The Free Her Flow School Tour was executed during October also dubbed Period Awareness Month. The brain child of Author and Activist, Shelly-Ann Weeks, the tour was funded by the United States Embassy, Kingston through it’s International Women’s Day Grant Program created to fund programs that directly benefits women and girls.
The tour features presentation about the anatomy, menstruation, hygiene, product knowledge as well as menstrual product donations to all students. The tour took place over 5 weeks covering 6 parishes – Kingston, St. Catherine, St. Ann, St. Mary, Clarendon and St. James. A total of 25 schools – 5 tertiary, 8 primary and 12 high schools and a 1 prison for under-aged girls.
Partners on the School tour included Lasco Curves, Stayfree Feminine Napkins, Cubbies Disposable Wipes as well as the Jamaica Observer. Copies of Shelly-Ann Weeks’ book IT’S MY BODY. PERIOD. was donated to schools’ libraries.
The overall feedback from the school is mostly gratitude expressed by the schools’ administrators and teachers because they all agree that there s a need of this type of education among students. HerFlow Foundation Founder and Executive Director is very happy with the reception from the schools.
“We had to turn down some schools because we didn’t have the resources to continue the tour. We already went beyond our initial target and added 6 more stops, we had to end somewhere.” Weeks explained. “We will be conducting another tour in the coming months just a soon as we secure the funding.”