Second Chance For Adolescent Mothers

Immediately after completing the Advanced Digital Changemaking course, the first step in my digital campaign was to create a Facebook pagehttp://facebook.com/girlsariseinitiative and invite friends and fans to like the page as we discuss issues of girls’ rights and needs.

Closely followed was the creation of a blog www.girlsarise.blogspot.com.ng where we chronicle activities and programs atour girls’ club. The blog also publishes stories from members of the Girls Arise club, thereby giving them the opportunity to develop their writing skills as well as express their concerns on things that affect the girl-child through online media. In addition, a twitter account was opened to launch the campaign for #SecondChanceForAdolescentMothers. The past few weeks have been dedicated to publishing on both the blog and Facebook journals and preparing for the big campaign to voice support for teenage mothers.

Now that the stage is set, the first three months will be devoted to sensitization online and offline. First, we will kick-start our enlightenment talk-show from June 1st 2017 as we campaign on the need for girls to be well informed on their reproductive health rights and needs. This will be taken to the Facebook page for intellectual and interactive discuss where parents, educationists, girls rights advocates and all those passionate about empowering the girl-child will have the opportunity to bare their mind. From June 15th , there will be an aggressive twitter campaign to advocate for the empowerment of adolescent mothers. This will run from June 15th - 30th, alongside powerful chats on whatsapp platform.

On July 1st, we will kick start the call for adolescent mothers that have suffered one form of rejection, abuse and stigmatization or the other to share their experiences in form of stories. The call will be advertised through the resource page of World Pulse, through my personal Facebook page. I will also network with other partner NGOs and CSOs with special interest in the girl-child and use their platforms to spread this awareness and call for stories. This will run from July 1st to 31st July and will culminate in our first Young Mothers Summit, scheduled to hold on Monday 31st July at our center in Ijegun, Ikotun area of Lagos State, Nigeria. The summit will, among other things provide a safe space and opportunity for stakeholders and policy makers to meet with and interact with young mothers and hear their stories with a view to ending the blame game and proffering solutions to their problems as well as lending a helping hand in form of empowerment.

And from August 8th, we will embark on intensive social media campaign, especially now that we would have garnered more support and followership. The next three months will be devoted to accessing, promoting, publishing and celebrating the stories that are submitted to us, even as the campaign continues through all our social media platforms.