A five-day residential training equipping youth champions with knowledge and skills on Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) and human rights came to a close today in Kayonza District, bringing together youth representatives and project managers from across a five-organization consortium working to reach young people with compounded vulnerabilities in Gasabo, Kirehe, Muhanga, Nyagatare and Gatsibo.
The training, held at Midland Hotel from 20 to 23 July 2026, was organized under the “Beyond Boundaries: Reclaiming Sexuality of Vulnerable Young Persons in Rwanda” project, the AmplifyChange-funded initiative implemented jointly by the Organization for Integration and Promotion of People with Albinism (OIPPA), FAWE Rwanda, Learn Work Develop, Impanuro Girls Initiative, the Rwanda Union of the Blind and the National Union of Disability Organizations of Rwanda (NUDOR), which serves as the consortium’s coordinating secretariat.
Twenty-five participants took part in the training, including 13 youth champions and 6 project managers drawn from the five consortium partner organizations, alongside sign language interpreters and personal assistants who ensured the sessions were fully accessible to participants with disabilities.
The training forms part of the project’s strategy of investing in youth champions who can act as trainers of trainers, cascading knowledge on SRHR and rights-based approaches to their peers, particularly youth with compounded vulnerabilities such as youth with disabilities, youth living with HIV/AIDS, teen mothers and geographically isolated young people. The project builds on lessons from the “Make Way” programme, which found that these groups continue to face significant barriers to SRHR information and services, compounded by stigma, discrimination and gaps in rights awareness.
By strengthening the capacity of youth champions as peer trainers, the consortium aims to extend the project’s reach well beyond direct beneficiaries, multiplying its impact across the districts covered by its five partner organizations.
Beyond the transfer of technical knowledge, the training was designed to build participants’ skills as Trainers of Trainers, including practical facilitation practice, mock training delivery, and peer feedback, so that each youth champion leaves with a concrete cascade action plan for reaching other young people in their sector and district. Project managers took part throughout the training alongside the youth champions, a deliberate design choice intended to strengthen coordinated follow-up and ongoing support once champions begin cascading the training in their communities.
With the Kayonza training concluded, the consortium partners now turn to supporting youth champions as they roll out peer-led SRHR and human rights education, extending the reach of the Beyond Boundaries project to more young people with compounded vulnerabilities across the sectors of intervention.
