RUMPs for Rural Girls

Kawooya first became aware of period poverty as a barrier to girls’ education in 2019 while volunteering in schools in Nwoya District, Northern Uganda, where girls’ absentee and dropout rates were critically high. At Ongai Primary School in 2019, 50% of girls in P4 to P7 missed school every month during their periods, while 10 girls left school entirely due to period poverty and the stigma associated with menstruation. 

To combat this problem, Ongai’s deputy head teacher Mary Aciro was using her own money to provide menstruating students with cotton cloth and soap, allowing them to use her home on school premises as a changing room during their periods. Although Aciro’s efforts helped reduce absenteeism, assisting more than 20 girls every month, she could not afford the ongoing cost of menstrual supplies.

In 2020 Kawooya launched the My Voice Podcast to rally support for Aciro’s efforts. Listeners responded, and through the power of small donations Aciro’s personal project was reborn as RUMPs for Rural girls. In November 2020 a small team of RUMPS volunteers visited Ongai Primary School, delivering menstrual supplies to 100 girls and conducting a training session on proper hygiene management. By 2022 the program had expanded to serve four other primary schools in Nwoya District, while adopting a play-based educational model to engage girls and boys in learning about reproductive health and menstrual hygiene management.

The World Bank has reported that period poverty affects more than 500 million girls and women globally. In the twenty-first century, grassroots activism in global majority countries has brought menstrual health to the forefront of global health, education, human rights and gender equality/equity agendas. RUMPS for Rural Girls is one of many small-scale philanthropic initiatives that have emerged to champion menstrual health at the community level.

Contributors: Lizza Marie Kawooya, Albert K.