Institute of Progressive Women Uses Social Media to Empower Women

Stacey Ramirez, Program Officer, Global Partnerships, Institute of International Education, writes on how E-Mediat participating NGOs are using social media to usher change in their communities.

Wafa Abed, President of the Institute of Progressive Women

Amending laws that discriminate against women and promoting the passage of laws that empower them and allow them to be part of the decision-making process at all levels is one of the main tenets of the Lebanese non-governmental organization The Institute of Progressive Women (IPW).
As a manager at BBAC Bank in Beirut, Wafa Abed, the president of IPW, was surprised to learn that Lebanese law prohibited mothers from opening a bank account in the name of a minor, even while acting as their guardian. She found out one day in 2009 when she bumped into Barbara Batlouni, country director of AMIDEAST, who had just tried to open an account for her children and was denied. Wafa, currently an E-Mediat participant in Beirut, told her, “Barbara, if we can get this law changed, the first account opened will be by you.” And with that, IPW, which works to amend laws that discriminate against women, launched an initiative to change the law, as part of USAID’s Transparency and Accountability Grants project.

E-Mediat: Combining Work With Fun…and Food!

IIE Team with Lebanese Prime Minister, Najib Makati

Heather Murphy, Senior Program Officer, Global Partnerships at Institute of International Education shares her experiences from a recent visit to Jordan and Lebanon.

Last month I had the pleasure to traveling to Jordan and Lebanon with my colleague Stacey Ramirez to conduct site visits for E-Mediat. Jordan and Lebanon both have a special place in my heart for different reasons. Jordan was the first country I visited in the Middle East back in 2008 when I started working at IIE on the Women in Technology program. I had only been at IIE for a month before we started planning the trip! Lebanon is special to me because it is one of the countries that I visit most often for work and I long ago fell in love with the land, people and the food! So it was exciting to return working under a new program, seeing old faces along with the new!

Looking Back at 2011

As 2011 draws to a close, E-Mediat teams in Lebanon, Morocco and Tunisia reflect back at the trainings and experiences that made this year so special!

Nada Hamzeh, E-Mediat Country Director, Lebanon

Mobile Strategy Workshop, Lebanon

Five basic workshops and more than three additional workshops connected us with over 50 organizations in Lebanon and the trainings were instrumental in introducing them to the strategy of using social media. We started our work by changing the commonly views about networking, social communication and outreach strategy among local organizations.
Time was shorter than the content but we accepted the challenge because we realized that the need for this training was much larger than our challenges. Our first achievement was deleting the word “new” from the New Media Training. We believe that social media has become an essential need for organizations and not just another option; social media is the core of any organizations mainstream communications strategy rather than an auxiliary medium. We are glad that during the past year the E-Mediat trainings inspired many organizations to experiment with participatory communication approach and led to some impressive changes on the ground.