Change for girls

By joining our regular-giving program, Change for Girls, you’re supporting girls and their families around the world to thrive. When girls are educated and supported, their entire family and community benefits.

Right now, there are over half a billion adolescent girls on the planet. These girls hold the potential to completely transform our world – for themselves, their families, their communities and the planet.

Yet the world we live in now is holding these girls back. Gender inequality means that girls are often the first to be taken out of school, the last to be fed, the ones that suffer the most during emergencies.

It also negatively impacts boys, encouraging damaging beliefs and holding them back from realising their dreams. That’s why we’re working with girls, boys, women, men and entire communities to change this. And you can help.

Nowhere in the world are girls treated as equals.
You can help change that.

Support every four weeks
info_outline Right now, there are over half a billion adolescent girls on the planet. These girls hold the potential to completely transform our world – for themselves, their families, their communities and the planet.

$39

Can provide girls with meals for school

$49

Can give young women access to vocational training

$69

Can support a migrant worker to start her own business

By joining Change for Girls, you’re helping create a world where girls can stay in school, choose if and when to marry, find meaningful work, have a say in their communities and be free from fear and violence.
A world where girls can unleash their full potential, and all children can thrive.

Why Girls?

130M girls
130M girls
Globally, more than 132 million girls are not in school.1
12M girls
12M girls
Every year, nearly 12 million girls are married before the age of 18.2
12M girls
12M girls
Approximately 12 million girls aged 15-19 years give birth each year.3

Together we can create a better now for her,
which means a better future for everyone.

But when girls are educated and supported,
they can create incredible change.

  • 12 years of education for every girl would reduce child marriage worldwide by 64 per cent.
  • For every year a girl stays in school, her country’s climate resilience measurably improves.
  • 5 to 10% is how much infant mortality rates are reduced for every additional year of school that a girl completes.

Girls have the potential to change the world. Join Change for Girls.

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Marie is creating long-lasting change in her community

Marie is a 15-year-old from Sierra Leone and the daughter of a former practitioner of female genital mutilation (FGM). Despite her mother’s involvement with the practice, Marie has become an outspoken advocate against FGM and has refused to undergo the procedure.

Through Marie’s engagement with Plan International’s My Sexuality My Right project, she has learnt about the dangers associated with FGM, as well as issues like teenage pregnancy, early marriage and the importance of girls getting an education.

“I am totally against the practice of FGM, but it has been my mother’s source of income for my whole life. That is how she has been able to take care of us. It’s how she paid for our schooling, our food – all of our family’s needs. But I only learnt about its negative effects when I went to school. Before that, I thought it was ok”. Marie explains.

Marie’s activism has had a profound impact on her mother, who both supported Marie’s refusal to undergo FGM and stopped practicing the procedure on others.

So far, none of my friends or any other girls my age have been forced to undergo FGM or get married. Because of our work, that practice has been stopped – taking younger girls to be initiated. I have not seen that happen since I have been part of the activist group and it is a great feeling to know that I am helping to make a difference.

Our generous Change for Girls supporters allow Plan International to work with girls like Marie throughout the world to end the practice of FGM and uphold girls’ rights.

You can read more about Marie’s activism and the support she received through Plan International here.

Help create a world where girls can unleash their full potential

Create change for girls

1 UNICEF, unicef.org/education/girls-education
2 Girls Not Brides, girlsnotbrides.org/about-child-marriage
3 World Health Organisation, Adolescent Pregnancy (2020)