From Policy to Practice: Girls’ Rights in Focus

A closer look at adolescent girls through evaluation

In 2024, UNICEF Evaluation Office, in collaboration with Social Development Direct, conducted an independent evaluation to assess the current Gender Policy and the second and third Gender Action Plans (GAPs). The evaluation sought to understand the effectiveness of their implementation and to determine the extent to which UNICEF achieves programmatic results on gender equality, especially for adolescent girls.  

This was more than a technical review. It reflected UNICEF’s commitment to tackling gender inequality and advancing the leadership and well-being of adolescent girls. The UNICEF Strategic Plan 2022-2025 stated that empowerment of adolescent girls is essential in ensuring that no child is left behind. The plan laid out ambitious priorities to empower adolescent girls, from promoting girls’ nutrition and health care to advancing education, especially in digital skills and eliminating child marriage. These priorities were brought to life through the  UNICEF Gender Action Plan 2022-2025 (GAP) which focused on structural change and shifting norms change. 

As the evaluation unfolded one of the central questions of the evaluation was:  

To what extent have UNICEF programmatic results for gender equality throughout the life course been met across all five Goal Areas, particularly to advance adolescent girls’ leadership and well-being, in both development and humanitarian settings?

The findings were encouraging. UNICEF had made significant strides. It had used its global reach and influence to support individual change among adolescent girls and to strengthen their networks. In many places, adolescent girls were finding their voices, forming groups, and leading change in their communities. However, wider changes to social norms have generally been slower and on a smaller scale. While there were varying results across UNICEF’s five goal areas (i.e. health and nutrition, education, child protection, water, sanitation and hygiene and climate and environment and social protection), increased investment, evidence generation, and strategic focus have driven improvements, especially in social protection and education for adolescent girls. For instance, results related to the education sector vary across regions, but some countries have made upstream system-level changes that benefit marginalized and out-of-school adolescent girls (see Figure 1 below). Similarly, there has been a slow and steady decline in the percentage of young people aged 20-24 years who are married or in union before 18 years (see Figure 2 below). On a global scale, the U-Report platform engaged 590,000 young people in a survey focused on adolescent girls’ rights and policy priorities. This led to the publication of a key advocacy document, ‘Delivering with and for adolescent girls’ to promote gender equality.

“Within Dawwie, we reproduced a youth, Parliament. This simulation model paved the way for us to express ourselves freely, with no boundaries, to discuss important topics for our society. I hope that I will become a parliamentarian in the future.” –  Key informant 

In Mozambique, UNICEF has developed partnerships with youth-led organizations. For instance, UNICEF implements programmes that empower adolescent girls through comprehensive multisectoral initiatives that combine gender equal power dynamics, girls’ empowerment, prevention of violence and harmful practices, and connection to available services (i.e., social protection, response to gender-based violence). The interventions engage actors across different layers of the socio-ecological model, for changing behaviors and norms in a safer and conducive environment. An increased focus on engaging with men and boys, including on positive masculinities, also reflects efforts to improve the use of transformative approaches across sectors. Intergenerational dialogues focused on gender equality approaches; child marriage and peer-to-peer education engaged over 55,000 adolescents aged 10-19 years.

UNICEF in Peru is helping girls in vulnerable situations develop digital and career skills by providing safe spaces, leadership development, skills for social change, learning opportunities, and access to role models and mentors, ultimately closing the gender gap in digital access. The ChicasTec programme, for example, focuses on vulnerable adolescent girls who have not benefited from other programmes previously, producing rapid and visible results.

Challenges and missed opportunities

Despite the huge potential for transformative results, lessons from the countries highlighted missed opportunities to tackle perceived gender norms and roles. Focusing exclusively on programming for girls can unintentionally limit opportunities for broader gender integration across other programmes. In some countries, attention to dedicated programmes working with adolescent girls did not include a strong focus on gender mainstreaming across programmes, as recommended by the dual track approach of the Gender Action Plan. The programmes were not sufficient to motivate the boys to address issues of gender equality, which they often perceived to be girl’s issues. Higher engagement with boys and men, families, communities, local institutional structures, including religious institutions, and with implementing partners would be useful to support norm change in all the contexts.

The short-term nature of many UNICEF programmes constrains their ability to deliver lasting results, as durable change often requires more intensive and continuous engagement with communities. The procedures governing UNICEF’s partnerships with non-governmental organizations are largely managed through digital tools that require both IT competencies and a good command of English. These requirements may create challenges for smaller organizations, making partnership management more complex and resource intensive. This creates barriers for building direct partnerships with local, women-led and girl-led organizations.

“For adolescent girls, while the programming areas are defined, the approaches and methodologies need to be transformative and inclusive. This would require creation of political commitment on the importance of “how” to get to results that are transformative.” – Key informant

A vision for future

Based on the evidence from the evaluation, UNICEF has committed to the following actions to achieve efficient and better results for adolescent girls through its management response at the global and country levels:

• Increase visibility of adolescent girls’ rights and well-being in the narrative, targets and results framework of the new Strategic Plan and the accompanying Gender Equality Action Plan.
• Develop a comprehensive adolescent girl programme framework and action plan for sustainably shifting gender norms.
• Maintain gender-focused and adolescent girls’ programmes to drive flagship contributions to gender equality but increase focus on coordinated and holistic efforts across all UNICEF programming areas to contribute to the enabling environment for girls at scale to amplify gender equality results.
• Revise partnership procedures to support more partnerships with small civil society organizations, especially women’s rights organizations and youth-led organizations.
• Invest in the institutional capacities of civil society organization working on gender equality, such as youth networks and feminist organizations, providing them with flexible funding. 

Growth in these areas is vital for realizing UNICEF’s vision of gender equality, and sustained commitment is essential to ensuring that no child is left behind.