Can targeted interventions reduce school-based gender-based violence? Teacher and student training on gender-based violence in Mozambique leads to a reduction in teacher-led violence and greater school retention for girls.
Gender-based violence in schools remains a critical barrier to achieving gender equality in education across many regions of the world. According to UNICEF (2018), in Mozambique, the prevalence of school-based gender-based violence is alarmingly high, with 70% of students believing that girls experience sexual violence in schools and over half identifying teachers as the main perpetrators. These realities underscore the urgent need for interventions that address this pervasive issue, not just as a matter of protecting students, but as a foundational strategy for fostering girls’ educational and life outcomes.
Adolescence is a transformative period in life with schooling playing a pivotal role in shaping future opportunities. However, gender-based violence in schools disrupts this pathway, impacting girls’ mental health, self-esteem, and physical safety, often leading to school dropout. Such violence may also reinforce harmful gender norms and exacerbate cycles of poverty and inequality, particularly in contexts where education is a key driver of socio-economic mobility (Stojetz and Brück 2023). When it comes to violence committed by teachers, this type of violence is even more troubling due to the inherent power imbalance in the student-teacher relationship, which is critical for learning.
Our research examines a novel approach to addressing gender-based violence within Mozambique’s public education system, aiming to leverage existing resources to create safer school environments.
Intervention: Awareness and support systems for gender-based violence in schools in Mozambique
In the Province of Sofala, in Mozambique, we worked closely with the Ministry of Education and Human Development, UNICEF and the NGO Girl’s Child Rights, to develop an engaging curriculum focused on gender-based violence: the Está na Hora de Agir! (“It’s Time to Act!”). The curriculum includes content to understand gender-based violence, increase awareness, instigate a change in attitudes and proactive behaviours toward gender-based violence. The curriculum involved two components:
- Teacher training: Designated teachers appointed by the Ministry of Education to address gender issues at schools, so-called Gender Focal Points, were trained to recognise, respond to, and prevent gender-based violence in schools. Teachers received a two-day training where they were guided through concepts such as what is gender-based violence and pro-active behaviours and attitudes towards it. Sessions were engaging making use of theatre, music, simple coursework, group practice sessions and debriefing. At the end of the training, teachers received the curriculum, and peer-to-peer group chats were created to support all focal points from the same district. Training sessions also involved introductory remarks by senior education and gender representatives from the Government, to formalise and provide professional empowerment to focal points. During the implementation of sessions with students, teachers received additional one-to-one support.
- Student training: Students aged 13–14 attending upper-primary education participated in four two-hour interactive sessions on gender-based violence. These sessions included short videos and activities to educate students about violence, its unacceptability, and how to seek help.
This style of intervention and implementation was chosen to test a model of addressing gender-based violence within the public system in a manner that is scalable.
Should girls and boys both be targeted with school-based gender-based violence interventions?
An important gap in the literature is who should be the target of gender interventions (Andrew et al. 2022, Shah et al. 2023). To better understand the effects of the new curriculum we implemented a clustered-randomised controlled trial where we varied not only teachers’ exposure to the curriculum, but also the gender composition of the students receiving it. Across 326 primary schools in Sofala Province, we randomly selected 239 schools to receive Gender Focal Point training, and 88 schools were assigned as control schools. Next, we randomised treated schools into three different groups:
1. In 76 schools, Gender Focal Points exposed girls to the “Está na Hora de Agir!” curriculum.
2. In 83 schools, Gender Focal Points exposed boys to the “Está na Hora de Agir!” curriculum.
3. In 80 schools, Gender Focal Points exposed both boys and girls to the “Está na Hora de Agir!” curriculum.
One year after the intervention, surveys were conducted with students, Gender Focal Points, and teachers to assess changes in the prevalence of gender-based violence, the effectiveness of the intervention, and the behavioural changes among students and teachers.
Key findings: Impact on gender-based violence and schooling outcomes in Mozambique
After nearly two years since the intervention we find that gender-based violence perpetrated by teachers and school staff decreased. Girls in all treated schools were 67% less likely to report experiencing violence by teachers or school staff in the last month compared to girls in control schools. This reduction was particularly pronounced in cases of sexual violence.
We attribute this finding to two main reasons:
First, we find that the Gender Focal Points role in reducing violence is essential. The training of Gender Focal Points was crucial in deterring violence. Gender Focal Points were more proactive in discussing gender-based violence with students and teachers, and they took greater initiative in reporting incidents to school authorities. This proactive approach helped prevent violence before it escalated.
Second, while the intervention targeted both boys and girls in some schools, the greatest improvement in enrollment happened in schools where only girls received the training. In these schools, girls were more likely to report incidents of violence to the Gender Focal Point, and Gender Focal Points were more likely to take action by reporting cases to school councils. This proactive behaviour by girls, alongside the deterrent effect of well-trained school personnel, contributed to a safer school environment. In particular, we show that in schools where only girls received the training, girls were 10% more likely to be enrolled in school at the end of the study compared to the control group, largely due to an increased propensity for gender-based violence reporting by victims. Our findings suggest that effectively mitigating violence to improve girls’ schooling requires a dual approach: deterring potential perpetrators and fostering a proactive stance among victims, such as increased reporting.
Training teachers is a cheap, scalable and effective way to address gender-based violence
This study puts forward a novel way of thinking about how to address gender-based violence at school: equip teachers and equip them to equip students. We also provide evidence of an intervention that is easily scalable, cheap, and that relies on the existing infrastructure of the public education system in Mozambique. In remote areas this is likely to be one of the few systems that can help support victims.
References
Andrew, A, S Krutikova, G Smarrelli, and H Verma (2022), “Gender norms, violence and adolescent girls' trajectories: Evidence from a field experiment in India,” VoxDev, No. 22/41.
Shah, M, J Seager, J Montalvao, and M Goldstein (2023), “Sex, power, and adolescence: Intimate partner violence and sexual behaviors,” National Bureau of Economic Research, No. w31624.
Stojetz, W, and T Brück (2023), “Exposure to collective gender-based violence causes intimate partner violence,” Journal of Development Economics, 164: 103054.
UNICEF (2018), “Violence against children in schools in Mozambique: Towards an institutionalized reporting and referral mechanism.”