Author: Станица ПЕТ

Through education and resources, we create sustainable models of community organizing to advance gender equality in the region.

As part of the project “Her Voice – Her Power: Empowering Marginalized Women and Girls in Pelagonija”, a Gender Equality School was successfully implemented in December. The Gender Equality School was attended by 20 people from the Pelagonija region, who were selected in order to be trained and educated on topics related to gender equality, the rights of women and girls, and ways to actively participate in their empowerment.

The goal of the school was to create a network of gender promoters who will continue to work on the implementation of the project in their communities and who will contribute to raising awareness about gender equality and the importance of empowering women and girls in Pelagonija.

The school was conducted through interactive workshops, lectures, group discussions, and case studies. The program covered the topics of gender equality basics through which the participants learned about basic theoretical concepts, such as gender, sex, gender role and gender stereotypes. The students learned how to distinguish gender discrimination from other types of inequalities, the specific challenges that women and girls face in Pelagonija, such as limited employment opportunities, lack of educational resources, as well as socio-cultural barriers. The participants learned how to organize and influence their communities through campaigns, public speeches and initiatives to change attitudes and legislation regarding gender equality. They acquired skills to identify and solve women’s problems in their local communities.

The implementation of the School for Gender Equality represents a significant step towards the empowerment of women and girls in Pelagonia, as well as their active involvement in the process of changing awareness and attitudes in their communities. With this school, the project not only provides necessary education and resources for participants, but also creates lasting impacts by forming a network of gender equality promoters who will continue to work to advance gender equality in the region.

“Her Voice – Her Power: Empowering Marginalized Women and Girls in Pelagonija” is a project implemented by the Civic Initiative Center – Prilep in partnership with the Association for Legal Education and Transparency LET Station from Prilep and the Multiethnic Association for All Ages from the village of Crnilishte, Dolneni. The project is supported by the Government of Switzerland through the Civica Mobilitas program.

Child marriages are a very common cause and source of gender-based violence!

On 26th of November 2024, in cooperation with the Ministry of Interior – Sector of Internal Affairs – Bitola and the Department of Internal Affairs – Prilep, we organized an educational lecture on the topic “Domestic violence and underage marriages” as another in a series of activities to mark 16 days of activism against gender-based violence.

The lecture was intended for young people from Prilep and the region, with a special focus on young people from marginalized communities.

During the lecture, through the presentation of facts and numbers about the real situation with child marriages, both at the national and local levels, discussion and interaction with the participants, was emphasized the importance of recognizing, reacting to and preventing gender-based violence from a young age. Also, were discussed the risk factors and consequences of child marriages, which are often not sufficiently aware of by children and parents, and sometimes the actions of institutions in such cases are negligent, ultimately leading to gender-based violence triggered by early child marriages.