Empowering Teenage Parents through Coordinated Social Support
The City of Ghent, in collaboration with civil society partners, is implementing a project focused on supporting teenage parents through tailored guidance and empowerment strategies. The initiative provides continuous support across multiple life domains, including education, employment, childcare, and social integration, with the aim of reducing poverty and improving opportunities for both parents and their children.
The project contributes to equal opportunities and social inclusion, particularly for young parents in vulnerable situations. By combining individual support, network-building, and systemic advocacy, the initiative seeks to address both immediate needs and broader structural barriers affecting this target group.
Through the SMS, Ghent is working to strengthen the link between project-level activities and broader policy goals. The system supports reflection on desired outcomes and helps translate them into measurable indicators, improving clarity across partners and enabling more structured evaluation of results.
While data collection is still ongoing, the process has already highlighted the importance of collaboration between the city and civil society organizations, particularly in gathering qualitative data. It has also revealed challenges related to coordination, data quality, and aligning different stakeholders around shared indicators.
Ghent’s experience shows that building a city-wide monitoring system for human rights requires time, coordination, and shared understanding. However, it also demonstrates the potential of such systems to improve both policy coherence and long-term impact in complex social interventions.
