Tamariskia Primary wins social competition

The evils of gender violence were the topic for an inter-school social engagement competition run by the Ombetja Yehinga Organisation (OYO) trust together with the CSO Foundation and the European Union, in the Erongo Region. Tamariskia Primary School won the first prize followed by Namib High School.

To win the schools had to create two boards, one looking at gender violence and the other at services available to victims, and to collect commitment forms. Dr Philippe Talavera, Director, OYO said the idea of the commitment forms was to encourage young people and their parents to take a few minutes to think and write down mantras for their lives.
Fourteen schools took part in the project and were visited three times, twice by the OYO dance troupe and once by the Keetmanshoop Youth Group. “It is important to visit the schools more than once, to reinforce the message, using different angles,” explained Talavera adding that the first show focused on the roots of gender violence, the second looked at the role of counsellors while the last one looked at services available to survivors of violence, but also how to prevent violence.
Tamariskia Primary School drew very clear messages on their boards and collected the record number of 653 commitment forms. The runner up, Namib High School created outstanding boards, but only collected 72 commitment forms.