Belize Family Life Association

My Peace Corps assignment in Belize has me working with Belize Family Life Association (BFLA), the local affiliate of the International Planned Parenthood Federation. The organization's headquarters are in Belize City but they have offices in all six districts throughout the country. I am working at the Dangriga office where the organization was originally formed 26 years ago. The objective of this organization is to provide comprehensive and high quality sexual and reproductive health services to Belizean families. Clinical services are similar to what you would expect at a Planned Parenthood clinic in the US such as Pap smears, breast exams, pregnancy tests, HIV tests, diagnosis & treatment of STIs, and a variety of birth control options.

Along with clinical services, the organization has an advocacy and education branch that focuses on outreach work to continue the mission of BFLA to contribute to a healthy and productive nation. Outreach activities include satellite tables in the community, going door to door handing out brochures, health education sessions in schools, and a wide variety of youth activities. The majority of my work is with these types of activities.

The BFLA office in Dangriga has two staff members, a nurse and a youth officer, along with myself. They have worked with other volunteers in the past including most recently a Japanese (JICA) volunteer that left about a year ago. Both staff members are fairly new with the nurse beginning about a year and a half ago and the youth officer joining four months ago. With the large amount of turnover in the office, it appears that its been difficult to have much continuity in the programs being carried out.

The Dangriga office has a small clinic as well as a "youth space." I had envisioned this to be a youth center but in reality its a small office with two desk for the youth officer and myself as well as a computer hooked up to the internet. It is open all day throughout the week for youth ages 14-24 to stop in and hang out. They are free to use the internet if we don't need it. I think the long-term goal is to have an actual space for youth to hang out in that has more room and doesn't feel so much like an office but we are dealing with whats available in the meantime.

There are two youth groups that I have begun working with through BFLA. The first is the Youth Advocacy Movement, also called the YAM Club. In order to join YAM, youth must first complete 40 hours of training on life skills and sexual & reproductive health. We are hoping to begin the training next month since there hasn't been a group trained in Dangriga in about two years. YAM has meetings every Friday evening that those interested in joining and current members are required to attend. Other criteria for membership include completing regular community service, attending church, continuing training, and referring other to the BFLA clinic. I was surprised at these numerous requirements but not surprised to hear that they are having trouble finding youth to follow through and become certified members. Unfortunately it seems there is little flexibility in these requirements so now I am trying to find youth that have the time and willingness to participate. I do believe that participants will gain leadership and communication skills and have heard it looks very positive on resumes and applications as older youth try getting into college and find jobs but understand why youth may not want to participate. Last weekend, YAM completed a community service project at a local park. We painted the bandstand with the help of many neighborhood kids that were excited to participate.

The other youth group that I have started working with is Peer Educators. BFLA has a program to train peer educators in the two high schools in Dangriga. Again this hasn't been done recently and there has been no follow-up with those trained over a year ago so I have begun to work with this group. It seems that these are the leaders in the school and they are excited to participate in more activities and continue training sessions. I will be meeting with the group at one high school weekly and hope to start at the other school soon once I get permission. Hopefully we will also hold a training for younger students that want to join soon.

I am trying to find ways to stay busy and get involved in the community. Its been a huge change for me to have an actual office and set hours that I'm expected to be sitting at my desk compared to my experiences in Burkina where I considered any time in village my work and only spent a few hours every morning at the health clinic. The other challenge has been fitting into a structured program that has many restrictions on organizing and planning new activities. In Burkina I basically could do anything I came up with as long as I could locate resources and participants. Here, I have to get activities approved by several people, make sure that it fits into BFLA and IPPF's vision and program plan, and often use already prepared materials and presentations. It is definitely a change but probably much more like the real world that I will experience once I grow up and get a real job!