On Wheels

Teenage pregnancy cases have always been rampant in today’s society. Among the provinces of Iloilo, Anilao tops the list. The STEP UP Project & Anilao Local Government Unit partnered with Commission on Population (POPCOM) to launch You-For-You (U4U) Teen Trail, an interactive information campaign against teenage pregnancy. This program aims to deliver critical information to teens aged 10-19 regarding teen pregnancy prevention, sexually-transmitted infection (STI) reduction and early sex avoidance. This two-day initiative is supported by United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and Department of Health (DOH). This mobile information hub can be brought to different schools and barangays because of its portability and ease of use.

Eighteen teens, chosen by the team, were trained on the first day. Lectures were headed by Ma’am Lara, Ma’am Yan and Sir Roi. The activities were subdivided into different types such as Teen Chat, Teen Color, Teen Code, Teen Tunes, Teen Choice, Exhibit A and Exhibit B.

Teen Color is an activity wherein the teens get to know each other through an interactive game. They form a circle with their group and say a phrase like “Ako si ______ at mabait akong kaibigan dahil ______”. At the same time, they are taught about gender equality and sensitivity. One game involved an exchange of “gifts” where the teens are divided into two groups. One group has to give a gift that can only be used by boys and the other has to give a gift that can only be used by girls. For the next activity, the group is further divided into Work, Emotions and Physical groups. The main idea is that for each group, they are supposed to list what can only be experienced by boys alone and girls alone. The activity will also make the teens realize that a household chore is not only the women’s job but the whole family. You get to realize that a man’s job can also be done by a woman. She can be a driver; she can be a construction worker; she can also do a man’s job. The main gist of this is that you realize that boys and girls have a common ground when it comes to items. Also, girls can wear briefs if she wanted to. Boys can wear napkins, however unnecessary. Boys can wear bras, makeup and hairclips. Both girls and boys use shave and shaving cream. You realize that phrases such as “for boys only” and “for girls only” are a social construct and that the only distinction between sexes are their physical differences.

Teen Chat is an activity where the teens are asked about informative facts and fallacies through a quiz-type kind of game. And this is named “Fact or Bluff”. Different topics were involved such as sex, STIs, HIV and AIDS and other adolescent health related questions.

Teen Code is a small activity about teen’s rights. It featured a short movie entitled “Red Leaves Falling”. It catches everyone’s attention because it’s a cartoon and it tackles about child pornography and child trafficking. Afterwards, the teens are made to remember three ideas when he or she is faced by trouble: Saying no, running away and telling the incident to the authorities.

Teen Choice is another activity featuring a short movie about three different teens. The fun part is that each has their own story to tell and the teens are able to pick which path each character should take. For example, the girl from the film was confronted by her boyfriend that he wants to have sex. She was undecided and felt ill at ease the whole time because of the confrontation. She questioned herself whether she should ask advice from her best friend or not. The teens will then get to choose for her. If they chose not to tell her bestfriend, the girl will end up pregnant because she decided to do what her boyfriend asked her not seeking her bestfriend’s guidance. And if she told her bestfriend, then she can reject what her boyfriend offering leading to their breakup and the girl, focusing more for her future. The other character, which is gay, has an online chatmate who wanted to meet up with him. The gay guy was torn on whether he should go for it or not. He was also torn on whether he should tell his bestfriend about it. So the results that may end up is the possibility of a happy ending if he chose to seek advice from his bestfriend and if not then there is that chance where he might involve his self in risky behaviors if he met up with his chatmate and also he might contract some sort of STI. So the main lesson here is that in life you are given a lot of choices but at the end of the day, you alone are able to make the decision of choosing.

Teen Tunes is simply a fun-filled karaoke in which the songs represent the stages of falling in love, and yes, including all the breakups, bitterness and moving on.

Exhibit A & B are criss-crossed panel boards and each surface has different activities and self-reflection about the teens wellness, health, future, the ABCDEs and personal realizations.

On Day 1, all these were discussed to the chosen teens because for Day 2, the chosen teens will be the ones who will facilitate the activities. This serves as training for them. Seventy teens will have been invited for Day 2 and instead of Ma’am Lara, Yan and sir Roi, the newly trained peer educators will be the ones who will lead the whole thing.

At the end of the day, our takeaways were that the PeerEds were really happy that they got a chance to express themselves. Their boosted confidence make them want to think more and do more. Personally, I believe that this interactive trail was very helpful. It unlocked the potential in each of them and made them close as friends and schoolmates. The teens themselves promised that they will do whatever they can for the advocacy.

These are just small steps of Project STEP UP but we believe that what matters most is the leap it takes to promote the advocacy and make aware the whole community.