Gender and Development Council (GAD)

There are several different committees here in Peace Corps Morocco. There is a SIDA (AIDS in French) committee, a GAD (gender and development) committee, Peace Works, which is a written publication, and the VAC (volunteer advisory council) committee.  For most of these committees, representatives are elected by fellow PCVs. The SIDA and GAD committees are made up of 8 volunteers each. Two are elected with each incoming group of volunteers as the older volunteers are on their way out.

The reason I bring this up is because the other day we held elections. I woke up in the morning and thought to myself; today I am going to step out of my character. I am going to run for a position on the GAD committee. I told a friend of mine that this is what I wanted to do but that I was afraid I would chicken out at the last minute for the sole reason of not wanting to stand up in front of my stage( group of incoming YD volunteers.) I asked him to give me a little jab when they asked who wanted to run, essentially holding me accountable to get up there and say what I wanted to say. Well, the plan worked because when they said who wants to run for the GAD committee, I was jabbed in the side, quickly raised my hand, and hopped up as fast as possible to give my spiel and sit back down. There were three of us that were running and then everyone had to write the name of the person they wanted to elect on a piece of paper, drop it in a hat, and a current member of the committee counted the votes and announced the winner. As I was sitting there I watched the girl who was going to announce the winner, struggling over the name, trying to figure out how to say it. This is ALWAYS a good sign for me. And sure enough, I WON! I am sooo excited. This will be the first time I am on a committee, or act as a representative for a group of people but I am psyched and very confident that this will be a good position and opportunity for me.

So, after all of that, what the heck is GAD?

The Gender and Development Council is responsible for making sure that gender issues and activities are incorporated into community projects. Gender in this case includes girls, boys, women, and men. “The committee is a resource for PCV efforts, and works with Moroccan NGOs on gender issues.  Activities under the GAD umbrella include GGLOW (Girls and Guys Leading our World) Camps, International Women’s Day events, tea talks, harassment issues and regional GAD conferences.” As a committee member I will also be responsible for getting information out to the people in my stage about different activities they can do to incorporate Gender into their projects and give them different resources they want or need. I imagine I will have a lot more to say about it in the coming months but I wanted to briefly talk about it because I am very excited to make this apart of my work as a PCV.