Welcome to the first Spotlight of 2020! In this issue, you will find a recap of our Phase 3 Learning and Design Workshop , where many of us came together to learn from each other and look forward to the next four years of the initiative. Additionally, our member spotlight is with Rawnak Jahan of CARE Bangladesh. We’ve also included a brief overview of the baseline studies from Nepal and Bangladesh . Finally, there are a few program updates and resources. Keep reading to see what we’ve been up to at Tipping Point!
 
Sincerely,
Tipping Point Global teammates
Phase 3 Learning and Design Workshop
From January 27-31, Tipping Point teammates from across the globe gathered with movement actors, program participants, and colleagues from across the CARE federation to learn about girl-led movement building, cast vision for Phase 3 , and sketch activities surrounding three key areas of work: Influencing how CARE approaches girls’ rights programming, influencing governments and donors to invest in evidence-based and root cause approaches, and increasing girls’ visibility and participation in movements. The workshop generated a series of strategic objectives that will contribute to the success of these workstreams in Phase 3 (July 2020 – December 2023). 
Photos by RIddhima Sharma of CARE Nepal
Staff Spotlight: Rawnak Jahan
Rawnak holds a master’s degree in Law and has vast experience working in NGOs, INGOs and Regional Organizations on development and women rights. In her professional life at different organizations she has designed, implemented, and monitored different events for promoting of women rights. She has led and participates in a variety of policy enactment movements in Bangladesh, including coordination of the CIDV (Citizen's Initiative against Domestic Violence), a coalition of more than 25 women rights organizations for enactment and implementation of Domestic Violence Protection and Prevention Act. Rawnak’s passion is to fight against the discrimination and oppression of women, and we are privileged that she is a key member of the Tipping Point team. You can see Rawnak discussing Tipping Point with Laurie Lee, the CEO of CARE UK in this video.
1.       What do you do in your position? What's the most motivating part of your work with Tipping Point?

Currently I am leading the TP Bangladesh team. Generally, I coordinate team members, partners, and our CARE USA counterparts. One of my main responsibilities is organizing and coordinating advocacy initiatives at different levels. My work involves identifying and developing advocacy strategies in coordination with other stakeholders, conducting policy and context analysis, identifying influencing opportunities through key partners or coalitions. I represent Tipping Point in different national networks like Girls Not Bride Bangladesh, Citizens Initiative against Domestic Violence and Men Engagement Alliance. I also lead a process to identify key advocacy issues that are very relevant to bring about a change in social norms and policy improvements for preventing child marriage. Additionally, I support my team for smooth implementation of planned activities. The position also involves working as a senior team member to lead, organize and mainstream gender in all initiatives.

2.       Looking forward to Phase 3, what something you are excited about? What makes you nervous?
I love our vision statement. What I have sensed from our design workshop that we will do more on the movement related work. We will facilitate the girls to create their movement. Girls will raise their voices to achieve their rights and we will support them from back. I can see that spirit within our girls. I am so much excited to think of how these girls’ collective will evolve to a movement.
I am bit worried about how we will link this girls’ groups with the women’s’ rights movement. As in Bangladesh women right movement has a very strong history and quite organized but the girls’ collectives are not very organized, and people may not be ready to accept girls as leaders.
3.       You’ve worked with movements before, what advice would you give to your colleagues at Tipping Point as we engage with movements in Phase 3?
From my experience I have seen that strong committed leaders are very important for any movement. A second line leadership is also important. As a movement is a loose forum and no one is under any formal commitment to the issue, as CARE we should have clear understanding on our roles. We will be just facilitating, and our role is to support from the back. Movements will evolve in their own way. We have to support girls to find good, committed and motivated leaders who will passionately lead the movement.
4.       What do you enjoy doing outside of work?
Spending time with my daughter. I enjoy every single moment with her. I also love to stay alone in nature, only me, I love “me” time. I need this frequently. This helps keep me calm, patient, and logical. 
Baseline Studies: The Context of Program Areas
The results are in! Tipping Points’ RCT baseline evaluation is ready. Kudos to Shikha Sunuwar and Rajan Subedi at CARE Nepal, Mahmud Khan at CARE Bangladesh, Sadhvi Kalra at CARE USA, and our partners at icddr,b, GBK, Emory University, Interdisciplinary Analysts, DSDC and SSS for making these products possible.
If you missed our Learning Xchange webinar on the findings, have a listen!
Nepal Baseline Study
The baseline study in Nepal found that in program areas, even girls in school were at risk of being married early if perceived to be disobedient, for example by roaming or interacting with boys. Restrictive norms around girls’ mobility, interacting with boys, and participating in leisure activities outside the home intensify during adolescence to guard against’ reputational damage. Norms are somewhat in flux, especially among educated families, but girls who violate them are at risk of being married off early. Despite norms being in flux, girls face limitations in their ability to participate in decisions about the timing of marriage and choice of spouse. Collective action among adolescents is in a nascent stage, but there are some adult stakeholders who are committed to supporting such activity.
Bangladesh Baseline Study
In Bangladesh program areas, there were high rates of child marriage reported, and girls’ aspirations for when they will get married is at odds with the reality. The majority of girls accepted gender-inequitable attitudes, including the control by their family about their mobility and other aspects of their lives. Girls rarely negotiate marriage, since social norms related to girls’ voice and decision-making would lead to girls’ opinion being ignored. Girls’ interaction with boys outside of family was also restricted and the result of violating this norm could be early marriage. The study recommends building girls’ movement for collective action in favor of girls’ rights and community sensitization to girls’ rights, both of which are important components of the Tipping Point Phase 2 package.

Initiative Updates
  1. Each country team has developed a map of policy opportunities and a SWOT analysis to prioritize strategies and targets for Phase 3 based on a thorough understanding of their respective context
  2. Girl-led movement groups have now launched in all program areas. In Rangpur (Bangladesh), the girl activists have chosen to advocate for their voices to be heard. In Kapilvastu and Rupandehi (Nepal), the girl activists have chosen to advocate for increased mobility.
  3. Attendance in Tipping Point groups is generally improving, thanks to innovations from the teams on the ground, including snacks for the fathers, adjusting session time and pairing participants together for accountability.
News and Resources
  1. Make sure you check out the CIGN Position Paper on Supporting women’s social movements and collective actions. As we plan the next phase of Tipping Point, let’s consider how we can be a convener, ally, resource partner, and amplifier of movements that strive for girls’ rights.
  2. Since the last issue of Spotlight, Tipping Point team members have been busy writing to communicate the program’s impact. Some recent reads include Suraiya Sultana’s Story of Change about how a program participant improved her relationship with her mother, and Suniti Neogy’s blog about how even the most motivated field staff working on sexual and reproductive health and rights can at times get caught in a conflict between their own values and the prevalent socio-cultural norms that control adolescent girls’ sexuality. 
  3. While at the Learning & Design workshop, a couple of us spoke and we learned about feminist slam poetry in Nepal. It is, an inspiring way that the feminist movement is expressed in Kathmandu., To share the inspiration, check out this video of Ashmina Ranjit collaborating with poet Gunjan Dixit on Day 2 of Collaborative Artivism: Silence No Longer in 2018. Gunjan performs Eve Ensler’s poem “Bodies”.
We hope you enjoyed the resources, updates, and staff insights from this edition of Spotlight. As always, if you have any ideas, inputs, resources, or updates that you want included here or in the Learning Xchange, please let us know so that it can be arranged