6. Useful resources

Toolkits

Tools to promote change in school systems 

• UNICEF’s 2011 guidance, Promoting Gender Equality through UNICEF-Supported Programming in Basic Education, shows how to incorporate gender issues in education programme design, focusing on the support girls need to access education and the barriers that prevent them doing so. 
• CIDA’s 2006 Tip Sheet on Gender Equality in Education, covers policy, education statistics, teacher training and curriculum development, identifying questions to ask and actions to improve gender responsiveness and education outcomes for girls.
• UNESCO’s 2009 Promoting Gender Equality in Education provides resources to raise awareness of gender and activities for school environments with exercises to build gender-responsive educational management, including how to develop gender-responsive budgeting. 

Tools to support gender-equitable approaches in the classroom  

• IREX’s Creating Supportive Learning Environments for Girls and Boys: A Guide for Educators describes how to ensure ‘gender friendly’ classrooms and teaching materials, using a workbook format to help teachers create their own action plan and monitor change.  
• Alongside other FAWE resources, FAWE’s 2005 Gender Responsive Pedagogy: A Teacher’s Handbook describes how to implement its gender responsive pedagogy model. Teachers are helped to understand the specific needs of boys and girls as they learn, and the skills required to be gender-responsive in the classroom. 
• Promundo’s Portal for Gender Equality in Schools (PEGE) has teaching resources for lessons on gender equality. Teachers have accessible manuals for Programmes H and M (flagship community based informal education programmes on gender-sensitive masculinities). 

Tools based on proven initiatives

• Transforming Education for Girls in Nigeria and Tanzania (TEGINT): tools to promote gender equality and girls’ rights with teachers, school management, community members and policy-makers, as well as girls and boys, provide insights into how different actors can work together to achieve change. 
• The International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) has produced resources based on the Gender Equity Movement in Schools (GEMS) programme, including a training manual for facilitators and a campaign guide setting out activities to reach young people and community members, including campaigns to tackle gender and violence in schools. 
• The Population Council’s It’s All One Curriculum presents a unified approach to gender, health and sexuality education, while the Council’s broader work with adolescent girls has generated other toolkits on programme design, including on Girl-Centered Programme Design, Building Girls’ Protective Assets, and Girls’ Leadership and Mentoring.  
• Connect with Respect is a resource from Plan International focused on how teachers and school management can prevent gender-based violence in schools. Other resources on this issue include My Safety, My Wellbeing (a curriculum developed by the International Rescue Committee), and insights from ActionAid’s Stop Violence Against Girls in School project. 
• Useful resources from Girl Effect include the Girl Consultation Toolkit and the Insights Toolkit.

Further reading 

While there is strong evidence for the social impact and transformative effects of education for girls, the processes by which education contributes to empowerment and norm change have received much less attention.

Social impacts of girls’ education 

• While a vast body of literature draws on large-scale statistical evidence to highlight the positive social impacts of girls’ education, the pathways to norm change are not discussed in any depth. Good overviews include Sperling and Winthrop (2015), King and Winthrop (2015), UNESCO’s 2013 infographics on ‘Education Transforms Lives’, and Chaaban and Cunningham’s 2011 analysis of the economic gains of investing in girls’ education. 

Education and empowerment 

• Studies focus on the relationship between education and various dimensions of empowerment, such as developing self-confidence and skills. Key conceptual sources include Murphy-Graham and Lloyd (2015) and Stromquist (2006). Marcus and Page (2016) synthesise evidence on the empowering impacts of girls’ education, while Sperling and Winthrop (2015) highlight evidence on the impact of girls’ education on voice and agency and political engagement. 
• Analysis of demographic and health survey (DHS) data from the mid-2000s shows how these patterns can be complicated by factors such as family structures. Studies of women’s empowerment processes with a long historical view highlight the rising proportion of girls in school and greater economic opportunities for women with secondary education as key drivers of gender norm change (see also here).  

Education and norm change

• Some literature explores the impact of education on gender norms using statistical data to illuminate the role of education and of other factors in attitude and norm change. Examples include the World Bank’s 2013 On Norms and Agency, which draws on primary research in 20 countries to highlight education as a key driver of shifting gender norms. Kabeer’s 2012 analysis of evidence on the forces underpinning women’s economic empowerment also emphasises education, as does Seguino’s 2007 analysis of data from the World Values Survey. Studies on particular issues (such as UNICEF’s 2013 Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting: A Statistical Overview) illustrate education’s power to change gender norms and practices.