Baseline Report Girls Unstopable LEGO Project

Save the Children International in Vietnam (SCI Vietnam) is set to launch a project from 2023 to 2025 in Quang Binh and Binh Duong, with the generous support of the LEGO Foundation. This initiative aims to empower girls aged 10-13 by equipping them with leadership and agency skills, enabling them to realize their full potential. The project leverages the Learning through Play methodology and integrates topics from the Girls Unstoppable technical package.

Girls Unstoppable is a curriculum tailored for girls in migration and displacement scenarios. It is adaptable across diverse humanitarian and developmental contexts, addressing the unique needs, vulnerabilities, and capacities of girls and young women. The curriculum is flexible, accommodating varying engagement durations across different settings.
The core objective of the “Girl Unstoppable” initiative is to unleash their potential, and together they become strong activists for their rights and be able to make their voices heard on issues that matter to them.
The primary beneficiaries are girls aged 10-13 from 20 target secondary schools in two provinces in Quang Binh and Binh Duong Provinces. These girls often hail from public schools lacking quality extracurricular activities due to underestimation and untrained educators. The project, in collaboration with local authorities, will identify and select schools and students fitting the criteria.
The project’s outcome for 2024 & 2025 is to ensure that girls aged 10-13 possess the knowledge, skills, and confidence to voice their concerns in a learning-through-play environment.
Study Purpose and Key Questions
The purpose of this baseline survey will serve as a foundational reference, capturing the starting point from which the project’s interventions will be launched and against which future progress and impact will be measured:
• SQ1: How do girls perceive and experience playing, learning through play, safe places, school club availability, and topics they want to explore at clubs?
• SQ2: How do young girls rate their power (self-confidence) in vital life and decision-making skills, including Power to Agency, Power within Wellbeing, Power with Solidarity, and Power in Safety?
• SQ3: To what extent do schoolgirls demonstrate and practice their leadership skills?
Conclusions
Play and Learning Experiences: Girls showed enthusiasm for active play and reported positive emotions associated with play, underscoring its importance for their well-being. They feel safest and most joyful at home or with family, yet prefer to play with friends, highlighting the need for safe communal play spaces.
Self-Confidence and Decision-Making: High levels of self-confidence and decision-making abilities were evident across various domains, particularly in agency, despite difficulties such as remembering and focusing. Safety emerged as an area for improvement.
Leadership Skills: Leadership skills were present but varied according to individual challenges, indicating a need for targeted support to foster these skills among all girls.

Recommendations
Enhance Play and Learning: Create safer play areas, address accessibility issues, and ensure school environments are free from bullying and violence. Align school club activities with the girls’ preferences.
Strengthen Self-Confidence: Continue supporting girls’ self-advocacy and decision-making. Implement strategies to bolster safety to enhance confidence.
Cultivate Leadership Skills: Integrate leadership development into programming and provide opportunities for girls to demonstrate agency and influence.

Methodology and Limitations
The Girl Unstoppable project employed a mixed-method approach for the baseline survey, comprising both qualitative and quantitative elements. Structured surveys and questionnaires were administered to 240 girls to capture measurable data on their confidence and leadership, as well as their participation in play-based learning. Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) conducted across four schools enriched the data, offering deeper insights into the girls’ leadership experiences and decision-making skills. This comprehensive methodology, underpinned by the MEAL framework, aimed to capture both the breadth and depth of the girls’ experiences to inform the project’s interventions.
The study faced limitations due to the potential mismatch of participants between the 2023 baseline survey and the girls attending the 2024 club training sessions. Efforts to mitigate this included coordinating with school management to identify likely participants and expanding the sample size to ensure representativeness. Despite these measures, there remains an acknowledgment that not all surveyed girls will partake in future sessions, which may affect the continuity of individual data tracking.