Everything Emily

My summer break was a memorable one. I spent almost my entire summer in my home country Liberia and half in the United States. During the summer, while I was overly excited to come to the U.S., I was still committed to doing what I do best:  “service” to my country. In June, I volunteered with an International Foundation “Davis Project for Peace,” which undertook its first ever project in Liberia where I served as the Head of Workshop Facilitation under the supervision of its supervisor Miss Junita Sangare. The goal of the project was to initiate a knowledge based system that empowers young women with education about their sexual reproductive health whilst creating a safe space that enhances their growth and development, which we achieved. To successfully achieve our goal, we developed a life planning curriculum that covers all aspects of adolescence development and engages young women to be more active about their own life. Our teachings did not only consider the broad presentations of sex education but also aspects of values, sexuality, communication, relationships, teenage pregnancy prevention and most importantly, planning for the future; all of which are important skills that young people need to harness before facing the future.

We did the project in two phases. We hosted the first phase of the project in lower Montserrado County, Paynesville at the William Booth High School. Our team “Project for Peace” conducted the first three days of intensive training at the William Booth High school. The second phase of the training took place in rural Liberia, Bahn Town, and Nimba County. As the head of workshop facilitations, I made sure my fellow facilitators were prepared for the workshops and training. We had different strategies for each training session. At William Booth High School in Montserrado, our strategy was to provide in-depth information to students on values, sexuality, teenage pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, relationships and planning for the future. On July 05, 2022, our team (Project for Peace) traveled nine hours from Monrovia to a town in Nimba County and conducted training for the women of Bahntown in Nimba county. Our strategies in Bahn Town, Nimba County were finding the roots to the problems that many young women face and reconnecting these young women with their parents (mothers) to give them the full responsibility of guiding them; something we call our mentorship-mentee program. First we worked with adult women by providing training to them on sexual reproductive health (SRH). Second, we gathered our girls and walked them through a three-day intensive training workshop on SRH skills including training on adolescence development, teen pregnancy prevention, STIs, gender roles and quality, relationships, rape, and planning for the future. Now collectively, we did a decent job by compiling all of those resources and pairing the 30 adult women with the 30 young women we also worked with. The adult women are to act as mentors/guidance for the girls. They are responsible for how their mentees grow and who they become. This may not be the ideal solution but there’s faith in this process which is why our work is not only limited here.

As one of the facilitators for the units ”Teenage Pregnancy and Planning for the Future,” I took our participants through the different ways an unwanted pregnancy can be avoided. I also explained the social and health consequences of early pregnancy and some of the health risks of illegal abortion. Again, I taught them how to prevent an unwanted pregnancy and  understand the consequences of early pregnancy and the options that are available for pregnant teenagers. We later discussed how we can plan our future. We made our participants understand how they can set clear goals for their futures, and identify obstacles that may affect them in achieving their goals. We were able to help young people recognise the link between personal values and vocational choices so that they will learn about various work forms. WE also taught them what a curriculum vitae (CV) is and how to prepare one. After completing the second phase of the training, I traveled back to Monrovia, came to the U.S. in August, met two of my mentors and had a blast with them the rest of the summer break.