We are GESE Africa

We bring Gender Equality and Sex Education to Africa´s poorest areas.

Our Vision

We create a new standard of literacy in Africa's poorest areas by ensuring high quality gender equality and sex education.

Our Mission

GESE´s mission is to foster sex education and gender equality among children and young adolescents in underserved communities.

Our Story

GESE was founded in 2019 with the idea, that everyone should have the right to make profound decisions about their sexual behavior.

In 2012, co-founder Marie Gabel was involved in an international sex education project. During this project, her close interaction with young students showed her that there are many myths surrounding contraception and sexual intercourse circulating, particularly in emerging and developing countries. For example, the high number of unintentional child-pregnancies results of common beliefs such as “Coke is an appropriate contraceptive”. However, far more severe myths are ones like "Bleach is a suitable abortion drug" or "By having sexual intercourse with a virgin, one is cured of the AIDS virus".

Working with different NGOs in Eastern and Western Africa, we realized that that the topics of contraception and sexual intercourse are often hushed up and sexual education is widely neglected. As a result, global problems like the HIV/AIDS pandemic, child pregnancies, and dramatic population growth are exacerbated.

In close cooperation with educational organizations in Nairobi, Kenya, we developed a gender equality and sex education program tailored to the needs of underserved children and young adolescents in Africa. With the help of this concept and our financial resources gathered in Germany, local teachers set out to schools in deprived areas to talk without shame or prejudice about gender equality and sex education.

We collaborate with a variety of local and international funders, governments, and educational organizations to make a sustainable impact in the life of future generations in Africa´s poorest areas.

Founded

2019

Locations

4

Team

30

Nationalities

6 Get to know our team

We are an interdisciplinary team of PhDs, university students, and young professionals dedicated to promoting gender equality and sex education in deprived regions across Africa. Our backgrounds include psychology, intercultural studies, business administration, data science, and humanitarian work. We collaborate intensely with local teachers, community workers, and project managers to tailor our program to the needs in the target areas.

We are convinced that together we can counteract the global challenges of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, child pregnancies, and population growth.

GESE Africa - Team Germany