Our Results

Overview of Evidence Based Girl Power Project® Impact:

For 13 years we’ve been teaching Girl Power Project® curriculum to girls, boys and the communities at large in over 90 regions in rural Uganda and have seen firsthand that educating girls is the solution to many of the issues our world faces today.

We’re excited to announce that the data scientifically proving the transformative impact of Girl Power Project® at the community level has been published in the Journal of Universality of Global Education Issues. We can now scientifically prove what we’ve known to be true all these years, Girl Power Project® transforms not just the lives of girls, but boys, teachers, parents, police, health care workers and the community at large! 

“The stakeholders observed increased confidence in their communities, increased communication and confidence to communicate between parents and children in their communities, increase in attendance and a decrease in dropout rates, increased gender equality, and an overall increased capacity in their communities to respond to violence against girls.”

In response to the challenges vulnerable adolescent girls face living in poverty, JLMC designed the replicable Girl Power Project curriculum and system of delivery to empower adolescent girls with the tools they need to stay in school and protect them from early child marriage, disease, early pregnancy, and violence as well as equipping them with critics assets they need to overcome these barriers and navigate adolescence successfully. Research indicates that when a girl has these assets, she is more able to succeed, specifically in negotiating life-changing decisions that affect herself and her family and also to be engaged in decision making in her community. 

JLMC aims to reach 50-80% of girls aged 12-15 in communities through the Girl Power Project curriculum, thereby administering a “social vaccine” to inoculate girls against harmful cultural norms. This includes over 60 hours of in school workshops, camp experiences and after school club sessions taught by local mentors over the course of two years. JLMC understands that a critical input required for the ultimate achievement of the Girl Power Project theory of change, is the creation of an enabling environment for empowerment of girls to exist and flourish. This is accomplished by training and building the capacity of parents and local community members to sustain GPP accomplishments long term. 

As of 2019, JLMC has reached over 6,000 girls in 96 communities in Central Uganda with the Girl Power Project curriculum. JLMC has engaged in data collection around the impact of the Girl Power Project for two separate research studies.

1. In September 2015, JLMC began gathering data internally for a monitoring and evaluation framework designed to measure the efficacy of the 2 year long Girl Power Project curriculum in shifting the attitudes and behaviors of girls who were educated with the Girl Power Project program.

2. Additionally, in September 2017, JLMC engaged an objective third party, Texas A&M University, to assess the impact of the Girl Power Project at the community level - on boys, parents, teachers, administrators and community leaders.

Internal Research Findings on Girl Power Project’s Impact on Girls:

In 2015, JLMC set out to evaluate the impact of the Girl Power Project. The two year study adopted a quasi experimental phase in design to evaluate the projects causal impact on outcomes. 

A survey was designed to measure girls personal empowerment via their demonstration of knowledge and attitudes based on Girl Power Project curriculum. The survey questions were administered to two cohorts of girls (treatment and control) at two points and (treatment) at three points. Over 750 girls participated in the study. 

Midway through the study, the preliminary results were clear. The girl Power Project was working. The treatment group outperformed the control group across all critical indicators.

Without Girl Power, I wouldn't have known that my body belongs to me.

— Naluzze Joyce, age 14

I learned that every child has a right to live a violence-free life.

— Nakalema Joyce, age 13

60% of girls can identify ways to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS

compared to 37% of girls at the beginning of the program and 38% of girls not trained in the program

In the second year of Girl Power Project programming, participants receive club sessions designed to put their mentorship and leadership skills into practice, strengthen their learning and provide additional information. JLMC found at the end of the second year, girls retained the information they had learned in the first year and gained additional assets. 

JLMC learned many lessons from the internal evaluation and immediately began implementing recommendations to further strengthen GPP programming. Moreover, JLMC is carrying out a continuous longitudinal study of 25 randomly selected girls from the Girl Power Project. These girls were selected in 2015 and will be followed for several more years, so JLMC can measure whether or not they have stayed in school, avoided early marriage, pregnancy and disease. 

Texas A&M External Research Findings on Impact of Girl Power Project® on Communities:

In order to further explore the impact of the Girl Power Project at the community level, Just Like My Child Foundation (JLMC) and Texas A&M University (TAMU) partnered to evaluate how engaging and empowering community members with knowledge of human rights and children's rights can enhance the success of the Girl Power Project. For a girl to live an empowered life, her community -- parents, teachers, law enforcement, government officials, men and boys -- must be supportive and actively involved.

Four post-graduate students from TAMU – two from the Bush School of Government and Public Service and two from TAMU's Department of Agricultural Leadership, Education, and Communications were interned in Luwero, Uganda during the summer of 2018 to evaluate  whether engaging adults and boys in the Girl Power Project contributes to improved conditions for a girl to live an empowered life. This investigation focused on the resulting relationships that a girl has both in and outside her home - with her neighbors, school teachers, local police/authorities, adult role models, and other members in her community.

The students conducted 143 interviews with 7 stakeholder groups (including JLMC staff; Community Legal Volunteers; Girl Power Advocates; Teachers; Parents; Partners; and Untrained Others) in 17 communities and collected 2,669 responses. 

The Texas A&M study revealed Girl Power Project community impact as evidenced by an increase in: 

• community awareness and advocacy for girl’s education 
• community knowledge and agency to respond to violence against girls 
• community awareness and dialogue on women’s equality 
• assumption of responsibility by community leaders with regards to girl’s issues 
• range of gender roles within the community 
• capacity of community members to parent their children

Conclusion: 

With these internal and external monitoring and evaluation outcomes demonstrating that the GPP® is effective in empowering girls and their communities, JLMC is now poised and committed to sharing the research widely through presentations and publication as well as identifying and working with strategic partners to support the scaling up of the Girl Power Project, a proven and sustainable model of success for girls empowerment. 

To learn more about the methodology and findings of these research studies and the theories that underpin them, please review the following reports:

Texas A&M Study: The Girl Power Project® in Uganda – An Evaluation of the Impact at the Community Level

We need your help to continue our transformative work, one girl at a time.