Establishment:

The MZU Gender Champions in Mizoram University was set up on 7^th September 2015 by the Vice Chancellor Prof R. Lalthantluanga, vide letter 2/1/2011-EOC/2996-01 dated 7^th September, 2015 .

About:

The Ministry of Women and Child Development (www.wcd.nic.in) has issued Guidelines for engagement of Gender Champions by schools and colleges across the country.

Gender Champions are envisaged as responsible leaders who will facilitate an enabling environment within their schools/colleges/academic institutions where girls are treated with dignity and respect. Gender Champions can be both boys and girls above 16 years of age enrolled in educational institutions. They will strengthen the potential of young girls and boys to advocate for gender equality and monitor progress towards gender justice.

The broad mandate of Gender Champions is to provide an integrated and interdisciplinary approach to understanding the social and cultural constructs of gender that shape the experiences of women and men in society. The aim is to make young boys and girls gender sensitive and create positive social norms that value the girls and their rights.

Gender Champion Clubs are envisaged in educational institutions. These clubs can organize focused group discussions, debates, poster competitions, thematic plays, workshops etc., identifying gaps in school/college’s activities vis-à-vis gender, and make recommendations on how to address these gaps. The Gender Champions Club can organize school’s annual function or college fest on the theme of gender equality and women’s empowerment and encourage students to sign up and express their support for gender justice and equality. They can organize exposure visits to various public service institutions at the village, block, district and city level (public health centers, hospitals, post offices, banks, police stations, block office, SDM/DM office to facilitate knowledge about gender issues as they affect diverse populations.

Roles and Responsibilities of a Gender Champion:

The responsibilities of the Gender Champion will include the following:

i. Provide overall guidance to the peer group in integrating /mainstreaming gender in all activities of the Institution in the form of focused group discussions, debates, poster competitions etc.

ii. Engage a variety of stakeholders from the school, college, civil society organizations, women’s groups and media in gender mainstreaming activities.

iii. Identify gaps in school/college’s activities vis-à-vis gender, and make recommendations on how to address these gaps, e.g., observe classrooms to detect bias in interactions

iv. Promote Gender Champion Club in their educational institutions and undertake innovative activities, like creating a website or blog on gender equity and regularly writing an equity column on issues on, e.g. untold stories of extraordinary men and women who changed lives of women and girls, about enabling legislations, government schemes or about finding a new Gender Champion in his/her educational institution, or competitions to analyze greeting cards from gender perspective, organize film fest on gender equity etc.

v. Organize awareness programmes on various gender issues including legislations to influence behaviour change. This could be facilitated through workshops, theme based plays, films, painting competition, etc.

vi. Organize the school annual function or the college fest on theme of gender equality and women’s empowerment and encourage students to sign up and express their support for gender justice and equality in attractively designed Gender Champion booths.

vii. Organize exposure visits to various public service institutions at the village, block, district and city level (public health centres, hospitals, post offices, banks, police stations, block office, SDM/DM office) to facilitate knowledge about gender issues as they affect diverse populations.

viii. Popularize phone numbers of such services as police helpline, women helpline, hospitals among students.

ix. Arrange for providing necessary life skill education and information/guidance about existing public services to their fellow students.

x. Demonstrate knowledge of important Government schemes, events, legislation, and court rulings which has a major impact on the treatment and experiences of diverse groups.

xi. Document best practices to measure the extent of behavior change and display the same through exhibitions, fests, annual magazines etc.

List of MZU Gender Champions (2014-16)