Give Young People a #ChanceToThrive

Dream a Dream is a registered, charitable trust empowering children and young people from vulnerable backgrounds to overcome adversity and flourish in the 21^st century using a creative life skills approach. Currently, we work with 10,000 young people a year through our two innovation labs – After School Life Skills Programme and Career Connect Programme, have trained over 7,700 teachers/educators from 206 partners impacting over 192,500 children and have impacted over 1 Million children through strategic partnerships with state governments in Delhi and Jharkhand. We work on a strong collaborative approach with local charities, corporates, volunteers, governments, expert consultants and a host of national and international strategic partners.

In our After School Life Skills Programme, we use creative arts and football as medium to engage and develop critical life skills among young people between the age of 8 to 15 years. This programme is an innovation lab where new approaches to life skills development are introduced, demonstrated, documented, evaluated and fed back into a larger framework for re-imaginig learning for young people in the country. To measure the improvements in life skills amongst the young people, we use the Life Skills Assestment Scale (LSAS*)

*Dream a Dream’s Life Skills Assessment Scale was selected as one among hundred inspiring innovations that are changing the face of education across the world at the HundrED Education Summit in Finland. This is a recognition of over 8 years of research that we put into establishing a first of its kind, standardised, validated and published scale to measure the impact of Life Skills on young people from disadvantaged backgrounds. The published paper has been downloaded over 4500 times and is being used across the world. For moreinformation visit https://hundred. org/en/innovations/dream-life-skills-assessment-scale-dream-a-dream

You can read about the scale here - http://dreamadream.org/the-urgency/item/362-dlsas

 (Please copy and paste the link on to your browser to access the same)

 As always “Thank you for giving our young people #aChanceToThrive!”

Thank you so much for your contribution to Dream a Dream’s #aChanceToThrive campaign. This year, in honour of India's Joy of Giving Week, Dream a Dream launched a fundraising campaign called #aChanceToThrive. Through this campaign we hoped to raise $ 25,000 to support 600 young people in our programmes for the next year.

  Since the campaign began we have till date raised $6,103 and still want to continue celebrating giving!

 The campaign has seen people from all walks of life and economic backgrounds join hands to donate. Some of the highlights of the campaign have been:

1. At the time of reporting this last time the young people at the Dream a Dream’s Career Connect Centre came up with their own fundraisers such as ’Chaat’ (spicy & tangy Indian snacks) stalls, art sales, etc. to raise funds. They have also kept a piggy bank at our youth centre and are putting in small change to raise funds. Collectively, they have raised and donated over Rs. 10,000 ($154)
2. Redamma, who has been working as the domestic help at our centre for the past 2 years, donated Rs. 500 ($7.69) from her meagre earnings
3. Twelve-year old Vaibhavi, daughter of one of our staff members, made earrings and sold them at an artisan market and donated Rs. 500 ($7.69) of her profits
4. Our office landlord donated Rs. 25,000 ($350)
5. Many of our staff reached out to their family and friends to raise funds for this campaign. 

More than the amount raised, it is the idea that anyone, irrespective of their background, can donate or raise funds for a cause. This has most inspired us and we want to honour these efforts by making a sincere effort to raise as much as we can.

 Your generous donation can help us reach our goal; we need your help to keep the momentum going! My sincere request to you is that you continue to donate to Dream a Dream as we know we can count on you. No donation is too small.

 Our young people need your support now more than ever. We urge you and your network to join in the spirit of giving this holiday season. Become a Changemaker and give our young people #aChanceToThrive!

Please read the stories of transformation we have brought about in the young people’s life and this could not have been possible without your generous donations. 

Noor just needed to believe skills and talents in her… 

Noor Fathima is a seventh-grade student of Global Public School. Her family comprises of her father, an auto mechanic; mother, a home-maker and a younger brother who is currently in the fourth-grade. Noor is a highly confident child but was always excluded from class activities, which disheartened her, making her feel like she wasn’t accepted.

Noor was part of the After School Life Skills Programme, through the medium of creative arts. During one of the sessions, when there was an activity where everyone had to work in groups for a cultural performance, the other students refused to take Noor in their group. The facilitator was observing the interactions between the students and decided to give Noor the role of an anchor, providing the perfect platform to showcase her own talent by hosting the show. This was her holding space for Noor to prove to herself and to the other students that she was good enough. The anchoring did exactly that. She was bold and did a great job, without taking help from anyone else. All of her classmates saw how confidently Noor hosted the show, and it enabled them to change their own opinion about her.

Post this performance, Noor was welcomed into groups and she began making new friends and mingling with the others in class, sharing chocolates and snacks with them. When the facilitator gave her that opportunity to be an anchor, Noor was able to bring the confidence and talents she had to the surface and display it to the world. It gave her the courage to be herself, in front of the other students. Armoured with confidence and belief in her own skills, Noor is working towards her dream of joining the Indian Army to serve the nation and is developing her leadership skills, to get there.

Quote from the Teacher:

“Noor has now begun to improve a lot in class and opens up and asks questions to get her doubts cleared in class. She speaks up and has gained a lot of confidence.”

Quote from the Facilitator:

“Noor just needed to believe in her skills and talents a bit more. When she began to truly believe in herself, it became evident to the other students as well, making it easy for them to accept her.”

“I have learnt how to address the challenge of strategizing as a team”…says Yuvraj

Yuvaraj, a 12-year-old student of Annaswamy School joined the After School Life Skills Programme, through the medium of football. He was quiet and when he spoke during the reflection circle, got teased and laughed at by the other children who had enrolled themselves for the session.

The facilitator observed that Yuvaraj is extremely active in sports and highly spontaneous while playing. He showed great talent while playing football and spent his free time during his class breaks to play football. The only problem was Yuvaraj didn’t interact much with other students and take initiative in group activities. Even when given opportunities to lead by the facilitator, he refused to lead. When talking to his teachers, the facilitator heard complaints that he wasn’t concentrating on academics and instead was always playing with his friends and disrupting the class activities with their mischief. The teacher even requested the facilitator not to include him in the football session, fearing that Yuvaraj would never focus on his studies.

Taking Yuvaraj’s behavior as a challenge, the facilitator promised the teacher that he would enable him to become more focused on school work and in the football sessions. He slowly began giving Yuvaraj more opportunities during the sessions to explore his talents and kept encouraging him to interact with others and express his feelings. During one such activity, which was a role play to solve a community issue, Yuvaraj took an initiative to form his own team and chose ‘playground’ as the topic. The drama revolved around searching for a football ground and the challenges involving that.

During this activity, the facilitator identified Yuvaraj’s talent, skills and the passion for which he fought for the right to play football. Yuvaraj was selected to participate in the BFC Football Under 13 - Tournament in Karnataka. He was awarded a medal and a certificate. He displayed great confidence when he spoke up in front of all the other students and clarified their doubts about the game.

Over the following sessions with the facilitator holding space for him, giving him attention, encouraging him to explore his skills, Yuvaraj began to show signs of transformation. He began to take initiatives in leading reflection circles at the end of the session and that he was slowly interacting with other students about the game. He even began asking them questions like, “What did you find challenging during the game?” and “What have you learnt during the session?”. Yuvaraj slowly began to come out of his shell and express his thoughts and emotions freely.

His performance in class has also improved considerably, making the teachers less apprehensive about him playing football.

Yuvaraj’s Feedback:

What I have learnt from the facilitator is how to address the challenge of strategizing as a team, decision-making skills and strong leadership qualities. I want to work at Dream a Dream as a facilitator.  

Facilitators Feedback:

Observing Yuvaraj before and after the BFC Football Tournament has been incredible. He has changed a lot, taking initiatives in sessions and leading football drills for the other students and helping them by advising them on how to improve in academics and in the football sessions.

Impact in our After-School Programme:

• 96.8% of the tracked participants were more focused and willing to complete studies and achieve their Dream goals 
• 96.9 % of the participants had an end line score above norms and thus improved their skills to deal with challenges
• 96% of the participants have seen a positive change after 2 years of reengagement.