Post by account_disabled on Mar 4, 2024 1:43:44 GMT -5
It's no secret that there is still a real stigma around menstruation globally. Lack of education and misinformation has promoted shame around a human right and natural biological process throughout history. But, that's not all, the consequences not only impact health, but also affect their development. Due to this situation, women, girls and menstruating people from different parts of the world miss days of school; and in some cases, they abandon their education entirely once they begin menstruating. The 3BL Media portal presents us with a proposal to put an end to period stigma. Get to know her!
When Diana Sierra founded Be Girl a decade ago, global period protection wasn't yet a hot topic. Traveling to Uganda, she was surprised to learn that girls lacked effective Chile Mobile Number List ways to control their periods. While she worked on United Nations-funded projects, local girls often asked her for work, and Sierra saw that they were in great need of income. Connecting the dots, she realized that these girls were missing out on a quarter of a month of school or work because they couldn't afford hygiene supplies .
Global studies have confirmed a similar connection between menstruation and lost wages, reports the United Nations Population Fund .
The girls she met used absorbent material, such as torn rags or pieces of mattresses, to control their periods, solutions that Sierra said can be uncomfortable and ineffective. As an industrial designer, she was inspired to create something new. Her first prototype, PeriodPanty , was made from mosquito nets and umbrella material.
Although Diana continued with the project after hours, making modifications and gathering feedback; one answer changed her course. A girl in Tanzania wrote in a survey:
My favorite thing: I'm proud to be a girl!
The next day, Sierra quit her day job and dove headfirst into her social enterprise.
Sierra said moments like that showed her that Be Girl is more than panties, pads and menstrual cups. She sees the products she makes as vehicles to change harmful narratives about menstruation. As well as increasing helping girls and women accept and love who they are.
“We need to be transformative in the future”
It's time we put aside the myths, misconceptions and negativity that, for far too long, have surrounded the menstrual life cycle, from menarche to menopause.
Dr. Julitta Onabanjo, Regional Director of the United Nations Population Fund in Eastern and Southern Africa.
Be Girl has been quietly transforming its corners of the world through innovative and empathetic designs. Over the past six years, the initiative has distributed more than 250,000 products to women and girls in more than 30 countries and provided age-appropriate education to help boys and girls understand the beauty of menstruation.
We need to be transformative in the future.
Be Girl
Understanding that many people around the world have trouble accessing products and services "just because they are not in a viable market," Sierra said it strives to develop products specifically for the markets it serves, not as "parachute solutions." that fall from the world to developing nations.
Their creative process was based on respect for the user, which included collecting regular feedback from girls and taking it seriously. While the girls had absorbent material, they needed something comfortable and leak-proof. The PeriodPanty design offered to transform any absorbent material into a sanitary pad. And in this way it communicated to the girls that what they were already doing was good, but that PeriodPanty could help them do it better. End period stigma.
Today, Sierra's team continues to listen to the girls they serve. When girls said they loved the product, but wondered why the panties were black and didn't come in "girly" colors; Sierra realized that her customers viewed underwear as an accessory and not simply a practical necessity. Once again, she thought outside the box and used colors like bright blue and purple, which still hide leaks but looked fun while doing it.
End period stigma: teaching children about menstruation
The Be Girl team does more than sell menstrual products. It also engages girls and boys from around the world in conversations. Like her creative process, Sierra's approach to these conversations evolves with feedback. Initially, the team spoke exclusively to girls. But the predominant problem girls report about their periods is that boys bully them. Sierra realized that her team was only solving half the problem because they were only talking to half the population.
Children are so important and crucial in this matter, and they are being left aside in complete ignorance.
Mountain range
Although they decided to develop educational and awareness workshops to end the stigma of the period. The click of the creative process was SmartCycle , which is a small mechanical disk that can track the menstrual cycle of a girl, woman or menstruating person. On one side of the disk, numbers represent the days in a cycle. The other side has symbols that represent the key phases of a cycle: menstruation, ovulation and preparation. As you turn the dial to the correct day, it clicks into place.
This Sierra design became a gateway for children. While Be Girl representatives talk to girls about menstruation with sanitary pads on their hands, that same solution wouldn't work for boys. "It's very shocking," Sierra explained. "It's very difficult, so you needed to have another entry point, and this little clock, being somewhat mechanical... really caught their attention."
Children now go through Be Girl classes with a SmartCycle in their hands and are tasked with giving it to a girl or woman who is important to them and teaching her how to use it. Be Girl calls these workshops for kids “Building Cycles of Empathy.”
How mentoring helped this social enterprise scale
When Kimberly-Clark and its foundation, the company's Kotex brand, and the Toilet Board Coalition launched the Women in the Sanitation Economy Innovation Lab in 2020, Be Girl was focused on scaling. Sierra joined the six-month program , which seeks to cultivate women-led businesses focused on women's health within the sanitation economy. Through the program, Kimberly-Clark employees offered their expertise and guidance to Sierra and four other impact entrepreneurs from Kenya, the US and the UK, all focused on addressing some of the world's most critical sanitation issues. .
The Be Girl team had the opportunity to speak with advisors they wouldn't normally encounter, said Tatiana Reyes Jové, Be Girl's chief growth officer. The mentoring experience also helped the small business understand and address the challenges of growth. “
I currently run both supply chain and business-to-consumer sales and marketing, so having a trusted expert advisor I can turn to and problem-solve has made a big difference.
Be Girl's two mentors, who specialize in supply chain, sales and marketing, helped the company achieve key milestones this year. One of them included entering the Kenyan market.
Be Girl aims to continue growing. “I really want to make sure that Be Girl is like the Nike of vintage panties in emerging economies,” Sierra said.
And what is a more Be Girl world? The vision that Sierra hopes everyone will support in their own way, whether through finance, activism, art or any avenue, is one in which people advance their education and careers based on merit, not gender . “In our case, we work on menstrual health, menstrual protection and education,” —End Period Stigma—but everyone can do their part in creating this equitable landscape, she said.
When Diana Sierra founded Be Girl a decade ago, global period protection wasn't yet a hot topic. Traveling to Uganda, she was surprised to learn that girls lacked effective Chile Mobile Number List ways to control their periods. While she worked on United Nations-funded projects, local girls often asked her for work, and Sierra saw that they were in great need of income. Connecting the dots, she realized that these girls were missing out on a quarter of a month of school or work because they couldn't afford hygiene supplies .
Global studies have confirmed a similar connection between menstruation and lost wages, reports the United Nations Population Fund .
The girls she met used absorbent material, such as torn rags or pieces of mattresses, to control their periods, solutions that Sierra said can be uncomfortable and ineffective. As an industrial designer, she was inspired to create something new. Her first prototype, PeriodPanty , was made from mosquito nets and umbrella material.
Although Diana continued with the project after hours, making modifications and gathering feedback; one answer changed her course. A girl in Tanzania wrote in a survey:
My favorite thing: I'm proud to be a girl!
The next day, Sierra quit her day job and dove headfirst into her social enterprise.
Sierra said moments like that showed her that Be Girl is more than panties, pads and menstrual cups. She sees the products she makes as vehicles to change harmful narratives about menstruation. As well as increasing helping girls and women accept and love who they are.
“We need to be transformative in the future”
It's time we put aside the myths, misconceptions and negativity that, for far too long, have surrounded the menstrual life cycle, from menarche to menopause.
Dr. Julitta Onabanjo, Regional Director of the United Nations Population Fund in Eastern and Southern Africa.
Be Girl has been quietly transforming its corners of the world through innovative and empathetic designs. Over the past six years, the initiative has distributed more than 250,000 products to women and girls in more than 30 countries and provided age-appropriate education to help boys and girls understand the beauty of menstruation.
We need to be transformative in the future.
Be Girl
Understanding that many people around the world have trouble accessing products and services "just because they are not in a viable market," Sierra said it strives to develop products specifically for the markets it serves, not as "parachute solutions." that fall from the world to developing nations.
Their creative process was based on respect for the user, which included collecting regular feedback from girls and taking it seriously. While the girls had absorbent material, they needed something comfortable and leak-proof. The PeriodPanty design offered to transform any absorbent material into a sanitary pad. And in this way it communicated to the girls that what they were already doing was good, but that PeriodPanty could help them do it better. End period stigma.
Today, Sierra's team continues to listen to the girls they serve. When girls said they loved the product, but wondered why the panties were black and didn't come in "girly" colors; Sierra realized that her customers viewed underwear as an accessory and not simply a practical necessity. Once again, she thought outside the box and used colors like bright blue and purple, which still hide leaks but looked fun while doing it.
End period stigma: teaching children about menstruation
The Be Girl team does more than sell menstrual products. It also engages girls and boys from around the world in conversations. Like her creative process, Sierra's approach to these conversations evolves with feedback. Initially, the team spoke exclusively to girls. But the predominant problem girls report about their periods is that boys bully them. Sierra realized that her team was only solving half the problem because they were only talking to half the population.
Children are so important and crucial in this matter, and they are being left aside in complete ignorance.
Mountain range
Although they decided to develop educational and awareness workshops to end the stigma of the period. The click of the creative process was SmartCycle , which is a small mechanical disk that can track the menstrual cycle of a girl, woman or menstruating person. On one side of the disk, numbers represent the days in a cycle. The other side has symbols that represent the key phases of a cycle: menstruation, ovulation and preparation. As you turn the dial to the correct day, it clicks into place.
This Sierra design became a gateway for children. While Be Girl representatives talk to girls about menstruation with sanitary pads on their hands, that same solution wouldn't work for boys. "It's very shocking," Sierra explained. "It's very difficult, so you needed to have another entry point, and this little clock, being somewhat mechanical... really caught their attention."
Children now go through Be Girl classes with a SmartCycle in their hands and are tasked with giving it to a girl or woman who is important to them and teaching her how to use it. Be Girl calls these workshops for kids “Building Cycles of Empathy.”
How mentoring helped this social enterprise scale
When Kimberly-Clark and its foundation, the company's Kotex brand, and the Toilet Board Coalition launched the Women in the Sanitation Economy Innovation Lab in 2020, Be Girl was focused on scaling. Sierra joined the six-month program , which seeks to cultivate women-led businesses focused on women's health within the sanitation economy. Through the program, Kimberly-Clark employees offered their expertise and guidance to Sierra and four other impact entrepreneurs from Kenya, the US and the UK, all focused on addressing some of the world's most critical sanitation issues. .
The Be Girl team had the opportunity to speak with advisors they wouldn't normally encounter, said Tatiana Reyes Jové, Be Girl's chief growth officer. The mentoring experience also helped the small business understand and address the challenges of growth. “
I currently run both supply chain and business-to-consumer sales and marketing, so having a trusted expert advisor I can turn to and problem-solve has made a big difference.
Be Girl's two mentors, who specialize in supply chain, sales and marketing, helped the company achieve key milestones this year. One of them included entering the Kenyan market.
Be Girl aims to continue growing. “I really want to make sure that Be Girl is like the Nike of vintage panties in emerging economies,” Sierra said.
And what is a more Be Girl world? The vision that Sierra hopes everyone will support in their own way, whether through finance, activism, art or any avenue, is one in which people advance their education and careers based on merit, not gender . “In our case, we work on menstrual health, menstrual protection and education,” —End Period Stigma—but everyone can do their part in creating this equitable landscape, she said.