of the literature (academic and grey) to identify existing research and gaps in knowledge. Using flexible and iteratively developed search terms enabled us to identify direct violence – physical, sexual and emotional – and structural violence, rooted in inequitable and unjust systems and institutions. RESULTS: The relationship between VAC and EWEs is linked to gender; climate-induced mobility or immobility; child labour; and health. We found that VAC can intensify during EWEs, but the nature of this relationship is contextually specific. The relationship between VAC and EWEs is rooted in historical injustices, global systems and structures, and therefore disproportionately affects those living in poverty. CONCLUSION: Studies have uncovered how increasing social, economic and emotional pressures following EWEs increase children's violence risk exposure. This may occur in their homes or in relief shelters. The violence may involve peers, or forms of hazardous labour that young people are compelled into because of the sudden need for families to rebuild or help make ends meet. More knowledge is needed to inform integrated, context-specific and culturally sensitive plans to better protect children from the consequences of EWEs

How do Climate Change and Environmental Degradation contribute to Violence against Children?

This scoping review of the literature explores the interlinkages between two pressing crises: violence against children (VAC) and climate change (CC) together with environmental degradation (ED). Only recently have research and policy begun to shine a light on the magnifying effect of CC on children’s exposure to violence, exploitation, and abuse, with the role of ED remaining under-explored. To spur academic and political movement in this area, our research aims to help establish the magnitude, direction, and pathways of the relationship between CC, ED, and VAC. We showcase the complexity of that relationship and illustrate, in the form of case studies, why context-specific approaches and more research are needed. Doing so, we cover five thematic areas: 1) Hazards and Disaster Risk Reduction, 2) Gender, 3) Im/mobility, 4) Child Labour and 5) Health. Taking all five thematic areas together, structural violence against children emerged as a cross-cutting theme, creating and reinforcing the conditions for multiple forms of VAC in the context of CC and ED

Addressing silences in research on girls’ experiences of teacher sexual violence: insights from Uganda

Growing evidence from multiple countries in Africa documents sexual violence in schools. However, when that violence is committed by teachers it is shrouded in secrecy. This article identifies disconnects between quantitative and qualitative research, policy and practice, which have contributed to these silences. We address some of these silences through a dialogical analysis of mixed methods data from the Contexts of Violence in Adolescence Cohort study (CoVAC) with young people in Uganda. The analysis illuminates girls’ experiences of sexual violence by school staff, and patterns of discrimination and inequality that increase vulnerabilities. The data reveal how schools vary in their institutional responses and, in the absence of institutional support, girls develop strategies to resist sexual coercion. Overall, our analysis exposes significant disconnects between policies and practices of sexual exploitation in schools. We conclude that dialogical, mixed methods research approaches have strong potential to better understand and address silences in policy and practice on highly sensitive topics

Does the Good Schools Toolkit Reduce Physical, Sexual and Emotional Violence, and Injuries, in Girls and Boys equally? A Cluster-Randomised Controlled Trial.

We aimed to investigate whether the Good School Toolkit reduced emotional violence, severe physical violence, sexual violence and injuries from school staff to students, as well as emotional, physical and sexual violence between peers, in Ugandan primary schools. We performed a two-arm cluster randomised controlled trial with parallel assignment. Forty-two schools in one district were allocated to intervention (n = 21) or wait-list control (n = 21) arms in 2012. We did cross-sectional baseline and endline surveys in 2012 and 2014, and the Good School Toolkit intervention was implemented for 18 months between surveys. Analyses were by intention to treat and are adjusted for clustering within schools and for baseline school-level proportions of outcomes. The Toolkit was associated with an overall reduction in any form of violence from staff and/or peers in the past week towards both male (aOR = 0.34, 95%CI 0.22-0.53) and female students (aOR = 0.55, 95%CI 0.36-0.84). Injuries as a result of violence from school staff were also lower in male (aOR = 0.36, 95%CI 0.20-0.65) and female students (aOR = 0.51, 95%CI 0.29-0.90). Although the Toolkit seems to be effective at reducing violence in both sexes, there is some suggestion that the Toolkit may have stronger effects in boys than girls. The Toolkit is a promising intervention to reduce a wide range of different forms of violence from school staff and between peers in schools, and should be urgently considered for scale-up. Further research is needed to investigate how the intervention could engage more successfully with girls

Good practice in needs-based post-diagnostic support for people with young onset dementia: findings from the Angela Project

Evidence on post-diagnostic support for people with young onset dementia is scarce. Previous studies have employed a problem-focused approach; however, evidence on ‘what works’ in real-life practice is essential to develop recommendations for service design and delivery. This study aimed to provide insight into ‘what works’ from the perspectives of people with young onset dementia and their supporters. We gathered free-text responses on positive service experiences via a UK cross-sectional survey. Inductive thematic analysis was used to identify the objectives of positive services and the needs these met. Follow-up interviews enabled in-depth insights from people with diverse diagnoses, ages and social situations. These were analysed using a template drawn from the survey. The 233 survey respondents gave 856 examples of positive support. Analysis of 24 follow-up interviews led to 16 themes clustered under three superordinate themes: ‘maintaining autonomy’, ‘being myself’ and ‘togetherness’. We found that positive services address the disruptions to sense of agency, selfhood and meaningful relationships that are experienced by those with young onset dementia. The study provides an in-depth understanding of the needs met by positive services for younger people with dementia. Our nuanced findings on good practice can inform age-specific guidelines for young onset dementia and indicate how personalisation can work in practice to help people with young onset dementia to maintain identity, autonomy and connections

Young-onset dementia: scoping review of key pointers to diagnostic accuracy

Background Routine psychiatric assessments tailored to older patients are often insufficient to identify the complexity of presentation in younger patients with dementia. Significant overlap between psychiatric disorders and neurodegenerative disease means that high rates of prior incorrect psychiatric diagnosis are common. Long delays to diagnosis, misdiagnosis and lack of knowledge from professionals are key concerns. No specific practice guidelines exist for diagnosis of young onset dementia (YOD). Aim The review evaluates the current evidence about best practice in diagnosis to guide thorough assessment of the complex presentations of YOD with a view to upskilling professionals in the field. Method A comprehensive search of the literature adopting a scoping review methodology was conducted regarding essential elements of diagnosis in YOD, over and above those in current diagnostic criteria for disease subtypes. This methodology was chosen because research in this area is sparse and not amenable to a traditional systematic review. Results The quality of evidence identified is variable with the majority provided from expert opinion and evidence is lacking on some topics. Evidence appears weighted towards diagnosis in fronto-temporal dementia (FTD) and its subtypes and young onset Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Conclusion The literature demonstrates that a clinically rigorous and systematic approach is necessary in order to avoid mis- or under-diagnosis for younger people. The advent of new disease modifying treatments necessitates clinicians in the field to improve knowledge of new imaging techniques and genetics, with the goal of improving training and practice, and highlights the need for quality indicators and alignment of diagnostic procedures across clinical settings

Unintended pregnancies in the lives of young people in Luwero, Uganda: a narrative analysis

Using a feminist narrative approach, this article explores how unintended pregnancy can rupture young lives, and how young people respond to and navigate these ruptures. We analyse qualitative data from a longitudinal cohort study in Luwero, Uganda, focusing on narratives of a girl and a boy about their recent experiences of unintended and unwanted pregnancy during COVID-19 school closures. We argue that laws, policies and norms relating to education, sexual and reproductive health, and the family in Uganda position young people in complex and contradictory ways, that create the conditions for unintended pregnancies, and restrict the choices open to them. The analysis traces how pregnancy ruptures their everyday lives, their identities, and relationships. Their narratives reveal gendered ways in which they enact identities to manage the ruptures. Families are sites of contestation, where gender and sexuality are regulated, but are also mobilised by young people to support their efforts to repair the ruptures. Our analysis underscores the importance of working with young people to understand their positionalities, resource environments and social networks as they make and navigate decisions about pregnancy, and of addressing the structural forces that underpin the rupturing effects of pregnancy on teenage lives