The Population Council in partnership with PRERANA implemented the ‘Life Skills Education: A Best Practice’ project at Lucknow, which was a quasi experimental research to assess the effectiveness and feasibility of the developed model of Life Skills in Delhi.
The project that was implemented at Lucknow was the result of PRERANA’s concern for effective grassroots level interventions that targeted to improve lives of girls in a rural setting in and around Lucknow in UP in the age group 14-16, empowering girls with awareness, information and skills to enable them to explore better life options.
Interventions were carried out at two levels in the communities:
At the Micro Level
It focused on providing specific knowledge and information to the girls..
Skills trainers in cutting and tailoring provided vocational skills to the girls, while a trained community worker (usually a woman) encouraged experiential and participatory learning through interactive sessions following a structured Life skills Curriculum through the facilitator’s source manual ‘Choose a Future’.
At the Macro Level
The focus was on community awareness and sensitization regarding the needs and issues of young girls.
This was addressed through home visits, small group discussions, sensitization camps for parents, awareness melas (fairs), community exhibitons etc.
The Life Skills component was imparted through a training manual titled ‘Choose a Future: Issues and Options for Adolescent Girls’.
Through six months cycles of Life Skills Training and Skills Training in 20 villages of the Malihabad district of Lucknow, as many as 445 girls were awarded certificates at the end of the cycle, based on their performance in both the theoretical and practical evaluation undertaken for their skills training.
After the six months training the girls were kept engaged through involvement in centres serving as platforms for alumni activities and advanced inputs were provided to the girls in the form of:
- short term skills training courses like tie and dye, block printing,
- candle making etc.
- recreational activities, games
- inter village and intra village alumni competitions
- recreational picnics
- exhibition of various handmade items made by the girls, in their respective villages.
The project begun with the Council conducting a Baseline Survey of adolescent girls of area and a Control Site to assess Pre Intervention Levels of knowledge, attitude etc. Thereafter PRERANA was involved in the implementation and after 18 months an End Line Survey, following the completion of the intervention was conducted by the Council again, to reassess the Base Line Survey indicators.The results of this survey are awaited.