Growing Up GREAT!: The Way Forward (GUG!) is a longitudinal multi-level intervention in Kinshasa, DRC for very young adolescents (VYAs), their parents and caregivers and other influential community members. It uses an ecological approach to provide information and address social and gender norms related to reproductive health and wellbeing at each of these levels, with the goal of improving sexual and reproductive health outcomes among in-school and out-of-school VYAs (10-14 years).

The GUG! consortium – Save the Children, the Global Early Adolescent Study/Johns Hopkins University (GEAS-JHU), UCSD/GEH, and the Institute for Reproductive Health/Georgetown University – brings together implementers, researchers, scale-up experts, and implementation scientists to generate evidence on the value of investing in interventions with early adolescents in order to foster effective contraceptive use as they enter older adolescence and young adulthood. The GUG! consortium’s intermediate outcomes are: 1) Build understanding of how gender attitudes, behaviors, and norms are formed and transformed among very young adolescents, and their medium-term life course trajectories; 2) Institutionalize the GUG! intervention within the Ministry of Education and community-based partners in Kinshasa; and 3) Generate knowledge on how to sustain and scale gender and Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) interventions for early adolescents, including the feasibility and acceptability of engaging parents.

Relevant Materials:

Growing Up GREAT! Impact Brief: in English and French

Save the Children’s Growing Up GREAT! Resource Collection: https://resourcecentre.savethechildren.net/document-collections/growing-great-collection

Growing Up GREAT! Implementation Guide:  View the landing page: https://resourcecentre.savethechildren.net/library/growing-great-implementation-guide or download directly.

Profiles of Very Young Adolescents in Urban Kinshasa, Growing Up GREAT! Baseline Brief: in English and French

Global Early Adolescent Study – Wave 3: Kinshasa and Growing Up GREAT! Findings

Related Projects:

Global Early Adolescent Study/Johns Hopkins University (GEAS-JHU):  https://www.geastudy.org/kinshasa?rq=Gug!

Democratic Republic of the Congo

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