Supporting Youth on their Changemaking journey to become ethical Leaders
We engage, train and support organizations working with young people on their journeys to become changemakers and grow in their roles as ethical leaders. And as true change is a change of mind, we help young people lay a strong foundation and share tools for inner clarity, peace and joy out of which sustainable and compassionate action are born.
The Challenge
Most education systems are outdated and not preparing young people for the challenges they are facing in real life. Everyone demands more. More education, more rigorous curriculum, more reading, more memorisation, more testing, more training, more monitoring, more accountability and more investment in schools. But little of the discussion, criticism and feedback on education has explored what is the real more required in
education in the light of massive evidence (what is happening with the graduates) and context (growing social, economical and environmental changes and challenges). It is quite clear that we must stop defining success for children and youth in terms of high scores or grades. A new vision is required which focuses on unlocking the inherent changemaking potential in every person.
The Solution
The difference between what students are doing in classrooms and what they are capable of doing outside the classrooms would solve many of the worlds pressing problems. We must realise that the quality of contributions, not the
memorisation of correct answers would be the best measure of the educative growth of children and youth. This requires a new approach to education, rooted in more useful paradigms about young people. Our aim is to promote those paradigms.
It can be as cheap as 10 USD to transform a young persons belief system, provide them with an opportunity to experience Changemaking in their Life and to start adding real value in their community...
10$ is sometimes all it takes to change a Life...
One of the biggest leaps in personal development can be experienced when a young person gets to experience themselves as being capable of changemaking and adding social and economic value in the lives of others and their own. The other big leap is the realization that Life and perception works from the inside out. We help young people as well as organizations working with youth, with these two insights. And so a contribution as small as 10$ can bring immeasurable social dividends, as the young people impacted continue their changemaking journeys because, as the saying goes, Once a Changemaker, Always a Changemaker.
What We Do
We are working with young people and organizations addressing them, to help engage youth in a way, that they can discover themselves as Changemakers and ethical leaders.
At the same time, we share cutting edge psychological tools, that can help young people in developing deeper self-awareness, confidence, resilience and find their clarity and purpose as ethical leaders.
Documentation
We support organisations working on youth-led changemaking, social entrepreneurship and tools for ethical leadership, to document and disseminate their approaches, share their successes and spread the word, about what is possible, if we trust ourselves and young people and understand the massive untapped changemaking potential. Recent collaborations have been with for example YES Network Pakistan and The Work Under The Tree Trust in Zimbabwe.
Changemakers Mindset and Tools
What does it take for a young person to develop resilience? What does it take to let go of limiting belief systems? What tools are needed in order for young people to deal with conflict in a clear and effective manner? We gather and share leadership and mindset tools, such as self-inquiry, with young changemakers, to help them be more effective in delivering their solutions.
Engaging Youth as Leaders
Engaging young people as Leaders and Changemakers is at the heart of our mission. We share and use an approach developed by Ali Raza Khan, to give young people the opportunity to practice and develop their changemaking skills. We also help in developing and expanding the approaches adaptability to different educational systems and regulations. Our first collaboration started with The Work Under The Tree Trust in Zimbabwe in 2018.
Inspiration
Our inspiration activities are in networking, disseminating information and gathering further evidence, useful in promoting changes in educational systems. We are also collecting and sharing stories of young changemakers. In a recent and ongoing project, we spoke in person with over 100 changemakers in 20 African countries, to hear their stories and share them in audio and video formats.
TOOLS AND RESOURCES FOR
YOUR CHANGEMAKER JOURNEY
Having access to the right tools both for mindset as well as for implementation of changemaking projects makes all the difference. In this section you find a host of tools and resources, to build your changemaking venture from scratch, as well as examples for how others have started changemaking projects with similar tools and how you can do it too.
TOOLS AND RESOURCES FOR
EDUCATORS AND INSTITUTIONS
With the innovative, proven tools and resources developed by Ali Raza Khan from YES Network Pakistan and other innovators, you can easily make your institution, school or foundation an early mover in implementing a succesful and scalable Youth-led Changemaking program. You can also contact us for support in setup and implementation.
Our Services For Organizations and Institutions in the field of Youth Development
We don't believe in working in silo. This is why we offer our services and know-how to organizations and institutions addressing youth to make a positive impact together. Our expertise is in creating and sharing inspiring content (for example AfricaX - 100 interviews with Changemakers on the African continent), setting up and managing digital platforms (for example online summits on youth-led changemaking) and helping you design and implement effective programs that can bring out the changemaker in young people.
Competitions, Challenges, Prizes
We help in
- organising youth-led changemaking competitions,
- the development of competitions addressing specific topics i.e. a specific SDG and
- the organization of prizes and awards,
all to engage, connect and inspire young changemakers.
Inspiration, Reach, Awareness Creation
We help you to reach a wider youth audience with moving and inspiring stories. Many young people have not even heard, that there is such a thing as changemaking. We want to help you change that.
- A feasible project could be the setup, creation and promotion of an inspirational podcast OR
- an Online Summit & Mentoring Program OR
- Vlog and other social channels to reach youth effectively.
Publications & Documentation
We support organizations in the
documentation of knowledge in the field of youth-led changemaking and sharing the insights with the world on and through various platforms and channels to help further the spread of youth-led changemaking.
Selected Projects
YES! YOUTH-LED CHANGEMAKING BOOK PROJECT
An evidence based book on youth-led changemaking, detailing, how the lead author, Ali Raza Khan, successfully engaged over 16.000 young people in changemaking activities with over 80% of the participants, succeeding in creating social and economic value. MUST READ book for anyone interested in youth-led changemaking.
YOUTH-LED CHANGEMAKING COMPETITIONS ZIMBABWE
The co-founder of The Work Under The Tree Trust in Zimbabwe reached out to YES Founders Foundation after having read the YES! Youth-led Changemaking book, and requested for guidance, to conduct youth-led changemaking competitions in Zimbabwe. So far, two successful competitions were conducted in Zimbabwe with more planned...
AFRICAX PROJECT
Narrative is key. And in order to reach young people on the African Continent with a different narrative about what is possible for them on the continent, we conducted the AfricaX project, interviewing over 100 inspiring African changemakers in 20 African countries, during a 6 month expedition on the land route . The interviews are to be found here.
STARTUP MENTORING
Since 2017, through one of our founding members, startup mentoring for youth enterprises has become an ongoing activity we take part in. It allows us to connect, share and learn with and from the organisations that organise the startup mentoring programs. Mentoring since 2017 was conducted in Germany, Ghana and Nigeria.
IDEA SEED AFRICA
The Idea Seed Africa Project was launched by StartUp Mentor Markus Becker, under the YES Founders Foundation umbrella, after he was involved in mentoring African startups. With the project, he shares information about the StartUp Ecosystems, primarily in West Africa and wants to inspire and connect more young entrepreneurs on the continent.
SELF-ASSESSMENT FRAMEWORK PUBLICATION
This self-assessment framework for young changemakers and institutions running youth-led changemaking competitions was developed by Ali Raza Khan as a roadmap for young people on their changemaking journeys and for educators as a guide for how to assess changemaking behavior. The publication is a booklet documenting the framework.
THE YOUNG CHANGEMAKER TOOLBOX
Having access to the right tools both for mindset as well as for implementation of changemaking projects makes all the difference. In this section you find a host of tools and resources, to build your changemaking venture from scratch, as well as examples for how others have started changemaking projects with similar tools and how you can do it too.
CHANGEMAKER SUMMIT
(COMING SOON)
We hope to be able to soon launch our first online changemaker conference, connecting changemakers from all across the world in a digital space, to learn, connect, collaborate and inspire each other. There are also ideas for online co-found events and other formats in the pipeline. Stay tuned and bear with us....
„The most exciting breakthroughs of the twenty first century will not occur because of technology but because of an expanding concept of what it means to be human.“
- John Naisbitt
About Us
YES Network Pakistan's founder Ali Raza Khan has innovated a unique trust-based model to turn young people into changemakers. He has tested this model with far over 20.000 young people from almost every walk of life. Thomas Jakel was inspired by the work of Ali Raza Khan and decided to visit Pakistan to see his Youth-led Changemaking model himself in action. After spending two weeks in the field with Ali and interacting with several hundred young people and faculty members of vocational and educational institutions, he ended-up firmly dedicating himself to help Ali take his model to communities and countries worldwide.
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CONTACT US
YOU ARE INTERESTED IN WHAT WE ARE DOING AND HAVE QUESTIONS OR IDEAS YOU WANT TO SHARE?
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