APPROACH AND METHODOLOGY
Women Win is built on three strategic pillars: Strengthen, Learn and Catalyze. The activities within the Strengthen pillar focus on increasing the sustainability and replicability of grassroots programs by strengthening organizational capacities. They comprise the funding and capacity building of Women Win's program partners. Learn includes the activities around impact measurement and research. Activities within the 'Learn' pillar focus on documenting and sharing the impact of sport on girls whilst also building open source guidelines and methodologies bottom up. Women Win's activities within the 'Catalyze' pillar aim to mobilize resources and shift practices and policies through an integrated, targeted approach using both online and offline tools.
IMPLEMENTATION, TIMELINE, AND DELIVERABLES
-Learn: By 2012 Women Win will build and open source several tools that will give insight in how to address gender based violence, and how to accomplish economic empowerment for girls and young women through sports. These tools consists of guidelines, and curricula that help program managers and coaches to design, and implement high quality sports programs that address these issues. The tools will be available on a wiki-type platform that allows anyone to download the information, add best practices and comments, and update translations. The tools are standard available in over 40 different languages.
-Strengthen: Between 2011 and 2015 Women Win will invest in at least 15 grassroots organizations focusing on sports as a strategy to address gender based violence. This will lead to an increased capacity to design and deliver high quality sports programs and will directly improve the lives of 1,500 girls and women.
-Catalyze: Between 2011 and 2015 Women Win will mobilize additional resources for the sports for development movement (with a particular focus on girls and young women) and will raise awareness with at least 5 million people (including key stakeholders) on the impact of sport on the advancement of women's.
Gender based violence is considered to be a key inhibitor for economic participation and empowerment of girls and women. According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), almost 50% of all sexual assaults worldwide are committed against girls age 15 and under. Worldwide, one out of three women experience physical and/or psychological abuse in her lifetime. In many countries engaging women in the workforce is a key element for economic growth. Also according to the UNFPA Gender inequality is a key feature of poverty; more than 70% of the world's poor are female. Women and girls comprise the majority of those living on less than $1 a day. Limitations placed upon girls and young women, limiting them from fulfilling their full potential, play a significant role in perpetuating the world's poorest economies.
Giving a girl or woman the ability to fully participate in society and the ability to sustain herself means we have to address gender based violence and provide girls and young women with life skills, opportunities and knowledge around their rights.
Sports has proven to be a key strategy to provide a safe space to discuss experiences, violations and fears, and receive validation that her fears are okay. Furthermore, a girl needs to understand her legal rights. She also needs a place where she can learn confidence that will help her avoid becoming a victim of gender based violence. Women Win is most effective as a convener, innovator, and pollinator of impactful strategies, resources, and tools. There is a real need at every level for strategies, direct and indirect support, capacity building, and tools to create quality sports programs that empower girls and women in achieving their rights. We inaugurated this strategy by launching the first interactive, online guide: International Guide to Designing Sports Programs for Girls (www.girlsportguides.org) and our CGI commitment will continue to build on its success.
Women Win is constantly seeking new and innovative partnerships to advance and complement its work. Bipartisan partnership and dialogue can lead to a common understanding of shared goals, a willingness to repartition responsibilities to achieve goals, and an increase in collective impact. The organization seeks implementing partners, knowledge sharing and best practice information, pro-bono assistance, and additional financial resources.
Women Win invites members to consult on and share its innovative guidelines, co-designed in the field with local organizations. Members will be able to learn how sport is being used as a tool to empower girls and women to achieve their rights. Women Win also offers expertise to organizations on how to capture the impact of sport on adolescent girls. Women Win uses Salesforce, a cloud based platform for customer relationship management,, allowing organizations to develop and customize their own tools for their specific needs. Visit Women Win's website for more details.
Women Win has produced and made available various guides, including: International Guide To Designing Sport Programs For Girls; International Guide To Economic Empowerment Through Sport; International Guide To Addressing GBV Through Sport In Conflict & Post Conflict Settings; and International Guide To Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights Through Sport.
