From absenteeism to attendance: empowering girls through gender-friendly WASH facilities

Redington foundation’s effort to support schools with WASH (drinking water, sanitation, and hygiene) facilities has positively impacted educational outcomes. A thorough assessment across urban-poor communities in west bengal, haryana, assam, and tamil nadu, led to identifying the reason behind increasing school dropouts, majorly due to poor WASH facilities. As part of our CSR initiatives, we addressed the issue via integrated water and sanitation projects, that helped in creating lasting welfare for the students.

Gender-friendly wash facilities address challenges of adolescent girls

Every child is entitled to school and education. School is where children spend most of their, yet for adolescent girls, it often becomes a place of discomfort during menstruation. The lack of proper washrooms and menstrual hygiene facilities has long contributed to absenteeism and even higher school dropouts. To address the issue and help adolescent girls better manage their menstrual health and hygiene, redington foundation initiated WASH projects – setting up sanitary napkin vending machines and incinerators in schools, as part of the project. Access to cleaner washrooms and training on menstrual hygiene management provided with better awareness among girls, which helped in breaking social stigma around it.

Priyodarshini mayur’s story – real impact created

Priyodarshini mayur, a student of class-10 at bauria girls’ high school used to skip school for 2-3 days every month during her menstrual cycle. When asked why, she said, “earlier there were no facilities for menstruating girls in the school. So, I was avoiding using the toilet during my periods to save myself from infection and preferred missing school. Not only me, many friends of mine also went through the same situation. Now that WASH project has constructed a new sanitary block along with a changing room with sanitary napkin vending machine and an incinerator, the long-prevailing problem is finally gone.”

Priyodarshini added that the awareness-generating sessions helped her a lot. She could now freely discuss her issues relating to menstruation with her friends and family. She now attends school regularly with a happy face.

Breaking the stigma and teaching better menstrual hygiene

In uluberia, west bengal, girls from samaj kalyan sangha balika vidyalaya often missed school during menstruation. It was majorly due to unclean school toilets, lack of running water, and dilapidated condition of toilet seats. Also, girls often were prone to infection due to unhygienic conditions of toilets and preferred to stay home during periods.

WASH project constructed and renovated existing gender-friendly toilets with running water facilities in the school. Changing room facility along with sanitary vending machine and incinerator to dispose of used napkins further improved health condition. Discussions with adolescent girls about menstruation cycles and their impact on health helped in reducing stigma around it. These interventions helped girls with access to safe, clean toilet facilities and maintain menstruation hygiene. It helped in reducing absenteeism and fear of infections from using unhygienic toilets.