MALIMBA COMMUNITY SCHOOL
SHE-SHELTERS
menstrual HYGIene PILOT PROJECT

Our proposal for a 3 pillar menstrual hygiene project won the Swiss Water Partnership Youth Water Challenge 2022. With the award, we obtained seed money to start our first She Shelters project and also a mentor to guide us through the project for one year.  Through the valuable mentorship of Karla Schlie of the Swiss Water Partnership, we created an easily repeatable prototype and developed a process and strategy for the long term use of the She Shelter at the school. Those measures include collecting relevant data before and after our intervention, repeating the educational sessions every six months, offering training sessions on how the cabin is to be used, and developing project ownership over the cabin by the children by involving them in decision making such as paint colours and student led maintenance through an after-school WASH club. 

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We were able to develop criteria for the roll out of more She-Shelters across the country after the implementation of our successful pilot project. Through the pilot project, we were able to connect with Uman Tok, an NGO focused on menstrual hygiene in Sierre Leone who would like to partner with us with building 4 new She-Shelters in schools in 2023-2024. 

We received recognition for the pilot project with press in both Switzerland and in Sierra Leone, as well as receiving a Distinguished Service Award from the Port Loko District Government, Sierra Leone.  Thank you to the Swiss Water Partnership, our mentor Karla Schlie, the SIG Patronage Fund, and the Communes of Veyrier and Vandoeuvres for their support in our pilot project.