Gender Audit

Introduction and Rationale of Gender Audit

Higher Education Institutions across the globe, despite many efforts and significant progress in many academic and non-academic areas, gender equality is still not addressed the way it is supposed to be. In this rapidly changing world, the role of women and men are changing along with their relations with each other. Globalization has fostered many evolutions in the nature of markets, workplaces and even households in which they live and work together. In this broad context, gender equality cannot be achieved when discrimination remains embedded in political, economic and social institutions and in development processes; it often remains unaddressed or is addressed in an uneven manner.

CGA is providing a very comprehensive gender audit for the higher education institutions with the following rationales: 

1.  The need of the hour is to address the discrimination women face as a matter of fundamental human rights and justice. Women continue to face disadvantages compared with men, who enjoy greater opportunities and better treatment in most areas of economic and social life. They are exposed to multiple forms of discrimination and consistently fare poorly in terms of socio-economic opportunities and treatment.
2. Equality is not just intrinsic value and a right in itself but is instrumental in achieving economic growth, social change and poverty reduction. women can play a critical role as economic agents capable of transforming societies and economies
3. Gender Mainstreaming: “Gender” often equates “women” in common practice, yet the awareness rising of men is essential and integral to women’s empowerment. The achievement of gender equality requires a context in which men and women work together. There is a renewed interest in the role of men and boys as a counterpoint to women-specific approaches and in the significance of “masculinities”, or men’s attitudes, aspirations, and anxieties from a gender point of view.

This Gender Audit manual provides all the higher education facilitators with guidelines and practical instructions on how to undertake a gender audit in an institutional or organizational context.

CGA- Gender Audit Framework

 

 

 

 

1. Gender audit team and creation of gender committee
2. Gender audit policy, strategy, and plan 
3. Gender audit internal/ external mechanisms
4. Gender audit projects implementation
5. Gender audit feedback and analysis

 

Gender audit team and creation of gender committee

 

• Gender issues in the context of the work unit, and existing gender expertise, competence, and capacity-building
• Gender in the institution’s   objectives, programming, and implementation cycles, and choice of partner organizations
• Information and knowledge management within the institution and gender equality policy as reflected in its mission, vision and public image
• Decision-making, Staffing, and human resources, and institutional culture
• Institution’s perception of achievement on gender equality

 

Gender audit policy, strategy and plan 

• Gender audit calendar
• Policy at the community level
• Management level
• College level
• Class level
• Individual-level

Gender audit internal/ external mechanisms

• Considers whether internal practices and related support systems for gender mainstreaming are effective and reinforce each other
•  Monitors and assesses the relative progress made in gender mainstreaming
• Establishes a baseline for the audited unit (class/ department/college/university)
•  Identifies critical gaps and challenges
•  Recommends ways of addressing them and suggests new and more effective strategies
• Documents good practices towards the achievement of gender equality

Gender audit projects implementation

• Gender audits require ‘consistent and demonstrated political will from the management/principals/ other authorities in the institution
• The participatory components of gender audits comprise self-assessment questionnaires

 

 

 

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