Quality Education Saves a Nation

Vandalark R. Patricks — Fri, 06 Jun 2014 13:13:14 +0000

Has your project been replicated/adapted elsewhere?:

Sì

Where? By whom?:

This project has been adapted by the Government of Liberia, Firestone-Liberia (world largest rubber plantation), Chevron Liberia (one of the biggest oil companies in the world and BHP Billiton (one of the biggest iron ore mining companies in the world)

What lessons can others learn from your project? (max. 1500 characters):

A lot of lessons can be learned from this project. Some of those lessons include: trust and accountability, persuasiveness, sincerity in the pursuit of education, motivating oneself to undertake meaningful initiatives in the absence of support, the skills to attract funding to implement a project in order to benefit the community, networking skills, ideas in fund raising and skills in engaging young people to yield good results.

Are you available to help others to start or work on similar projects?:

Sì

Nome dell'ente o associazione:

SURE-Liberia (Campaigners for Change

Contesto dell'ente o dell'associazione che presenta il progetto:

Other

What is the full duration of your project (from beginning to end)?:

Più di 6 anni

What is the approximate total budget for your project (in Euro)?:

Da 30.001 a 75.000 Euro

What is the source of funding for your project?:

Finanziamenti pubblici o privati

Il progetto è economicamente autosufficiente?:

Since when?:

2014-05-30 22:00:00

When is it expected to become self-sufficient?:

2016-12-30 23:00:00

Educazione fino a 10 anni

http://facebook.com/SURE-Liberia

Acconsenti al trattamento dei dati personali?:

Autorizzo la FMD al trattamento dei miei dati personali.

The project seeks to address the problems of violence, unemployment and illiteracy which have grown up to 80%. These were some of the contributing factors that led to the destruction of Liberia during the civil crisis. The President of Liberia, H.E. Madam Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, in 2012 described the educational sector of Liberia as a complete mess which validates the increment of illiteracy in Liberia and the weakness of the educational sector. Since our involvement and the involvement of other organizations in a robust form, there have been some changes in the educational sectors as government is now being compelled to provide more funding to support the educational sectors while other organizations are also making their contributions to solve some of the problems as well. The specific objectives of the project is to reconstruct the minds of young people through education so as to make them productive citizens of Liberia; prevail on national government to provide significant funding to address the issue of illiteracy in Liberian schools and to encourage Liberian youths to engage themselves in meaningful activities so as to become productive citizens of Liberia and the global community. We use our networking and human relations approaches, instruments or skills to achieve our goal and this has been working significantly.

2004-05-30 22:00:00

Barriers and Solutions (max. 1000 characters):

One of the major barriers or challenges in the implementation of this project or acceptance of our service is the lack of additional support from outside to buttress our efforts so as to deliver a positive result on time. To address this situation, we are now networking with international friends and organizations to support our programs in order to deliver an effective and efficient result.

Paese:

Liberia

Città:

Monrovia

Future plans and wish list (max. 750 characters):

It is our hope that in the next three years, this project would have grown to cover at least 5 counties so as to touch the lives of young people and motivate them to go back to school or stimulate them to get involved in volunteer activities in order to help transform their society and community as well. Currently, we are working in 3 counties in Liberia. Additionally, we intend to solicit the assistance of some international organizations and individuals in Liberia and abroad to be our permanent partners. We believe that it will greatly help us in achieving our dreams and deliver effectively. To make these pals true, we intend to network and make significant contacts with individuals, institutions, organizations, etc to make our dreams become a reality.

Describe the results achieved by your project How do you measure (parameters) these. (max. 2000 characters):

Since the initiation of this project, over 300,000 youths have benefited from our scholarship and financial aid programs, over 200 girls have been trained in basic skills work and empowered thrown micro-loans businesses. Several community youths, too, have been motivated to take up meaningful activities which have now shaped their sense of direction to be positive agents of change in Liberia. Honestly speaking, I must state here that since the project came into existence, we have been able to achieve most of our goals through difficult circumstance due to lack of adequate support.

How many users interact with your project monthly and what are the preferred forms of interaction? (max. 500 characters):

We have significant number of users interacting with us on a monthly basis which have really motivated us to make significant impact in the lives of our generation. Most of their interaction is through voluntarism and direct interaction. Through voluntarism with some of these users, we strive to reach, work on our programs and concept and make sure that we set a clear agenda for outreach programs to attract more volunteers to the organization. This has been working very well. With the direct interaction aspect, most of our users interact directly with our beneficiaries, office staff and our partners as well. This gives them a form of motivation and assurance to keep us connected with institutions and individuals that we intend to solicit support from. Through direct interaction also, we provide significant responses to some of the doubts that our users/partners normally have about the project and encourage them to be a part of the team to transform Liberia’s generation positively.

Description Frase (max. 500 characters):

The project is educative, informative and has the ability to address the issues of illiteracy and sensitize young people to understand their rights as Liberian citizens which could help them in holding their leaders accountable for the wrong that they do.

Project Summary (max. 2000 characters):

The key aspects of this project are sensitizing young people through civic education to know their rights as Liberian citizens so as to be able to contribute meaningfully to the development of Liberia and to also hold their leaders accountable for the wrong they do. Another aspect of the project is reconstructing the minds of young people by financing their education through scholarship and financial aids programs and motivating them through scholastic awards programs where brilliant students are certificated and encouraged to be studious in schools.

This idea was born in 2004 while at the University. It was observed that the community where the University that I was attending was situated, most of the young people in that environment never had the means of going to school to acquire quality education. Most of the youths became workers at the university where they used to wash clothes for students in order to earn something to feed their families. I decided to lobby with my friends at the university to educate many of them instead of hiring them as workers to clean their clothes. The process worked very well and today am proud to say that my dream has come to reality as most young people are now been educated through our advocacy and hard work.

Global Junior Challenge - Networking

Quality Education Saves a Nation