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Title: 
Teaching for Improved Gender Equality and Responsiveness (TIGER)
Location: 
Battambang Province
Timing: 
October 2017 - December 2020 (administrative closing throughout 2021)
Budget: 
€781,831
Donor: 
Belgium; European Union
Sector: 
Primary education; lower secondary education
Focus: 
Professional development of teachers (PRESET and INSET) and school leaders; school-related gender-based violence; gender-responsive pedagogy; equity
Challenge: 

Violence against girls and women in Cambodia is still a big problem, perpetuated by traditional gender norms. Schools, homes and wider communities are enabling environments for the construction of gender identities and relations based on social inequalities. School-related gender-based violence (SRGBV) is a serious obstacle to achieving gender equality.  

Education is critical in empowering and transforming the lives of young people, especially girls, yet widespread SRGBV seriously undermines the achievement of quality, inclusive and equitable education for girls and boys. Teachers and school leaders are fundamental in transforming practices, attitudes and values, including instilling in learners the understanding and practice of gender equality, non-violent behaviour and acceptance of differences. Education stakeholders are aware of this challenge, but feel insufficiently equipped to create safer environments and positive attitudes towards girls. Planned reforms in initial teacher education offer opportunities to equip future teachers with skills in gender-responsive pedagogy.

Goal: 

In Battambang, Cambodia, 762 teachers, school leaders and school support committee members in 40 primary and lower secondary schools staff are skilled in gender-responsive pedagogy, impacting around 5,000 learners. 105 staff of the Battambang Teacher Education College are also strengthened in gender-responsive pedagogy, ensuring student teachers are on board from the start.

Approach: 

The TIGER project worked with the Teacher Education College and 40 schools in Battambang Province to become centres of excellence for gender-responsiveness.

The project centred on improving initial training and professional development of teachers and school leaders so they have the capacity to identify the key spaces in school life where gender is important. They were provided with tools to address gender biases through changing attitudes and beliefs.

The project was built around 3 pillars:

  • Development of an Action Guide for the gender-responsive transformation of schools into safe and learning-friendly environments. This Action Guide has been anchored in the daily school reality of Cambodia, offering relevant ideas, tools, and information to transform teaching practices and/or school leadership in a gender-responsive manner.
  • Improved knowledge and practice of student teachers, inset teachers and school leaders for enabling gender-responsive environments, through a capacity development trajectory existing of trainings, individual coaching, and learning cycles including peer discussions.
  • Organisation of an outreach, sensitisation and communication campaign on the prevention and protection of girls from all forms of violence, ranging from radio shows, over social media campaigns to theatre shows, targeting parents and guardians, communities and other relevant stakeholders.

An important aspect of the TIGER project was the financial and capacity development support given to third party CSOs that are members of the Battambang Education Support Team. Next to the 20 schools directly targeted by the TIGER project partners (consisting of VVOB, KAPE, GADC and PKO), five local CSOs supported an additional 20 schools to transform into gender-responsive schools on their own account.

Achievements:

As evidenced by the impact research and the external end-term evaluation conducted in 2020, the TIGER project resulted in taking first steps to tackle the serious issue of SRGBV in Cambodia.

  • At teacher level, the post-intervention study evidences an increase in teachers’ knowledge and skills, change in attitudes and beliefs towards eradicating SRGBV. Largest effects of the TIGER project on improved knowledge and attitude of teachers are found in primary schools.
  • At learner level, the research also evidenced that the teacher professional development trajectory had transfered effects towards the learners in schools. Learners reported a small but significant decrease in emotional, physical or sexual abuse in primary schools.
  • Secondary school teachers indicated smaller effects (than primary school teachers) of the TIGER project on teachers’ knowledge of gender equality and gender-based violence, resulting in fewer transfer effects of the TIGER project on performing emotional abuse, and no transfer effects on performing physical abuse.
  • At institutional level, the project aimed at transforming schools into centres of excellence for gender responsiveness. The baseline assessment indicated that the Teacher Education College (TEC) and the 40 schools were ‘indifferent to gender’, meaning that schools lacked consideration of the specific needs of girls and boys, and/or women and men, and benefits from existing gender norms and an inequality of power. Throughout the project the TEC and the 40 schools started their transformation process towards a gender-responsive learning environment: all of them improved their initial baseline survey scores towards the end of the project. Not all schools and the TEC managed to achieve the highest achievement of centre of excellence however.

As for the outreach, sensitisation and communication campaign, outstanding results were achieved. The storytelling app was downloaded by 2,213 users and 4,136 stories have been read. With more than 15,500 responses, the online advocacy campaign during the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence in 2021 showed an overwhelming support for improving gender equality in education in Cambodia.

Opportunities for scaling:

The TIGER project was set up as a pilot intervention in the province of Battambang. During implementation, 2 key elements were identified as having the potential to scale up the fight against SRGBV in Cambodia:

  • the Action Guide continues to be a teaching and learning material in the teacher education colleges (nationwide), preparing generations of newly qualified teachers for installing a gender-responsive climate in class. Complementary to these actions in pre-service education, additional capacity building of in-service teachers and school leaders in other provinces with the Action Guide would further lift the pilot to a nationwide scale. In future interventions however, a more tailored approach specific for the context of secondary education needs to be taken into account.
  • the gender-responsive school assessment tool and scales for emotional, physical and sexual abuse also allow to implement targeted interventions (e.g. in schools where baseline measurements are critical), to measure changes overtime at individual and institutional level and to further collect evidence to understand what works to prevent SRGBV.