Grantee Profiles
Aglow Rescue Center, Kenya
Aglows vision is to enhance the capacity of youth to implement programs in health, agriculture, and the environment in order to improve their welfare, health status, and standard of living. Through these efforts, they are creating a sustainable system of community development. Aglows work empowers youth with skills which transform them from being dependent members of the community to active participants in the socio-economic development and welfare of their society.
The focus of the project is to improve the agricultural and business knowledge of the youth and the community. Aglow is bringing in experts to teach youth about agriculture technologies, crop rotation, and business practices such as marketing. The project will enable access to capital to start income generating activities through a microenterprise fund.
Grants
- February 2009 - $5,000 - GPA is supporting Aglows efforts to bring youth into the development process and providing business education and opportunities for them. Through agricultural and business education, Aglow is giving youth the opportunity to gain valuable skills and contribute to their community.
- October 2009 - $3,000 for Capacity Building. GPA is interested in helping our partners strengthen their organization and move toward sustainability. These funds will assist Aglow in gaining skills in effective program implementation, monitoring and evaluation, strategic planning, financial record keeping, risk management and proposal and report writing.
Center for Health, Environment and Safety Studies, Nigeria
CHESS is committed to the protection and promotion of health and environment for better living. CHESSs main goal is to create environment and health awareness through trainings, workshops, seminars, conferences liaising with other bodies or institutions, government and non-governmental organizations, to promote solution-oriented research and effective policy recommendations. CHESS focuses its efforts on services to humanity, community development projects, manpower development and skill acquisition for economic empowerment.
The project focuses on generating economic empowerment from solid waste by utilizing recycling for development in a waste to wealth program. The target groups are the young solid waste scavengers/vendors and solid waste managers. This waste to wealth for youth empowerment project also seeks to create a network of young solid waste scavengers/vendors and private solid waste managers in Ibadan; the largest city in Nigeria. The project will work to build more interest in the field of waste recycling and resource recovery as source of economic empowerment, networking to address common challenges faced by young scavengers/vendors and the private solid waste managers, and strategies and ways to develop and strengthen capacities of young scavengers/vendors and private solid waste managers.
Grants
- $5080 - GPA is excited about this project because of its potential as a social enterprise. Solid waste is a huge problem in many developing countries, and the GPA Advisory Board would like to support the testing of this model as a way to empower youth while promoting wealth creation from recycling.
Ekupholeni, South Africa
Ekupholeni is a non-profit organization in Katorus, South Africa that provides mental health services to their community. Their programs focus on psychosocial impact of violence, trauma, abuse and the HIV/ AIDS pandemic. Ekupholeni utilizes mental health development programs addressing youth at risk, gender violence and HIV/AIDS and bereavement to provide holistic mental health care to the community. A cross cutting income generation project supports sustainable livelihoods of clients in the various programs on a needs basis.
Recently, Ekupholeni launched a Kick-Start Program for the teenagers and young adults that have been emotionally and psychologically stabilized through the psychological intervention groups to move into a bridging program that affords them the opportunity for skills training, apprenticeship, further studies or micro-business depending on their abilities. Kick-Start is a "transitional" program that assists participants to become re-integrated into their communities with not only psychological but also material and economic resources. Such further intervention is necessary to break the long-term cycles of poverty and deprivation and the associated helplessness by empowering/transforming our youth to become as self-sufficient and productive as is possible.
Grants
- September, 2008 - $5,000 for establishment of the Kick-Start Program. GPA is very interested in the holistic approach to youth development Ekupholeni takes in the community where they are working. Few organizations use mental health and transition programs to serve youth and mentor them through a critical time in their lives.
Grassroot Soccer, South Africa
www.grassrootsoccer.org
Grassroot Soccer (GRS) is a South African based, not for profit organization. Its mission is to use the power of soccer in the fight against AIDS by providing African youth with the knowledge, skills, and support to remain HIV free. Founded by former professional soccer players in 2002, GRS trains African soccer stars, soccer coaches, teachers, and young peer educators in the worlds most HIV-affected countries to deliver an interactive HIV prevention curriculum to youth. GRS focus its efforts in delivering an innovative education program to and by youth. The curriculum focuses on building basic life skills that help young people, to adopt healthy behaviors and live risk-free. Through a series of interactive games, activities, and discussions students gain a tangible understanding of core messages related to HIV/AIDS and get a chance to practice the skills necessary for sustainable behavior change.
Key topics in the GRS curriculum include healthy decision-making, avoiding risks, building support networks, reducing stigma and discrimination, increasing knowledge about testing and treatment, addressing gender issues, and assessing values. After having completed the curriculum the students graduate with a ceremony. GRS graduates are also given tools such as Extra Time Magazine, which is a unique communications tool that includes messages and interviews with many of the Worlds top soccer stars. It also reviews the topics covered in the GRS curriculum and provides a tool for the graduates to serve as peer educators by sharing their knowledge with the community at large.
Grants
- July 2008 - $5,000 for Grassroot Soccer program in Port Elizabeth, South Africa. GPA was interested in becoming a funder of GRS so we might benefit from the excellent learning approach of this well-designed and evaluated program. Our African advisors also thought the program might be usefully extended to other countries where we make grants.
Hope Interactive, Nigeria
Hope Interactive works to promote a healthy, fair and sustainable future for all the people of Nigeria by eradicating poverty and improving the quality of life through capacity building in various spheres of human development. Hope interactive is committed to the promotion of innovative approach to positive human development, and behavior pattern through interaction and exchange of values and ideas.
The purpose of the project is to establish a community training center to empower youth through capacity building in agriculture (crop cultivation, fish farming, poultry and small animal/ruminant raising). Empowering the youth will give them a positive and sustainable means of livelihood, thereby alleviating poverty in the community.
Grants
- December 2009 - $4,940 to equip youth with agricultural skills and business loans to enable them to become self sufficient. GPA is excited about partnering with Hope Interactive to equip youth with valuable skills and the capital needed to start their own businesses.
Kenya Pastoralist Journalist Network, Kenya
Kenya Pastoralist Journalist Network (KPJN) works o demobilize and rehabilitate armed youths, to use ex-combatant (youths) as role model to society, to bring peace and harmony in North Eastern Kenya, to involve women and youths in various campaigns like peace buildings, climate change, human rights, women rights, indigenous rights, female genital mutilation and to empower rehabilitated ex-combatants through business incubation and empowerment programs.
So far, KPJN has rehabilitated 500 ex-combatants back into the society after many years of taking part in conflict. The program assists the rehabilitated ex-combatants to get business skills, opportunities and integrate themselves in various livestock markets, so that they can trade and make a living. After the training, the ex-combatants will apply for government managed youth fund, which will enable them to continue to grow their businesses. This program will act as a role model project for other active combatants in the field, and who are causing deaths, destructions, displacement and armed attacks.
Grants
- September 2009 - $4,652 for workshops that will introduce the rehabilitated ex-combatants to business skills, opportunities, tactics, and business plans. GPA is excited to fund this work because it is focused on youth and alternatives to violence and it has already helped for a partnership between KPJN and Uzima Foundation, another GPA partner in Kenya.
Kenya Tourism Concern, Kenya
Kenya Tourism Concern is a registered NGO in Kenya whose objective is to promote the positive aspects of tourism be they social, economic, cultural, political or environmental, and minimize negative impacts on the local people.
Kenya Tourism Concern engages in advocacy efforts on behalf of voiceless and highly exploited indigenous people located in high tourism areas of Kenya. Kenya Tourism Concerns activities focus primarily on youth who are affected by the tourism industry in a variety of ways including sex tourism. Kenya Tourism Concern assists homeless youth by offering them education and raising awareness about HIV/AIDS. Through their targeted intervention efforts, they sponsor our youth vocational training as an alternative to prostitution and other harmful employment. Kenya Tourism Concern also advocates for conservation efforts and protection of the environment and wildlife.
Grants
- July 2008 - $5,000 health education and vocational training for young women to give them alternatives to prostitution, increased self reliance, income generating activities. GPA funded Kenya Tourism Concern because of their innovative approach to addressing community issues associated with the tourism industry. Also a factor was their focus on providing education and training to young women who have few other alternatives. GPA hopes to learn more about the benefits and drawbacks of the tourism industry in Kenya and share innovative solutions with other grantees.
Remember Us Care Center/Navela, South Africa
Remember Us Care Center/Navela works to assist youth and community members affected by HIV/AIDS. They provide guidance, nutritional awareness education, training and home nursing skills, and job skills workshops. Remember Us Care Center/Navela advocates for victims of sexual violence through the use of support groups and counseling.Grants
- February 2009 - GPA is partnering with Navela to provide services to youth affected by HIV/AIDS. The youth will be growing vegetable gardens and learning to prepare healthy meals for themselves and their family.
UZIMA Foundation, Kenya
A Foundation is a catalytic youth-serving organization focused on youth 
empowerment that stimulates young men and women to define, plan for and act to experience improved quality of life. Their mission is to create social space and promote an enabling environment for Youth Empowerment that facilitates access to decision-making opportunities for young women and men, for holistic improvement of the quality of their lives and their communities. UZIMA operates over 100 UZIMA youth groups with 20,000 members. These groups are located in three of the eight provinces of Kenya, namely Nairobi, Nyanza and Western Provinces. The work of UZIMA is supported locally by members of their Board, Trustees and Friends of UZIMA; they have also received funds from the Ford Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, UNFPA, USAID, World Bank, IFC through their Grassroots Business Initiative, and GPA.
Uzima is the Kiswahili word for wholeness of Life, life in its fullness, the abundant life. This is the life that UZIMA wants to see among the youths of Africa. This explains UZIMA's holistic approach to youth development. Programs include but not limited to Reproductive Health, Economic Empowerment, Peace, Justice and Leadership as well as Environmental Care
Grants
- July 2007 - $5,880 for preparing land for youth agriculture project.
- January/February 2008 - $10,000 for non-violent conflict resolution work with UZIMA youth and assisting UZIMA Youth to volunteer in internally displaced persons camps.
- Report from the Malesi Kinaro, Executive Director of UZIMA: Jared is an AVP facilitator in Kisii and coordinator of the Uzima Foundation: "Jared is walking in the air. He just finished chairing a meeting that brought together District Commissioners, Members of Parliament, and elders from Kispsigis and Kisii. He says it went so well he doesn't think fighting will continue. We have been working to see this day when we make the first step. AGLI, through FPCD (Friends for Peace and Community Development), AGLI's partner in western Kenyan, gave 108,000/- ($1550) for this and Uzima gave 40,000/- ($575). The journey is still long and much money needed."
- Report from Miriam Were, Co-Founder of UZIMA and GPA Advisory Council Member: It brought tears to my eyes when on rertun Malesi and Fred shared some of the brave acts our UZIMA Youth carried out. In one case, they were threatened of being hurt themselves because they were talking to both sides. But they managed to get the two fighting sides together to "talk together" and so for people to know that when they move from one group to the other, it is not passing gossip but finding bridges. AND IT WORKED!
- View highlights from UZIMA's report on their response to the crisis in Kenya on their website or click here to view the report in pdf.