My Journey As A Young Woman Change Maker

I am a young woman change maker in my early 20s. While growing up I wanted to be a teacher or a lawyer after my first degree. After completing high school I enrolled into the faculty of law at the Douala University for a year, but dropped due to lack of a sponsor. I started as a volunteer peer educator for a non-profit organization called Adele Reproductive Health Foundation, which promotes reproductive healthcare and rights, for women in underserved communities. For the last three years I had devoted my time to educate women and girls on hygienic care and environment, increase access to birth control for low income families, and bringing affordable reproductive health and family planning information to in-school students. On regular basis I organize campaigns to raise awareness on improve access to long-acting and permanent methods (LA/PMs) of contraception.

Today, my work as a volunteer health coordinator with Adele Reproductive Health Foundation is striving to raise awareness about abuse issues in local communities. My work targets abused children, especially girls and young mothers who are abused in one way or the other. I see this important because in my community boys are valued more than girls. The consequences of abused are schooling cut short; early pregnancies and hazardous births. The risk has grown to include HIV at an age when girls do not grasp the risks of AIDS.
My new project involves bringing reproductive health and family planning information into local schools, colleges, universities (public & private) through the distribution of family planning handbooks, which are produced and shipped to the project by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health/Center for Communication Programs, USA. Through this, I mentor in-school students to be classroom peer educators. With this new initiative, I started looking for opportunities and a space where I could bring and share my story and work. I found World Pulse as the venue. This also inspired me to apply for Voices of Our Future. My journey as a young woman change maker working with women and girls fits well with my personal vision of “working to see equal opportunities for all including young women in underserved communities”.