NGO against human trafficking

Through workshops, the NGO On the Road for Equality between Men and Women (Por el Camino de la Igualdad entre Mujeres y Hombres) (PCIMH) aims to end human trafficking from the roots, with talks at schools cautioning children about this crime.

The director of the association On the Road for Equality between Men and Women, Yara Pérez Guerrero, informed through the Network of the Latin American Institute of Effective Communication, that there is a free version of their collaborative project “Neither princesses nor superheroes,” which has the purpose of defeating human trafficking.

Yara Pérez mentioned they were recently given an honorable mention by the Organization of the Ibero American States as part of the Ibero American Awards for Education on Human Rights, which she considers is a “huge achievement, since our model combines strategies in both online and traditional [courses],” which is innovative.

She spoke in detail of the backbone of their prevention program – the only one in its class worldwide – which broaches the subjects of gender, human rights, and cautions about the dangers of social networks and technological devices to raise awareness on human trafficking and prevent it.

According to Ms. Pérez, version 2.0 is the result of the work they've done online, for three school years, with more than 50 thousand students of elementary and junior high levels, in 23 states of the country; and traditional courses through methodological workshops for the integration of Solidarity Protection Networks and Experience-Based Sessions.

With the support of the Social Co-Investment Program of 205, 2016 and 2017 of the National Institute of Social Development, over 13 thousand children have benefited directly at the cities of Acapulco, Durango, León, Los Reyes la Paz, Mazatlán, Oaxaca, Playas Rosarito, Tijuana and Mexico City.

“We gather all your feedback and, the most important, is that we add to the Learning Modules of our platform the interviews we perform to the students and the videos we produced, so we can gather all their interests, points of view, observations (…), they are the protagonists, in a few words,” claims Yara Pérez.

Vladimir Peña Ramos, academic coordinator of the organization and the project, said that across the country there are several types of violence against women and children, not only in the states of communities where the gender alert has been issued.

At elementary schools and junior high schools in Mazatlán, Oaxaca and Durango, the association said girls were asked to raise their hands if they've ever felt uncomfortable by the gaze of a man, and that it was surprising that girls between the ages of nine and eleven raised theirs. They claimed to have been made feel that way by adult men.

Yara Pérez says that fighting this crime requires creativity from all those involved in the prevention of human trafficking and social network harassment, and further emphasized that schools and families need to work in the protection of their children and teenagers against this crime.

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