What We Do

Since our establishment, we have been working to bring equality to women by providing a platform where they can be themselves, express, learn, and grow directly and indirectly touching the lives of ten thousand plus females. The foundation identifies existing loopholes, conducts need based assessments and research and associates its work with women of the age group from 9 to 40, belonging to various regions in 7 different provinces and territories and of various ethnic groups and backgrounds.

Economic Empowerment

Investing in women’s economic empowerment sets a direct path towards gender equality, poverty eradication and inclusive economic growth. Women can make enormous contributions to the economy, whether in businesses as entrepreneurs or as employees, or even at home. But the irony is that they are the ones to also remain disproportionately affected by poverty, discrimination and exploitation. Our foundation thus supports women’s economic empowerment in line with these, with the growing body of evidence that shows that gender equality significantly contributes to advancing economies and sustainable development. By working with a variety of partners, our programmes promote women’s ability to secure decent jobs, and influence institutions and public policies determining growth and development.

Technology

Today, although technology is regarded as the forefront of innovation, women are still not able to make the most of it because of their underrepresentation in STEM. Access to technology plays a huge role in cementing gender inequality, especially in a developing country like Nepal, as it is a major factor that supports women’s empowerment through capacity building. A woman who does not have access to or who cannot afford technology is potentially disempowered due to a lack of voice and also participation within the information sphere. For that, our organization with its various approaches not just provides rigorous in-depth training to acquire technical skills but we have also been actively working on diversity initiatives to provide hands-on experience that intends to bolster the confidence of young girls to pursue a career in tech.

Socio-Cultural Shift

In the past, Nepal as a country has experienced a structured and unilineal direction of cultural practice that centered on the domination and execution of the female sexes of the society. Gender injustice towards women in societies is the basic reason for deprivation of women from expanding their abilities to make strategic life choices. For that, Shequal recognizes the fact that women’s discriminations are fortified by these various socio-cultural norms, in order to empower women in all walks of life and also to ensure an equivalent voice of women in decision making.

Health and Lifestyle

All societies have strong social and gender norms relating to Sexual and reproductive health rights, particularly related to girls’ and young women’s sexuality. There is a need to overcome and discard gender stereotypes and harmful gender norms that devalue girls and seek to control their sexuality such that they have the attitudes, confidence and skills to make autonomous and healthy decisions about their sexuality, bodies and relationships. For that Shequal has been working in this aspect of health and lifestyle particularly to eliminate the health inequalities by increasing the access of underprivileged girls and women to mental and physical wellbeing services such as sexual and reproductive health and rights, proper nutrition, family, planning, mental health, social wellbeing and also providing access to key (health-related) services.

Art and Culture

Art emerges as a form of expression that evokes various emotions and also acts as a platform accessible to everyone. In majority of the rural places, even today, women are taught that the female body must be veiled from the public eye, and ought to be confined to private spaces only. In such a social dynamic, women experience a deep sense of skepticism, accompanied with fear from societal disapproval, which in turn hinders their ability to raise their feminine voices. Here at Shequal we look at how different forms of culture and performing arts can address development issues such as ending violence against women, women's economic empowerment and also women's leadership that further opens for new possibilities to working with empowerment is including art in social work practices.

Advocacy and Governance

As fewer women study and work in STEM, these fields tend to perpetuate inflexible, exclusionary, male-dominated cultures that are not supportive of or attractive to women and minorities. Also recognizing the fact that the status quo does not always encourage girls to be themselves, our foundation has been encouraging girls to advocate for themselves by sharing their thoughts and ideas freely and candidly where Shequal wants to be their voice by breaking all kinds of stereotypes. Thus through our foundation we advocate for equal opportunity in STEM fields while raising awareness about the diverse opportunities and benefits for girls, women, at both an individual and community level.

Shequal Foundation