When girls lead: Strengthening leadership pathways for rural and peri-urban girls in Zambia

Education Access & Equity Education Policy Global Education K-12 Education

教育机会与公平教育政策 全球教育 K-12 教育

In recent years, Zambia has made commitments and launched programs to advance gender equality and girls’ leadership.

近年来，赞比亚做出了承诺并启动了促进性别平等和女孩领导力的计划。

The National Gender Policy (2023), the Education Act (2011), and the Eighth National Development Plan all name it, and years of skills, confidence, and empowerment programming have sought to build it.

《国家性别政策》（2023 年）、《教育法》（2011 年）和《第八个国家发展计划》都提到了这一点，多年来的技能、信心和赋权规划一直致力于构建它。

Yet girls in rural and peri-urban areas remain largely outside of formal leadership, a missed opportunity for Zambia’s gender and education goals.

然而，农村和城郊地区的女孩很大程度上仍处于正式领导之外，这对于赞比亚的性别和教育目标来说是一个错失的机会。

The problem is not that girls lack leadership, but that institutions fail to recognize, name, or support it.

问题不在于女孩缺乏领导力，而在于机构未能认识、命名或支持这种领导力。

Girls defined leadership through values and responsibility rather than title, consistent with Ubuntu, in which leadership is communal and relational.

女孩们通过价值观和责任而不是头衔来定义领导力，这与 Ubuntu 一致，在 Ubuntu 中，领导力是公共的和关系性的。

Programs targeting girls treat leadership as a skill to be taught, while policy names it without defining, tracking, or funding it.

针对女孩的项目将领导力视为一项需要教授的技能，而政策则在命名它时没有对其进行定义、跟踪或资助。

Drawing on storytelling circles with girls aged 12 to 17 and interviews with head teachers, teachers, and community elders across four schools in two Copperbelt districts, this brief examines how girls understand and practice leadership and what supports or constrains it.

本简报借鉴 12 至 17 岁女孩的讲故事圈以及对两个铜带区四所学校的校长、教师和社区长辈的采访，探讨了女孩如何理解和实践领导力，以及什么支持或限制领导力。

The brief shows that girls already lead at home, school, church, and community, learning it from the women around them, few of whom are in formal positions.

简报显示，女孩已经在家庭、学校、教堂和社区中发挥领导作用，这是从她们周围的女性那里学到的，其中很少有担任正式职位的女性。

Barriers identified across all four schools and both districts were structural and relational: peer discouragement, pressure to conform, fear of judgment, and inconsistent adult support.

所有四所学校和两个学区都存在结构性和相关性障碍：同侪灰心、服从压力、害怕判断以及成人支持不一致。

Girls named age as the barrier; adults named gender.

女孩们将年龄视为障碍；成年人命名的性别。

Schools recognized only the roles they created, and support remained uneven, so whether a girl’s leadership was noticed depended on the adults and peers around her.

学校只承认他们创造的角色，而且支持仍然不平衡，因此女孩的领导力是否受到关注取决于她周围的成年人和同龄人。

Girls identified individuals as enablers of their leadership, yet these relational supports are insufficient to address the structural barriers they face.

女孩们认为个人是她们领导力的推动者，但这些关系支持不足以解决她们面临的结构性障碍。

Closing this gap means recognizing and supporting girls’ leadership in coordinated and consistent ways.

缩小这一差距意味着以协调一致的方式承认和支持女孩的领导力。

This brief recommends that institutions, schools, communities, and policymakers:

本简报建议机构、学校、社区和政策制定者：