Dubai Cares visits Philippines to monitor girls’ education program

Dubai / Emirates Business

A Dubai Cares delegation conducted field visits in the Philippines as part of a monitoring and evaluation trip to witness the progress of its Real Assets & Improved Skills & Education for Adolescent Girls (RAISE) program in the country. The program, which was officially inaugurated in 2013 in partnership with Plan International, seeks to tackle gender-related issues to empower children, particularly adolescent girls, to stay in school and improve the quality of learning in the country’s poorest provinces, Northern Samar and Masbate.
The programme follows a comprehensive gender sensitive approach to address the specific barriers that prevent girls from receiving education in the Philippines. These issues include gender-related violence, gender-bias in the classroom, as well as societal considerations such as early marriage and pregnancy, financial and familial pressures. By addressing these issues, the program is supporting over 14,700 vulnerable children and adolescents, 70% of those will be girls who are deemed at risk of dropping out of school before graduating.
Commenting on the importance of the program in addressing gender inequality in the Philippines, Tariq Al Gurg, Chief Executive Officer of Dubai Cares said: “It is vital to recognize the importance of addressing gender-related discrimination in education if we are to put an end to poverty, which inhibits the future prospects of young people and the communities they live in. It is the mission of such programs to eradicate the gender gap between boys and girls in terms of economic and educational participation and to empower adolescent females to participate in a fulfilling education program, to improve their social, educational and career development. Witnessing the improvements that have already taken place in Northern Samar and Masbate is telling of the transformative power of the program, and the great steps that have already been taken in improving the prospects of adolescents living in the country’s poorest communities”.
Central to the success of the Real Assets & Improved Skills & Education for Adolescent Girls (RAISE) program is incorporating activities that focus on improving quality and relevance of education offered to the students and creating a supportive nurturing environment for girls to learn and prosper.
The program builds upon Dubai Cares’ gender equality approach which tackles context-specific barriers to girls’ education that occur at different developmental stages.