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On a brisk morning last week, 19 young reproductive rights activists gathered in a second-floor conference room in Palo Alto as part of the Youth Champions Initiative. They had come to California from Ethiopia, India, Pakistan, Mississippi, and Louisiana for an intensive week of sexual and reproductive health training.
Clustered in geography-specific groups for a media training session, the YCI participants discussed the stigma that surrounds sex ed, how to report on rape, and what to do with Twitter trolls, all before noon.
The Youth Champions Initiative was inaugurated this year in honor of the David and Lucile Packard Foundation’s 50th anniversary, with the goal of bringing international young leaders to a Silicon Valley-like incubator focused on sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR). The goal is for young leaders to meet peers in other countries and learn new strategies to “shake up” the field, according to the program’s executive director, Denise Dunning.
During the incubator, YCI participants heard from SRHR experts (including RH Reality Check’s Jodi Jacobson), visited the offices of Ideo and Mozilla Firefox, and brainstormed projects that would further the work they had begun at home. Innovation is the watchword at the new program.
“We often say, ‘Why aren’t young people using condoms?’ And then the solution is, ‘Let’s make the condoms bubble-gum flavored,’ as opposed to, ‘Young people aren’t using condoms. What radically different thing needs to happen in our space to change this?’” Dunning told RH Reality Check.
The program is designed to help young leaders think in challenging, fresh ways about their work, while making connections and meeting colleagues. After the incubator, participants can apply for YCI grants to fund their newly designed projects.
RH Reality Check sat down with four of the program’s participants to learn more about their work and what they hope to do in the future.
From a 21-year-old who first saw the need for sex ed when he was the only out gay man at his Catholic school in Louisiana, to the 27-year-old web editor of one of the most popular love and relationship sites in India, these young activists are leading local SRHR movements around the world.
Gayatri Parameswaran is the web editor for Lovematters.in, the first website in Hindi to focus on “blush-free information and news on sex, love, and relationships.” Originally from Mumbai, Parameswaran is an Erasmus Mundus Scholar in journalism, with a specialty in War and Conflict Reporting.
I am really interested in maternal health. So I’m going to be in training to become a midwife. I’m going to start that in a few months. And then I want to combine my maternal health technical knowledge with my public health knowledge and develop programs with the proper technical skills.
The above interviews have been lightly edited for length and clarity.