Literacy Class to Empower Women

Illiteracy is still a critical issue in Cambodian society, where most people, in particular women living in rural areas, cannot read and write because they have been unable to access school since their early school age. This is a result of poverty, old traditions, gender discrimination and lack of a school in or nearby their village. To participate in solving this social issue, new Heifer-funded projects have included a key activity in literacy class, Values-Based Literacy Program (VBLP), to empower women’s groups who have personally identified that their lack of education is one of the root causes of their poverty.

On August 16-21, Heifer Cambodia provided a training course for Training of Trainers (ToT) and VBLP class to 20 literacy facilitators (LFs) and 7 community facilitators (CFs), who were selected by Project Management Committees (PMCs) from five provinces where five Heifer partner organizations are implementing new projects. The six-day course was aimed at building the capacity of LFs and CFs in facilitation skills, understanding of VBLP concepts, running of VBLP classes and lesson plan development for VBLP class.

The training course was divided into two sessions. The first three-day session focused mainly on the 12 Cornerstone values and general concepts related to education, illiteracy, facilitation skills and lesson plan development. During the session, the participants were actively involved with sharing their ideas and experiences in relation to the topics.

In the last three days of the course, the participants divided into small group discussion. They were assigned to develop a lesson plan based on the VBLP book and demonstrate how to conduct a VBLP class. At the end of the session, the participants reviewed and checked the VBLP book and raised questions, so that they could capture the whole picture of the book. They were fascinated with lesson plan preparation and training methodology.

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Heifer Project International is one of many non governmental organization involved in rural development around the world. It works at the grass-root by providing animals and training to organized local groups that request assistance.