Past Project
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USAID Ethiopian Support Program/Office of Transitional Initiative (Phase 1-5)
Between 2020 and 2024, Egna Le Egna Youth Health and Development Organization implemented five different but interrelated projects in different towns within three zones in Oromiya region with the support of USAID/ESP/OTI.The main objective of the projects was to establish peaceful coexistence among different ethnic and religious groups and bring about sustainable peace among the general public in Oromiya region. Thousands of youth and young people have participated in peace dialogues in schools and out of schools. Egna Le Egna’s Youth Center has been renovated and is providing various services and comfortable facilities. The Youth Council at Shashemene city level was established to sustain youth engagement in peace-building and other community services.
Phase 1: Promoting High School Peace Actors
- Date: 2020
- Location: Shashemene (Bulchana High School, Burka Kero, Shashemene Chora), Shalla Woreda (Aje High School), Kofelle Woreda (Kofelle High School), Negelle Woreda (Arsi Negelle High School)
- Description: The objective of this project is to promote peace and foster a culture of dialogue, preventing exploitation by anti-peace actors through training 180 students as Youth Peace Actors. Participants’ life skills improved through enhanced communication, negotiation, and resisting negative peer pressure.
- Any ongoing activities or projects that came from this?
- Trained youth peace actors and teachers in schools are conducting one 45 minute peace-building dialogue per week within each school using mini media materials.
- Who is involved: Youth Peace Actors – 180 students from six schools
Phase 2: Expanding Safe Spaces for Positive Youth Engagement
- Date: 2021
- Location: Schools in Dinsho, Robe, Goba, Bale Zone; out of school youths from Shashemene, Kofale, Negele Ars, Adje among the community of West Arsi Zone
- Description: The objective of this project was to mitigate hate speech and promote interethnic understanding through designing and disseminating campaigns on social media and engaging youth in a series of dialogues and community service initiatives.
- Who is involved: 226 youth working in six schools (126 from schools in Dinsho, Robe, Goba, Bale Zone; 40 out-of-school youth; 60 peace cadres)
Phase 3: Fostering Youth Relationships to Mitigate Ethno-Religious Tensions and Conflicts
- Date: 2022
- Location: Shashemene, Assela, and Robe
- Description: This project seems to improve Amhara-Oromo relations and religious coexistence by fostering understanding and unity among Amhara and Oromo youth. After the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement, rising tensions, ethnic nationalism, political discourse, religious conflicts, and internet narratives have deepened divisions. This project empowers youth as peacemakers to engage in these issues and promote peace and coexistence.
- Who is involved: Religious leaders, different ethnic groups and youth
Phase 4: Strengthening Libraries as Spaces for Social Cohesion
- Date: 2023-2024
- Location: Shashemene Town
- Description: Demand for library services has increased as Shashemene Town’s security situation has improved. This project aims to increase library readership in Shashemene by furnishing its libraries, establishing book clubs and organization monthly literature review events, and offering opportunities to exchange resources among libraries, allowing libraries to fulfill their vital function as hubs of education and social harmony.
- Who is involved: Professional and amateur writers, youth, students, librarians
Phase 5: Fostering Collaboration Among Youth Associations for a Lasting Impact
- Date: 2024
- Location: Shashemene Town
- Description: This project facilitated the creation of a standing youth council in Shashemene Town, developing a bylaw and action plan, connecting it with key stakeholders, and equipping it with resources such as an office. The goal was to create a well-equipped, networked, and resourceful Youth Council with clear bylaws, enhanced resource management, and strong local partnerships.
- Who is involved: 39 youth (26 male, 13 female) previously involved in youth, art, book, sport, advocacy clubs
Improving the Lives of Needy Girls through Income-Generating Activities and Contributing to the Increased School Attendance of Girls
Status: Completed (2024) Location: Shashemene Town Sponsor/Funded: Ethiopian Aid
- Description: This project’s objective was to improve the lives of 25 economically vulnerable and disadvantaged girls starting from age 18 from Shashemene City administration, through income-generation activities and the production of reusable sanitary napkins. The goal of the reusable sanitary napkin production was to provide low- cost sanitary napkins that would reduce school absenteeism among girls while experiencing menstruation. The girls involved in income-generation activities had three months of entrepreneur training with the help of a revolving fund.
- Who is involved: Young school girls and women
Service for Street Children
Status/Dates: Completed (2022-2023) Location: Shashemene Town Sponsor/Funded: Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, supported by the World Bank
- Description: The objective of the project is to improve the socio-economic conditions of urban destitute children and homeless women, and facilitate their reintegration through the delivery of basic social and livelihood services. The dramatic increase in homeless families has been visibly seen in Ethiopia urban centers, with the majority of them headed by a single mother. There is no one single factor that leads to homelessness and living on the street, rather, multiple factors place women at risk for homelessness in their adult lives. At the individual level, multiple adversities and deprivations experienced by children are mentioned as push factors towards homelessness, such as lower levels of education or poor educational status, domestic violence, a history of early-onset use of substances and drugs, mental illness, unstable intimate relationships, pregnancy out of wedlock, and abandonment by parents.
- Who is involved? Children and low-income mothers
Enhancing the Institutional Capacity of Egna Le Egna
Status: Completed (2022-2023) Location: Addis Ababa and Shashemene Town Sponsor/Funded: Plan International
- Description: Egna Le Egna’s participatory institutional assessment (PIA), conducted in 2023, identified specific priority areas (resource mobilization, strategic planning, program designing and planning, and monitoring, evaluation, and learning) in the creation of an institutional capacity development plan for Egna Le Egna. The plan explored improvement in organizational capacity areas such as governance and strategic leadership, people management and culture, financial management and resource mobilization, program management, external engagement and networking, and gender transformative programming with feminist approaches.
Empowering the Youth in Sexual Reproductive Health and Safe Livelihood Options in Shashemene Town
Status: Completed (2017-2023) Location: Shashemene Town Sponsor/Funded: Youth Network for Sustainable Development, with support from The David and Lucile Packard Foundation
- Description: In Ethiopia, youth are more at risk of experiencing sexual and reproductive health problems like teenage pregnancy, early marriages, sexually transmitted infections including HIV/AIDS, and unsafe abortions. High school and college students are also vulnerable to persistent reproductive health problems, which are related to unprecedented social, economic, and cultural change and have less to do with health education, family support, and health knowledge factors.Youth in the Shashemene area are facing different challenges and among this unwanted pregnancy, lack of job opportunities, early sexual practice and multiple sexual partners, drug abuse, and tensions of peace and security issues. This project has contributed a lot to increasing sexual reproductive health awareness and improving health facility service on SRH.
- Who is involved? Young people between the ages of 15-29