Recruitment and Retention of Male Participants in Gender-Transformative Programs

This learning brief is part of a set of three from Plan International Canada and Equimundo; the brief documents lessons learned from Plan International Canada’s Strengthening Health Outcomes for Women and Children (SHOW) project, a multi-country, 4.5-year gender-transformative project – which works to identify, challenge, and shift harmful gender norms – with an aim to reduce maternal and child mortality among vulnerable women and children in underserved regions of five countries: Bangladesh, Ghana, Haiti, Nigeria, and Senegal, and to advance gender equality. 

The insights have been gleaned through Equimundo’s and Plan International Canada’s experiences with the SHOW project, as well as with similar group-based programs that work with fathers to help them become more involved caregivers and partners. This brief is intended for practitioners in the field of male engagement in gender equality and summarizes programmatic lessons on recruitment and retention including: targeting and scheduling, messaging and approach, and relevance of content.

Read the key lessons here.

Read the other briefs in this learning series:
Engaging Missing Populations in Gender-Transformative Programs
Role of Facilitation in Gender-Transformative Programs That Engage Men and Boys