Our digital universe will provide knowledge and tools to teenagers and professionals. Teenagers will have free access to sexual knowledge, advice, online counseling, and tangible tools, and thousands of girls will strengthen their sexual and reproductive health and rights. Girls can check it out in privacy and in a safe space.

“My boyfriend wants me to have sex with him to prove that I love him. He’s 18 and I’m 13. He says I cannot get pregnant when I’m so young. Is that true?”

“I would like to get condoms, but I’m afraid people will gossip about me in the one in the small town where I live. What can I do?”

“My boyfriend does not want to use a condom, but I am afraid of getting pregnant, so what can I do?”

Questions like these, and many others, will be answered in our upcoming digital universe. In an app and website, girls can see and listen to other girls’ stories and conversations about their experiences, thoughts, problems, worries, dilemmas, backgrounds for the choices they make – or do not make.

In videos and podcasts, girls can be inspired by how others deal with various issues or get online advice. Girls and boys will be able to satisfy their curiosity about the female and male bodies, knowledge on what happens in the body when one is sexually aroused as well as different types of sex, and of course, how to protect a girl from getting pregnant. Girls and boys can get a thorough insight into the different types of contraception and how to use them concretely to protect each other optimally against pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Girls can also find answers to what the symptoms of being pregnant are, and what to do if this is the case.

Girls get knowledge and tools to take care of their own sexuality and body

There is a huge need to talk about sex with girls and boys in Colombia. So many questions need to be answered and equally many important topics need to be illuminated open-mindedly and at eye level with young people. Myths, misunderstandings, lies, taboos, and ignorance controls the minds of teenagers and the consequences are fatal for every girl who become pregnant. As sex is so massively covered in taboos, we need to provide a free online space where free talks are allowed, and no questions are too stupid to be asked. Porn myths are powerful and influence teenagers’ perception of sex, and we need a critical view and gender discussions in the sexual mess of misunderstandings.

We provide equal access to sex education in rural and urban areas

In Colombia, girls often receive proper sex education too late and at ages with up to six years of difference depending on whether they live in a mountain village or the urban center, and depending on their educational level, wealth and ethnicity. The goal with our digital universe is to give everyone regardless of gender, age, cultural and geographic origin, and regardless of their school’s quality and prioritization of sex education, equal access to knowledge about sexual and reproductive health and rights. To this date in Colombia, there are no similar digital solutions available to girls – or boys. 

Girls from different ethnic origins will be represented

Knowledge about and perspectives on sex vary a lot across the country’s 32 departments. Colombia is multi-ethnic with ethnicities ranging from Afro-Colombians, Mestizos, and the Native South Americans. To accommodate the different cultures and the individual life situations of teenage girls and boys, we will strive to tell stories and life lessons through several relatable characters who differ in gender, age, socioeconomic and cultural origin.

Increasing use of Internet and smartphones give more children access to our online tools

As soon as our digital universe is developed, it will be free and available to access all across the country. In areas with poor internet reception, girls and boys can download our material in schools, libraries, and clinics and other public institutions with free Wi-Fi. From a more long-term perspective, internet usage in rural areas is on the rise as the government has developed a plan for expanding the technological infrastructure in remote areas.

The number of smartphone owners is also rising and is projected to reach more than 80 percent of the population by 2025. For most poor families, Chinese copies of smartphones are affordable and even the most marginalized teenage girls and boys will thereby be able to visit our digital universe.

Teachers will get access to SRHR education and toolboxes to teach their pupils
As a part of our strategy to build capacity in Colombia and spread our efforts, methods, and knowledge, our digital universe is not only considered self-help tools for teenagers.
It shall also be a platform for teachers and health professionals to find an SRHR educational program with up-to-date learning materials, flyers, and other relevant tools. Our partnerships with public and private educational institutions and NGOs enable us to spread our learning materials across the country so that all girls have the opportunity to learn about their sexual and reproductive health and rights.