ATTSVE Gender Training in Q4 of Year 4

January 29^th to February 2^nd, 2018

     The McGill team working closely with JUCAVM and the In-Country-Office successfully concluded their latest gender training for the ATTSVE project in sunny Adama, Ethiopia. Congratulations to all 16 participants who completed 5 intense days of activities, planning and intense discussions! Gender focal teams from all 4 partner colleges; Nedjo, Maichew, Wolaita Soddo and Woreta were in attendance along with a guest participant, Chimdessa Wakuma, from Bako ATVET and facilitators Sihen Getachew from JUCAVM and Amsalu Kassa from the Federal ATVET Agency. The main objective of this training session was to deepen an understanding the critical issue of gender based violence at each ATVET and to work on how the Gender Offices can tackle the issues. Day one started with a welcome address to the participants by Dr. Claudia Mitchell, followed by a brief introductory activity where everyone partnered up with and introduced each other. Participants also got a chance to view each college’s Photovoice exhibits and discuss their learnings from each other’s work at length. Participants went to engage in the Object Circle activity of “What’s Gender Violence Got to do with it?”.  This activity is designed to get the leaders of gender clubs thinking about the fact that Gender issues are everywhere and not only have an impact on our personal lives but have an impact on our work in our professional lives. The morning session ended with an introduction to the Gender and Leadership Community of Practice website, where Hani Sadati demonstrated the pages, resources and materials that has been embedded in the website. In the afternoon session Amsalu Kassa, gave a presentation on at new Anti-Harassment Policy in Ethiopia for use in TVET. The afternoon’s session was led by Dr. Lisa Starr and aimed integrating gender responsive teaching methods into the day to day classroom dynamics, as outlined by thenewly published Gender Matters Guide. Day two was one of two joint morning sessions incorporating participants from McGill’s gender training and Dalhousie’s assessment training. This session led by McGill amalgamated the issue of gender in assessment by discussing and debating the multifaceted problem of transactional sex. The afternoon brought two guest speakers. First, Catherine Walker of ATTSVE partner MEDA to talk about opportunities for women and income generation. Catherine talked about the involvement of women in ATTSVE sponsored business and cooperative placements. Participants discussed how best to involve more women in the application process for these positions and what could be done to make these positions more accessible for female students.  Then, Sihen Getachew of JUCAVM, provided a platform for shared learning as she gave participants an overview of JUCAVM’s gender activities and gender positive decision making. Day three started in a buzz of activity as trainees learnt about the fascinating process of Cellphilming, as a way to create gender awareness on their campuses by creating short but impactful gender positive Public Service Announcements (PSA). Cellphilming is a participatory visual research method, where participants use cellphones (or other recording devices, such as tablets) to make very short videos in response to prompts, questions, community issues or challenges. The morning time was spent for introducing the method, screening a sample, and brainstorming phases. The afternoon was devoted to storyboarding and filming each college’s PSA, followed by screening of the Cellphilms and reflecting on the themes that were highlighted by each. Day four began with another joint training session. This session, was led by Dalhousie’s assessment trainer, Dr. Lori Parsons, discussing ways in which the assessment process may be made more gender sensitive. Then representatives of each college gave presentations on their recent progresses and planned future activities in their colleges and particularly for the gender clubs. Following this, Chimdessa Wakuma, Dean of Bako ATVET, who was a guest participant of the training sessions gave an intro to the Bako ATVET college and talked about the gender related challenges in the college and how this training session helped him to make some decisions towards changing the situation. On Day five, participants worked on planning in the remaining timeline of the project. This was organized as a visual activity in which each ATVET mapped out its activities over the 12-month period. Having the planning session represented month by month gave everyone a chance to see what Year 5 of Gender in ATTSVE could look like. Also, each ATVET developed an action plan for convening a Cellphilm workshop with the gender club before the end of year 4. They also worked on gender club budgeting issues. As the day and the training session came to an end, participants were recognized for their 5 continuous days of hard work through certificates presented by Paul Kasanga, In-Country Manager for ATTSVE.     Some more pictures:                        .