November 2023 — UNICEF Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office (ESARO) SBC section in collaboration with the University of Nairobi and other partners launched two short Social Norms courses on keeping children safe and reducing harmful practices that impact children.

In recognizing the profound impact of harmful social norms on children and communities and the changes needed, these courses are now available to changemakers, including students across universities in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Somalia, as well as representatives from relevant government agencies at both the national and local levels, and members of civil society organizations in Kenya.

“The launch of the social norm change programming and measurement course comes at an opportune moment for the University, CISP, UNICEF and all other development partners. This course is a first locally and will enable us to understand how behaviors are formed and the best approaches to gain positive social and behavioural change in communities with endemic harmful practices that include FGM,” stated Prof. Stephen Kiama, Vice Chancellor, University of Nairobi in a speech read on his behalf by Prof. Margaret Hutchinson, the Deputy Vice Chancellor, Research and Innovation and Enterprise.

The training courses launched demonstrate the immense potential of partnerships between academia, national institutions, and the development sector in empowering the current and future generation of service providers with the objective of promoting children’s and human rights on a larger scale.

Lieke van de Wiel, UNICEF ESARO Deputy Regional Director, emphasised that “the partnership between academia and the development sector is an essential catalyst for creating meaningful and sustainable behaviour change for children. Academia’s research-driven expertise, when combined with the practical insights of the development sector, empowers us to better understand, address, and ultimately transform complex societal behaviors. It is through this collaboration that we can equip future generations with the knowledge and tools to promote positive change on a broader scale. We are delighted to see the University of Nairobi actively engaging in a process that may lead to mainstreaming of social norms programming and measurement across faculties and more broadly in the Eastern and Southern Africa region,” 

The Social Norms Courses have been developed with the technical and financial support of the Global Programme to End Child Marriage, which is jointly implemented by UNICEF and UNFPA in 25 countries, including Mozambique, Zambia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Kenya, and Uganda. These programs have over the years contributed significantly to generating knowledge and potentially effective solutions to address harmful social norms.