OUR STORY
Since our founding in 2013, Projet Jeune Leader has brought comprehensive sexuality education to tens of thousands of adolescents across Madagascar.
In 2013, Projet Jeune Leader was founded to disrupt the status quo of sexuality education in Madagascar.
Our founder Maia (Freudenberger) Ramarosandratana had been working to connect vulnerable youth in Fianarantsoa, Madagascar with peer educators who led basic sexual health workshops. Through this work, she saw how the standard practice of short-term and one-directional interventions fell short. Youth had follow-up questions and concerns—yet no one trusted to turn to.
In response, she founded Projet Jeune Leader in the city of Fianarantsoa to bring youth sustained access to information, support, and services. We soon expanded Projet Jeune Leader to rural communities in response to strong demand and observed need.
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In rural Madagascar, only one in five adolescents will complete middle school. Nearly half are married as children. One in three girls will become a mother before she turns 18 years old. It’s where few services exist, school infrastructures are most limited, and health and education outcomes are lowest.
Since then, we have built an effective and scalable model for comprehensive sexuality education.
We have been able to expand the reach of comprehensive sexuality education by reimagining three core elements:
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1. WHO DELIVERS IT. We believe in the impact of the right Educator, equipped with the right training, tools, and support.
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2. HOW IT IS DELIVERED. We believe in trust-based, comprehensive sexuality education, challenging one-time, one-directional, and top-down models.
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3. WHERE IT IS DELIVERED. We believe that comprehensive sexuality education must reach adolescents in under-resourced, hard-to-reach communities.
