IREX now a member of Women's Foreign Policy Group (WFPG)

Bob just announced that IREX is now a member of Women's Foreign Policy Group (WFPG). Some key information about them is below. --Randal 

Mission Statement 

The Women's Foreign Policy Group (WFPG) is an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit, educational membership organization that promotes global engagement and the leadership, visibility and participation of women in international affairs.

About WFPG  

The WFPG’s in-depth global issues programs feature women leaders and highlight their contributions and voices. The organization also hosts leadership development activities to promote the next generation of women leaders. The WFPG partners with many foreign policy organizations and is a key player in broadening the constituency for international affairs and helping educate Americans. The WFPG brings together participants from across sectors and links them domestically and internationally.

WFPG programs provide analysis and discussion of major international issues with women leaders and experts. Our programs include an Author Series, Embassy Series, and State Department Series. Recent programs have focused on U.S.-Iranian relations, the future of China, the Indian economy, the role of Islam, and climate change. The WFPG focuses on pressing international issues of the day, including topics that deserve attention but may not be on the front page of the news.

The WFPG highlights women’s leadership in international affairs at its Annual Luncheon Event. Dr. Condoleezza Rice, U.S. Secretary of State, was the keynote speaker at last year’s luncheon and Andrea Mitchell, NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, served as the Mistress of Ceremonies. Previous year’s luncheons have honored: Secretary of State Madeleine Albright; H.E. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia; Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, Karen Hughes; and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Each year WFPG members and guests also participate in a United Nations Study Visit at the UN Headquarters. This unique one-day event features briefings from top UN officials and ambassadors and provides participants with a forum for in-depth discussion on pressing issues facing the United Nations.

WFPG Mentoring Fairs and internships provide an opportunity for students to meet with international affairs professionals, receive counseling, and make connections in their fields of interest. Mentoring also provides WFPG members an opportunity to help and encourage future leaders. WFPG internships provide students and recent graduates substantive experience in the non-profit and foreign affairs fields.

From: Bob Pearson
Sent: Friday, July 30, 2010 9:24 AM
To: Bulletin Board
Cc: Chia-Yang Kao
Subject: FW: 8/05 Brown-Bag Lunch: Kyrgyzstan Refugee Situation

IREX is now a member of WFPG as part of our outreach on gender issues reflected in our new strategic plan.  If anyone would like to go, please coordinate with Chia-Yang as seating is limited.  Many thanks,

Bob

From: Women's Foreign Policy Group [mailto:wfpg@cc.memberclicks.com] On Behalf Of Women's Foreign Policy Group
Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2010 6:57 PM
To: Bob Pearson; Chia-Yang Kao
Subject: 8/05 Brown-Bag Lunch: Kyrgyzstan Refugee Situation

Women's Foreign Policy Group

- Brown-Bag Luncheon -

A Status Report on the
Refugee Situation in Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyzstan Refugees

Dawn Calabia
Senior Advisor, Refugees International

Maureen Lynch
Senior Advocate on Stateless Initiatives, Refugees International  


After months of political and ethnic struggles between the Kyrgyz majority and Uzbek minority, the violence reached a peak from June 10th-15th. UNHCR estimates that the riots affected 400,000 people, 75,000 of whom are still displaced and in need of shelter. Dawn Calabia and Maureen Lynch will share insights from their recent trip to Osh, Kyrgyzstan, where they met with displaced families in camps and in tents among the ruins.

Dawn Calabia is a Senior Advisor at Refugees International (RI) where she advocates on issues of statelessness, aid to displaced populations, resettlement, and asylum. Upon her return from Kyrgyzstan, she was interviewed by Fox News. Calabia has over 20 years of experience with foreign policy analysis, human rights issues, and public advocacy. She has handled governmental and non-governmental relations in the US and the Caribbean for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, served as the Director of Refugee Policy and International Affairs for the US Catholic Conference Migration office, and worked on Capitol Hill. One of the founders of the Women’s Refugee Commission, Calabia has led numerous fact-finding missions on refugee, humanitarian aid, and development issues. In 1996, she was honored at the White House for her work with refugee women and children. She also serves on the Board of the Women’s Foreign Policy Group. Read her RI blog on the issues.

Dr. Maureen Lynch is a Senior Advocate on Stateless Initiatives at Refugees International. Since 1999, she has conducted assessment missions to more than 20 countries including Azerbaijan, Kuwait, Bangladesh, Cote d’Ivoire, Ingushetia, the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Syria, and Zimbabwe. Lynch, a frequent author and commentator on refugee and statelessness issues, now focuses on advancing awareness and action on behalf of the more than 11 million stateless persons worldwide. She conducted a previous mission to Kyrgyzstan in 2007. Read her RI blog on the issues.


Thursday, August 5, 2010, 12:00 noon
Brown-Bag Luncheon and Program

Academy for Educational Development
1875 Connecticut Ave., NW, 8th Floor Board Room
Washington, DC

Space is limited. Advance registration is required.

WFPG Members—Free of charge      Non-Members— $10

Please direct any questions to (202) 884-8597 or programs@wfpg.org.


 

 

Benchmarking: Text on Gender

Keith Mellnick asked me to write some brief text for the new IREX website about gender and our programs. To start, I decided to look at a couple of our peer organizations to see how they describe their approach to gender programming. Their text is below.

FYI,
Randal

******

AED: True social progress leaves no one behind. Gender bias robs communities of their full potential. But as girls and women thrive, so does society. From education to health to social, economic and political empowerment, AED works to improve the lives of girls and women around the world.

CHF International: In approaching all phases of the project cycle, CHF International seeks to remove gender-related barriers to social and economic development through active community level engagement with men, women, and youth. CHF’s approach to gender and development has five major components:

  • Identifying and addressing particular needs, including disparities between men and women;
  • Ensuring that gender considerations are a key element of dialogue with stakeholders;
  • Ensuring appropriate representation of women and men in programming;
  • Evaluating programs and creating feedback loops to assess gender dynamics that affect successful program implementation; and
  • Increasing staff capacity to design and implement gender programming strategies.

Our programming seeks to empower women and men through reducing inequalities and addressing the particular needs of men and women equitably. This is facilitated through understanding and recognizing gender-based roles, responsibilities, relations and the interaction of these factors with the development process.

Equal participation of women in the political, economic and social spheres of society is a key ingredient to their empowerment. Our approach to gender programming takes into account the particular circumstances of each community or household that we work with, recognizing differences in culture, economic circumstances, age, and resources. As a result, CHF’s programs have made it possible for women to contribute substantively to program design and implementation, and for men and women to collaborate more effectively towards building prosperous and peaceful societies locally, regionally, and ultimately, worldwide.

For more information about CHF projects with a gender focus please see the Gender Factsheet.

Counterpart International adheres to a gender and development approach that emphasizes gender mainstreaming and equity in all program activities, including staff hiring practices, partner selection and grantee selection.

Counterpart International's (Counterpart) approach seeks to create a balance between resources allocated for women and men. Counterpart's purpose is to demonstrate that empowerment of women is not achieved at the expense of men, but rather to their benefit. In Afghanistan, Counterpart catalyzed a Gender Budgeting process by bringing together key government ministries and CSOs. The result of this effort was a commitment to gender-sensitive budgeting, and a $5 million earmark for women's programs in the 2009 parliamentary budget.

Children and youth make up over 40 percent of Counterpart's community-based project beneficiaries, and Counterpart works with a range of organizations to address youth needs, such as orphanages, parent-teachers' associations and ministries of education.

EDC: Gender and Equity: Educating girls can produce profound improvements in society: well educated women make better health decisions, have fewer children, and experience less poverty than uneducated women. Still, in too many countries, girls' enrollment rates are low and dropout rates are high. Of the104 million children ages 6-11 who are not enrolled in school, 60 million are girls. Girls’ enrollment is hampered by high fees and other school costs, inaccessibility of schools, and safety and hygiene concerns at school. In addition, many school practices—in and out of the classroom—alienate girls.

IDD works to make education more accessible to girls by reaching out to rural and isolated populations, establishing gender equitable education, and promoting girls' enrollment and retention. IDD asks teachers and their instructors to analyze their teaching habits and provides clear, concrete steps teachers can take to ensure that children of both genders are engaged and learning.

Ultimately, these learner-centered educational practices benefit both boys and girls. As IDD works with donors, governments, and communities to deliver quality education, we also strive to assure that quality is delivered to all learners.

Internews: Issues of vital concern to women worldwide— gender-based violence, child marriages, the trafficking of women— are often ignored or covered only superficially by local media. Across the globe, women journalists and media professionals work, many times under difficult circumstances, to bring light to the issues that affect all women. Internews media projects aim not only to open eyes to gender issues, but also to give voice to women so that they can change their lives and communities for the better.

Training Women Media Professionals: Internews is one of the world’s leading trainers of female media professionals, training more than 25,000 women in media skills since 2003 alone. Internews helps women get on the air and in the newsrooms in societies where their participation has been marginalized, allowing for reporting on all issuesnot just women’s issues—to be done through the voices of women in that society.

Mainstreaming Women’s Issues: To ensure that the media meet the needs of all audiences, Internews works to foster women’s leadership in the media industry so that issues of vital concern to women are “mainstreamed,” integrated across all programming and not relegated to a niche market. In communities where specific gender issues are underreported, such as gender-based violence or women’s health, Internews has developed special programs produced by and for women.

Welcome to IREX GenderDev

GenderDev is a resource for IREX staff to build a community of practice around gender issues, specifically in an international development context.  Through it we hope to share:
  •  Best practices in international development programs and how they affect both women and men
  • Models of addressing women’s empowerment, girls’ education, lifeskills training for boys and girls, etc.
  • The latest thinking on gender as it relates to our work

If you have any questions, please let me know.

Thanks,
Randal

E-mail: rmason@irex.org | Skype: randalmason