Support Young People to Lead Social Change

Shahid, 17 is a 10^th standard student in New Delhi’s Kamla Nehru Public Higher Secondary School. He lives with his parents and a younger sister in Sunder Nagar Nursery (SNN), an urban slum community situated in Nizamuddin Basti, Delhi. Shahid’s father is a rickshaw puller and mother works as a domestic help. He joined The YP Foundation’s, Blending Spectrum Programme as a shy, 9 year old, back in 2008.He often recalls, “I was under confident and couldn’t express myself before others. I used to think that I will never be able to realize my dreams as there are no opportunities for children and young people like me, who come from vulnerable sections of the society.”

As part of Blending Spectrum, Shahid actively participated in various capacity-building workshops. He started as a participant in the Life Skills Education programme and over time attended trainings on health, hygiene and gender. He also took part in creation on digital and live media productions, learning communication and technical skills to talk about issues that were close to his heart. Emerging as a youth leader in the community, he took the opportunity to lead small interventions on first aid, waste management and safety of women and girls in the community. “The encouragement from Blending Spectrum team and increased confidence further helped me perform better in school and publicly showcase my singing, without any hesitation. The trainings have remarkably changed my perspective and helped to build my confidence and leadership skills. I have also developed an enhanced understanding and sensitivity on critical social issues such as gender-based discrimination, health and hygiene and women-empowerment", shares Shahid.

When offered the opportunity to take up additional leadership roles in the community intervention, Shahid was one of the first to say he wanted to become a trainer leading the sessions he had attended years ago with other children and young people in the community. With support from our donors on Global giving, we have been able to start a new round of Life Skills and Leadership workshops with children and young people between the ages of 5 and 20. Shahid is one of the young facilitators, leading Life Skills and Leadership workshops for 45, 5-7 year olds. The sessions aim to develop children and young people’s leadership and awareness on gender, violence and health and hygiene.

“It gives me immense contentment to be able to contribute to these trainings and do something for these kids. These trainings are an excellent platform to instill in children, critical Life-Skills like empathy, team-work, creativity and eagerness to learn new things, at an early age. To make learning a fun-filled experience, we use lots of interactive and innovative methods such as film screenings, storytelling and games”, says Shahid. He believes in the value of organizing more and more such trainings to empower young people from marginalized sections just as they had once empowered him to reach at this stage today.

The Blending Spectrum programme has been working in SNN since 2006.Each year 150 children and adolescents like Shahid from over 105 families enroll to participate in sessions to build rights-based and youth enabling environment, improve health, hygiene and sanitation of families and prevent gender based violence and abuse in the community. Over the past years, the programme has directly worked with 1271 children and a total of 254 families. The YP Foundation is committed to continue empowering children and young people to become agents of change like Shahid. This won’t be possible without the support of donors like you who’ve helped us come this far. Thank you for supporting our work and continuing to donate to help us advance learning and leadership opportunities for young people from diverse backgrounds.

Links:

• About the Blending Spectrum programme