youth

While university scholarships provided to Kazakhstan’s disadvantaged youth will certainly help them towards brighter futures, there is still an important component necessary for becoming empowered and successful individuals.

As aid budgets shrink, donors want to see more than just the immediate impact of their dollars – they want to know an investment will be sustainable, continuing to affect people’s lives for years to come.

 The longer I live in Russia, the more I see similarities with the United States. Then there are moments where I am reminded of the tremendous differences. One of these moments happened last week while I was attending a youth government training in Kotovsk, a town of about 27,000 people in Tambov, one of the more conservative regions of Russia.

I’ve been back in the US for almost four years now, but the lessons and memories from 27 months in Ukraine continue to influence my perspective on life and my approach to development work. I had traveled prior to becoming a Peace Corps Volunteer, but had never really lived in another culture. I lived in Antratsyt, a coal-mining town in eastern Ukraine, characterized by a difficult economic environment and declining infrastructure.

While recently visiting sub-grantees of the BOTA Foundation in Almaty, Kazakhstan, I met a group of young adults who are developing their professional talents, despite never having had attended school and rarely having had the opportunities to leave their homes.  It is not that Almaty lacks schools; there are many schools of high quality that are developing a skilled workforce that is supporting their country’s economic growth.  Nor are they excluded from the education system based on their ethnic or linguistic aff

In a world where —according to tech-guru Richard Graves— “mobile phones are king,” how do practitioners engage youth in the social, economic, and political development necessary for lasting reform? Last week at the “Youth and Media: Capturing Youth Perspectives” panel, four journalists challenged the international development community to find their answer in media.

Firdavs thinks I can’t see his mouth moving. I’ve asked him and the other teachers not to tell the youth at our theater camp in Tajikistan what to say, and to let the campers create scenes and dialogue on their own. The group is having fun, rehearsing their skit to make the characters’ movements as big as possible. But Firdavs keeps whispering under his hand, feeding them lines. What would these young people be saying if he wasn’t there putting words in their mouths?