Books for Him & Her

Books for Him & Her has transitioned from a virtual platform, aHnonymous (www.ahnonymous.org) to include a physical permanent space. This space is manned by youth trainers and a youth coordinator. The Elevate prize will largely contribute to setting up the space to make it youth friendly, accessible and functional and also to pay for rent for the space.This will include purchase of electronic tablets for digital training, sexual health materials such as mannikins, and simulators. Also, the prize will contribute to engaging more counsellors to man our ahnonymous virtual platform, maintain the website, engage and train more youth trainers, and employ a digital and non-digital marketing approach to make adolescents within the community aware of the resources that we provide. 

Finally, we will use the prize to support our quarterly community outreach sessions to engage the youth who are not able to access our program. 

I am a cisgender sexually fluid young man who spent most of his earlier life years trying to figure out his sexuality. Through this process, I experienced several traumatic events including episodes of sexual abuse, coercion and manipulation that impacted me mentally and physically. This problem was compounded by my lack of access to sexual health resources growing up, or even someone trusted I could speak with. This informed my drive to provide such a resource in the community for children growing up, and promote safe spaces for adolescents to discover and learn about their sexual health and sexuality. My vision is a new world of safety, self-acceptance, embracing one’s sexual and gender identity and community for children all over the well. Books for Him & Her thus aims to promote safe spaces to drive uptake of sexual health information using age-appropriate youth strategies. 

Ghana is considered one of Africa’s safest countries.  But a veil of silence hides a devastating reality. A culture of secrecy, homophobia, blame-the-victim attitudes, and lax law enforcement has fueled a hidden epidemic of unwanted teenage pregnancies and criminal sexual assaults.  

According to a recent report by the Council on Foreign Relations, 14% of Ghanaian girls are victims of sexual abuse, and more than half have experienced gender-based violence.  The problem also affects young males as well.  

Although there may be solutions to tackle these problems individually, education has the overarching power to empower young people with healthy values and tools to protect themselves. Yet, more than half of Ghanaian school-age children have no access to sexual and reproductive health education.   Books for Him and Her, a community-based project, aims to provide adolecents with quality sexual health education using age-appropriate youth strategies. 

We de-stigmatize delivery of sexual health information through:

• Provision of a safe, judgement-free space
• Youth delivered information and programming using youth trainers who are close in age to the young people they are coaching. This promotes a community where young people can build trust and feel accepted. We offer educational resources and Skills based workshops like coding/art clubs 

Our new approach is an all-inclusive one that is largely cognizant of all identities which to date, most Ghanaian youth organizations are silent on and/or do not recognize. We recognize the unique burden of health issues in minorities such as the LGBT community, persons with disabilities and young girls. 

Our approach is simple: young people find it easier to speak with each other. Our goal is to use youth trainers to train other youth, who can be peer advisors for other youth. We aim to build a community of well-informed young persons who do not have to depend largely on adults for adulterated information, but have access to complete, correct information themselves. Again, we go beyond sexual health programming to provide educational resources and skills-based workshops to give our trainees the opportunities to build skills that actually enable them to act on the information they receive. 

Our focus on minority populations including the LGBT community in a very homophobic country (Ghana) is uniquely disruptive that may face pushback.

Humanity is better when everyone can truly express themselves and take confidently take decisions about their health, particularly their sexual health. Our model of allowing adolescents to express themselves in safe spaces is key their self-development and personal growth, and we strive to promote self-acceptance within our spaces. 

Our planned impact is to build a new-generation and community of self-accepting and progressive young people who are comfortable in their sexual health, and able to transfer that information to others. We are engaging with parents at the community level and taking their children through a planned co-curricular training using youth trainers who have been certified.

Our community survey with parents showed that 97% of parents are responsive to our model of a sexual health curriculum delivery. That survey encouraged parents to involve their children within our pilot program we run in March-April. We believe that a new generation of inclusive thinkers is key to a sustainable and progressive country.