Optiven Foundation Impacts Girls With Initiatives

The world’s attention shifted on 11th October 2020. This was to take stock and shine a light on the girl child. It was time too to commemorate 25 years since the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action – the global agenda for advancing the rights and empowerment of women and girls, globally.

So, how has Optiven Foundation plugged in to give girls a hope for the future. Chairman of the Optiven Foundation, Mr George Wachiuri says, ” the number of girls keen on gaining a better future is increase. We have been involved in empowering such girls through giving them opportunity to go to secondary school vide our Soaring Eagles Scholarship Program SESP.

As we celebrate the girl child today, we look back with great pride because of who these girls have become”. Wachiuri and the trustees of the Foundation can indeed celebrate as they look at the development of a confident Lilian, one of the SESP beneficiaries who is now geared to change the world. Through mentorship and physical support from Optiven Foundation, Lilian was able to attend school and having completed and passed with flying colors, the world now has an empowered girl ready to build a better future for all.

The theme for the year 2020 celebration My Voice, My Equal Future, resonates well with the intervention taken by Optiven Foundation. Through it’s #SpreadtheHope campaign launched amidst the Covid 19 pandemic, the foundation has traversed different counties to give food to starving families and encouraging them to care for their children.

The challenge for many such families has been how to keep their children from trouble including girls getting into early marriage or unwanted pregnancies. Mitigations such as provision of food for households and stipends for sustenance has kept the families together and the girl child protected.

With the Generation Equality launched in early 2020 as a multi-year, multi-partner campaign and movement for bold action on gender equality, Optiven Foundation has made a significant contribution by providing girls with sanitary pads.

A Trustee at the Foundation, Mary Wachuka says, “the Foundation has donated sanitary pads to three counties targeting hundreds of girls. We are keeping the tab and look forward to continue empowering the girls because we know they will impact the society in future”.

The initiative by Optiven Foundation has seen the donations of sanitary pads benefitting girls in Kirinyaga, Nyeri, Kajiado, and Loitoktok. The initiative has addressed actions related to the needs and opportunities of adolescent girls and their solutions is central to the Generation Equality mission.

While progress for girls has not kept pace with the realities they face today, and COVID-19 has reinforced many of these gaps. This year, under the theme, “My Voice, Our Equal Future”, Optiven Foundation seized the opportunity to launch the George Wachiuri School Of Mentorship.

It was inspired by what youth and especially girls see as the change they want, the solutions- big and small- they are leading and demanding across the globe. WACHIURI says, “the school of Mentorship meets the need for directing the youth on the realities of the future and how to prepare for them amidst arising challenges”.

Through such mentorship from the Optiven Foundation through the George Wachiuri School Of Mentorship, at least 20 girls have received hands on experience of the workplace. The recipients have gone on to be employed and are contributing positively to the society.

As girls worldwide assert their power as change-makers, the Optiven Foundation joins in celebration of International Day of the Girl as they focus on their demands to: