“We named the organization VOW for Girls both because of its connotations around a promise,” Clay Dunn told Ms. “We’re making a promise to girls that the situation will change.”
Oct. 11 is International Day of the Girl, an annual celebration that promotes advocacy for the rights, education and empowerment of girls across the globe. This year’s theme is “Girls’ Vision for the Future.” Child marriage, a practice that robs millions of girls of their childhoods, opportunities and dreams, prevents girls from realizing their own vision for the future. Each year, an estimated 12 million girls are married before the age of 18, perpetuating cycles of poverty and inequality.
We got the chance to speak with Clay Dunn, CEO of VOW for Girls, an organization that partners with brands, individuals, and the wedding industry to raise money for local partners working to end child marriage in their community.
The interview below has been edited for length and clarity.
Ashley Steimer-King: How did VOW for Girls begin?
Clay Dunn: Mabel van Oranje and Darren Walker have been partners in building the movement to end child marriage over the last 14 years. Darren is the president of the Ford Foundation, and Mabel is a global human rights activist. They had previously come together around the formation of Girls, Not Brides, which is an international advocacy organization comprised of more than 1400 member organizations. Advocacy to eliminate child marriage was increasing, countries were making commitments around it, and the issue was included in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
However, Mabel and Darren were discussing progress on ending child marriage and came to believe that real change wouldn’t happen unless more money went into the hands of local leaders supporting girls in their day-to-day lives and changing local social norms that say girls don’t deserve to make their own choices.
Around that time, Mabel went to the wedding of some friends who had asked their family for donations to Girls, Not Brides as a wedding gift. Mabel, sitting at that wedding and thinking about their generosity, had an ‘aha’ moment. Weddings and celebrations are really big moments that bring people together. These weddings of love and choice can help improve the chances that girls around the world can make their own choices.
Darren loved the idea, and together, they launched VOW for Girls about five years ago. We’re raising money in creative ways to bring new funding and new resources to the movement to end child marriage. We believe the people closest to problems are in the best position to identify how those problems can be righted, which is why we direct funding to local leaders.
Steimer-King: How do you connect with couples interested in directing gifts from their wedding to VOW for Girls?
Dunn: We are finding couples in any way possible as a scrappy young organization.
We’ve also had a chance to work with more than 30 brands over the last five years. For example, we work with a bridal designer right now, and every sale of their entire accessories line benefits our work. We also have a global network of around 1000 event professionals who have adopted us as their cause.
We have couples now who are discovering us via Pinterest and Instagram as they’re doing their wedding planning and looking for inspiration, especially couples who are looking for more unusual ideas about how to personalize their wedding, how to have a more feminist wedding, how to create a sustainable wedding, how to have a wedding that gives back. We recently had a bride who didn’t want a bridal shower, but her parents pushed for it. She said well, instead of a bridal shower, let’s turn it into a fundraiser. Couples who are making their wedding their own.
Steimer-King: I love the idea of having a more feminist wedding! Can you tell me about the scale of child marriage today? What impact does it have on girls and their communities?
Dunn: This year, more than 12 million girls are at risk of child marriage. It’s truly a global problem happening in the greatest concentrations across Sub-Saharan Africa, parts of Asia and parts of Latin America. It also happens here in the U.S., though at a much lower rate. The problem looks different from community to community, but there are common themes around the globe. Poverty leaves families unsure about how they can feed and take care of everyone. Anytime that lives are being disrupted, either because of climate change or because of conflict, we see a rise in child marriage.
Interestingly, we’re funding work in 15 countries this year, and the practice is illegal in all of those places. By making the practice illegal, the countries have clearly stated, we know that child marriage is not right for the future of our girls, the future or our communities and our economies. Unfortunately, it’s still happening at a high rate.
This one moment, right where a decision has been made for a girl, impacts many other moments that follow because becoming a child bride typically means you’re pulled out of school. She, therefore, won’t have a career where she can make her own money. It means she will have less control over when she has a child. This one moment sort of alters the trajectory of a girl’s entire life.
Girls who marry early are more likely to have a pregnancy before their bodies are ready. That not only causes complications for the pregnancy and endangers her life, but it also creates health complications that will follow her for the rest of her life. We believe in ensuring girls make their own determinations about the right time to have a child.
Steimer-King: Are there any misconceptions about child marriage that you want to clear up?
Dunn: I think the misconception is that it’s happening far away from me and not happening that much. The reality is that 12 million girls a year is an enormous number. It’s a girl every three seconds. And as we remind people, it’s happening here in our backyard. It’s happening at a high rate; a third of girls in the Dominican Republic are married before the age of 18. That is a very short flight from where I live in New York City. I think the biggest thing about it is that it’s under the radar for most people, especially for something impacting so many girls.
Something that has been both surprising and not surprising to me is how many people come up to me at events, sharing things like, “My mother was a child bride, my grandmother was a child bride.” Two of our biggest corporate partnerships happened because the women who were in leadership with those organizations saw this in their own families. People are constantly sharing their own experiences, either what’s happened to them or to people they know and love. Given that the numbers are so high, it shouldn’t be surprising.
[Child marriage is] happening here in our backyard. It’s happening at a high rate; a third of girls in the Dominican Republic are married before the age of 18. That is a very short flight from where I live in New York City.
Clay Dunn, CEO of VOW for Girls
Steimer-King: I know we have seen some increased efforts to raise the age of child marriage of marriage in the U.S. to 18. There are only 13 states in the U.S. that currently set the minimum age for marriage to 18.
Dunn: Yeah, there’s a great coalition going state by state to push for change in the laws. That coalition has had great success, and we are supportive partners of theirs. A federal law would change that in the U.S. Absent that, it is a state-by-state game.
Steimer-King: How does child marriage impact girls in particular?
Dunn: I mean, 12 million girls a year are impacted by child marriage. Some boys are also affected by child marriage, though it is a fraction of the number of girls. Usually, when there is one of these early unions, there is an age differential, sometimes a large one, sometimes a smaller one, but still, the difference between a 14-year-old and a 20-year-old is a really big power dynamic change.
We named the organization VOW for Girls both because of its connotations around a promise: We’re making a promise to girls that the situation will change. It’s also to tie into our donors’ celebrations and that they are making their own vows for the future, making us a part of that.
Steimer-King: You started VOW right before the pandemic. How did that impact the work?
Dunn: One, there’s the issue of child marriage itself. Anytime girls are out of school, it means that they’re at a higher risk of child marriage. We fund work in Uganda, which had one of the most prolonged school closures worldwide; I think it was over 18 months. Unfortunately, in so many places, we saw the rates of child marriage rising during the pandemic, even in areas where they had been on the decline.
There are forecasts from the U.N. about the estimated number of increased child brides due to the pandemic. It brought into focus our need for urgency around meeting the moment meeting girls’ needs and mobilizing more money for community partners.
The way it impacted VOW, in particular, was that our entire model is built around turning moments of celebration into support for girls, and suddenly, all of those celebrations were on hold. The pandemic, no doubt, slowed our progress.
Steimer-King: You’ve mentioned that directing funding toward local partners is important to VOW; why is that, and how do you find those partners?
Dunn: When VOW started as a fundraising and awareness-raising engine, we were launched with a sister organization called Girls First Fund, which specializes in finding incredible local leaders who are underfunded, resourcing them, learning alongside them, handling reporting and more.
Our portfolio of partners is diverse. There is a lot of programming that you might expect: helping to keep girls in school, paying for their school fees, and creating safe spaces so girls can learn and support one another. But there are more unusual efforts as well, like vocational training, sports and drama programs that teach girls about their rights and build their agency.
Five years ago, I couldn’t get these girls to say a word. They were so quiet. Today, they won’t stop talking.
A local leader in the Dominican Republic being funded by VOW for Girls
In our first few years, we supported around 175 local organizations in six countries. This year, we’re funding more than 200 organizations in 15 countries, and so I’m happy to see the expansion of open geographies and local partners were able to support.
Steimer-King: Do you have a favorite example of someone impacted by your work?
Dunn: I’ll share a few with you. I recently visited the Dominican Republic because we’ve been funding work there for five years. We asked a local leader whose work we are funding what had changed in the last five years.
She said, ‘Five years ago, attracting girls to this program was hard. They and their parents were uncertain. But today, we have overwhelming demand because we have built a lot of trust in the community. The other thing that has changed is that five years ago, I couldn’t get these girls to say a word. They were so quiet. Today, they won’t stop talking.‘ I love hearing the girls are feeling more confident. They’re expressing what they want for their futures.
When I started in this role about five years ago, I had an opportunity to travel to see the work we were funding in Uganda. On the first day of that trip, we went to a site and met a woman working with the organization we were funding. She shared that when she was 15 years old, she came home from school one day, and there was a strange man in her house. Her brother said, “You’re going with him.” She said, “Nobody asked me what I thought or what I wanted. And I thought it was like the end of my life.” She had to leave town with the man, and he was pulled out of school.
Later, she had an aunt who helped her escape that situation. Today, she’s running one of the programs that are funding, and is helping girls in her community avoid the same fate that she had.
I think about that conversation every day because I think the situation that she was in is so similar to what other girls are facing around the world. Her resolve to improve the situation for the girls who come after her is powerful. I thank her for sharing that story and the impact that it’s had.
There was a girl in my village who got to finish school, and she went to college. And she came back, and she had a real wedding. She wore the dress, and we danced. And I was there. That’s what I want. I want the party.
A girl in rural Uganda at a VOW for Girls program site
On the same trip, we visited a program site and sat in a little semicircle with a group of girls from this community in rural Uganda. We talked to them about everything, like what’s happening in school, what they think is happening in their community and what they want to be when they grow up. We also asked them what they knew about child marriage. One told us that there was a girl in her class last year, and she’s not here anymore because her parents decided it was time for her to marry.
Then, a girl sitting on the edge of the circle said, ‘There was a girl in my village who got to finish school, and she went to college. And she came back, and she had a real wedding. She wore the dress, and we danced. And I was there. That’s what I want. I want the party.‘
That moment lit me up because I thought about my nieces in Nashville, Tennessee, who dream about dresses and dancing. I thought about myself growing up in rural Kentucky, dreaming about a life that I couldn’t see. It gave me a lot of certainty at that moment because I knew that the shared desire to make our own choices would help us rally people to the cause and build a real movement around this work.
Steimer-King: Beautiful. That’s what we want for ourselves, for our friends, for everyone—to choose our own partner, to choose if, when and how we marry.
Dunn: These problems might feel far away, but the themes are the same, right? That we all want to be able to make these really basic choices for our lives.
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