Learning and Action Alliance for Girls’ Agency

BrookingsGlobal

The Learning and Action Alliance for Girls’ Agency (LAAGA) envisions a world that values the knowledge and dignity of girls and young women, listens to their voices, and supports them in taking action to shape their own lives and those of their communities.

Illustration of women in profile

The Learning and Action Alliance for Girls’ Agency (LAAGA) is a community of practice composed of 23 leaders from 18 countries across Africa, America, Asia, and the Middle East (all of them Echidna Global Scholar alumni) and the Brookings Center for Universal Education team focused on gender equality in and through education.

LAAGA is guided by a vision of a world that values the knowledge and dignity of girls and young women, listens to their voices, and supports them in taking action to shape their own lives and those of their communities. Grounded in feminist principles and collaborative approaches to research and practice, our journey has been one of co-construction and iteration. We’ve delved into critical questions surrounding “girls’ agency”: What exactly does “agency” entail? How does it vary by context? Who gets to define it? When we speak of “girls,” which girls, and for what reasons? And most importantly, how can we incorporate girls’ voices, perspectives, and lived experiences into our research processes?

Why girls’ agency matters

For adolescent girls around the world, agency is a practical issue rather than a theoretical concept. Every day these girls make conscious decisions about their lives and the future, while they navigate larger social structures and power relations impacted by class, religion, race, and gender, among other factors. Accounting for this daily struggle is vital to improving learning opportunities and life outcomes for girls and their communities. Yet the agency of young people, especially that of girls and young women living in the most marginalized contexts, is often misunderstood, unrecognized, underdeveloped, and/or actively stifled.

Since 2022, in collaboration with the Center for Universal Education at the Brookings Institution, LAAGA is working to co-create ideas and understandings regarding the development and exercise of girls’ agency across diverse contexts. We are committed to translating these ideas into action, working alongside girls, their families and communities, educators, practitioners, and policy makers. Using girl-centered methodologies developed collectively, LAAGA is currently concluding the first round of research in four highly marginalized communities in Bangladesh, along the Kenya/Uganda border, in Vietnam, and in Zimbabwe. We are exploring how girls themselves perceive and practice agency in their lives and what are the practices and policies that either support or constrain that.

Group photo of LAAGA members

Meet the LAAGA members

  1. Mayyada Abu Jaber, Jordan
  2. Christine Apiot Okudi, Uganda
  3. Nangyalai Attal, Afghanistan
  4. Musammat Badrunnesha, Bangladesh
  5. Jin Chi, China
  6. Ellen Chigwanda, Zimbabwe
  7. Adefunke Ekine, Nigeria
  8. Ganga Gautam, Nepal
  9. Arundhuti Gupta, India
  10. Khadim Hussain, Pakistan
  11. Dasmine Kennedy, Jamaica
  12. Joyce Kinyanjui, Kenya
  13. Pamhidzayi Berejena Mhongera, Zimbabwe
  14. Armene Modi, India
  15. Sumbal Naveed, Pakistan
  16. Jennifer O’Donoghue, United States
  17. María Cristina Osorio Vázquez, Mexico
  18. Edem Dorothy Ossai, Nigeria
  19. Mary Otieno, Kenya
  20. Jamila Razzaq, Pakistan
  21. Atenea Rosado Viurques, United States
  22. Suman Sachdeva, India
  23. Nasrin Siddiqa, Bangladesh
  24. Samyukta Subramanian, India
  25. Tran Thi Ngoc Tran, Vietnam
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