TAG Finalists Carry Out Social Project to Prevent Family Violence

Assisted by IATP, a group of young women in Comrat, Moldova, united their efforts in the struggle against family violence, and raised awareness about this problem among local residents to receive their support. Student and Tech Age Girls (TAG) project finalist Tatiana Turcan initiated an anti-violence project after learning the results of an anonymous survey, which she and her friends conducted in the region from December 2008 through February 2009.

The TAG project is an IREX-founded initiative that aims to address challenges facing young women in a number of countries. TAG in Moldova works with young women designated by local civil services as being at-risk of being trafficked as they consider seeking better lives in Europe and Russia. Since March 2007, TAG has reached nearly 115 young women in Chisinau, Balti, Ungheni, Comrat, Căuşeni, Soroca and Tiraspol, providing in-depth ICT skills and leadership training. Participants learned everything from computer basics to Web design, database creation, and blogging. Four nationwide online discussions introduced the participants to prominent female role models in Moldova. Their newfound skills and confidence are applied in initiating social projects for their communities, and help them find gainful employment close to home, family, and security.

The survey revealed that the main causes of family violence in Moldova are poverty, heavy drinking, divorce, and when children are left behind with relatives while parents seek work abroad. To present their findings to the public, the students created an MS PowerPoint presentation on family violence, which they presented at a conference attended by all of the schools in Gagauzia. Turcan and her peers also distributed pamphlets on the problem among conference attendees. The pamphlets encourage youth to use anonymous hotlines to seek help in facing domestic violence problems.

In order to further develop the project, reach wider readers, and, possibly, to generate more volunteers for anti-violence activities, the group decided to publish information about their work on their wiki page created in the IATP center. As a result of their outreach efforts, the young women received anonymous messages about at-risk families. In response, the TAG finalist and her friends disseminated materials and information on obtaining psychological help to the families.

Other TAG finalists are having success in their social projects and employment searches as well. Nina Ivanova trained ten girls from her community on the same topics as she studied herself, and also assisted trainers of the ICT4Librarians project in Chisinau from March to May 2009. Xenia Terzi landed a well-paid job in at the Classic Salon in Comrat, and uses her ICT skills to create promotional materials for the salon and to show her clients the expected results of various hair and skin treatments. Other young women, currently finishing school, are planning their projects for the summer months.

Tatiana Turcan described the attitude and approach to service of TAG finalists. “The most important thing is to be stay active, not to be silent, and not to become helpless.”

Comments

[writing a dissertation]

Blogs are good for every one where we get lots of information for any topics nice job keep it up !!!

[excel classes]

Definitely! I know one of the major causes of family violence is when folks who commit it usually were exposed to it at sometime in their lives. Negative role models, financial stability, low self esteem, depression, alcohol and drug abuse, are some examples.