Investing in Young People to be Powerful Champions

Between the months of April and July 2018, the Women Deliver’s Youth Engagement Team was hard at work preparing for the Women Deliver 2019 Conference, in addition to many other ongoing Young Leaders Program projects. This report outlines Women Deliver’s progress in key areas of Youth Engagement from April through to July 2019.

Women Deliver 2019

This June, Women Deliver’s Young Leaders were joined by hundreds of young people from around the world at the Women Deliver 2019 Conference (WD2019) in Vancouver, Canada. Of these delegates, 440 Young Leaders and Alumni were sponsored to attend by Women Deliver. WD2019 kicked off the week with the Youth Pre-Conference, which was open to the more than 1,400 young people in attendance at WD2019 and included vibrant performances, lively regional breakout sessions, and remarks from diverse speakers, such as Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of UN Women, and Jayathma Wickramanayake, the UN Secretary General’s Envoy on Youth. The Youth Pre-Conference was just one of three pre-conferences hosted by the Youth Engagement Team; the Young Leaders & Alumni Workshop, Generation Now, and the Youth Pre-Conference each drew enthusiastic and passionate participation from hundreds of people.

The Youth Zone, which lay at the heart of the Fueling Station (WD2019 exhibition hall), was a bustling hub for people of all ages at WD2019 and provided a space for intergenerational dialogue and idea-sharing. Fourteen events were hosted in this space over the week, including various conversations on harnessing creativity for advocacy, a speed networking session, and a silent disco. Beyond these youth-forward spaces, young people were engaged across the Conference, bringing their unique voice and perspective to the forefront of the conversation. More than 150 Young Leaders had speaking engagements at WD2019, from the Plenary Stage to Concurrent Sessions each day. One highlight not to be missed was the explosive presence of 18-year-old Young Leader Natasha Mwansa on the official WD2019 Opening plenary stage!

Alumni Committee

In 2018, Women Deliver’s Young Leaders Program launched its inaugural Alumni Committee, gathering 10 Young Leaders from the 2010 and 2013 cohorts to collaborate and advise on the best next steps forward for an alumni program. This committee was instrumental in the success of initiatives such as One Year Out (OYO), a collection of events held around the world to mark one year until the Women Deliver 2019 Conference, and the Women Deliver Youth Engagement Team’s alumni mapping effort to begin re-engaging Young Leader Alumni.

In May 2019, the Youth Engagement Team launched a call for applications for a new Alumni Committee cohort to join for the 2019-2020 term. Following a competitive application review process, 10 Young Leader Alumni from the 2013 and 2016 classes representing a diversity of regions, identities, and areas of expertise were selected and introduced at the Young Leader & Alumni Workshop at the Women Deliver 2019 Conference. The first Alumni Committee meeting for the new cohort is scheduled for late July.

Small Grants

Too often, young people are viewed by institutional donors as lacking a “proven track record”, and are therefore perceived as too young and inexperienced to implement a grant or change policies in any significant way. As a result, youth advocacy efforts are left ignored, underestimated, and under-funded. To fill this gap, Women Deliver has been providing small grants to select Young Leaders and alumni to implement short-term six-month advocacy projects since 2014. With thanks to the generous support of our donors, Women Deliver has provided 93 small grants totaling US$465,000 to Young Leaders and alumni to date.

In this small grants cycle, which began in January 2018, 17 small grant recipients receiving a total of $85,000 USD successfully completed their projects across 13 countries and 3 continents, increasing their capacity to manage donor funded projects and providing them with the foundation to seek larger, continued funding opportunities

In the past three months, Women Deliver launched the broadest and biggest grant making cycle to date, open to all Young Leaders and Alumni, and received one of the largest pools of grant applications thus far. Further, Women Deliver’s Small Grants program provided inaugural pre-application assistance both at the Women Deliver 2019 Conference and through in-country consultants across the Southern and Eastern Africa region. Young Leaders selected to receive these grants will be notified in July 2019.

Communications

Women Deliver’s communication initiatives continued to spotlight the efforts of young people as champions of gender equality and for their meaningful engagement in the programs and policies that affect them and their communities. Examples include the following:

• Women Deliver’s webpages underwent a transformation with the introduction of new brand language and a brand refresh. In keeping with best practices, the youth webpages were accordingly simplified and made more dynamic in design and substance by incorporating compelling and clear language, as well as use of rich multimedia content that better reflects the power of our work.
• In the lead-up the Conference, the team also produced a new infographic that spotlights powerful data to make the case for deeper investment in young people politically, financially, and in representation. More than 5,000 conference delegates received this new infographic.
• In addition, the team launched a position paper titled, Sharing Power, Advancing Progress, Driving Change. This latest position paper calls for redefining power and establishing new approaches that meaningfully engage youth to build a healthier, equitable, and sustainable society.
• A powerful new video spotlighting the work of Young Leaders in the movement for gender equality was screened at Women Deliver 2019.

Finally, the team is proud to share that in keeping with the commitment to meaningful youth engagement, all Young Leaders were equipped with the tools and resources to standout and shine at Women Deliver 2019 and beyond. All Young Leaders were provided access to a webinar on enhancing public speaking skills and a media training. In advance of the Conference, those with formal speaking engagements received a comprehensive speaker package containing a link to the public speaking skills webinar, fresh messages, and a day-of “cheat sheet” to support them on-site. A select group of Young Leaders and other youth advocates speaking on high-level stages were also provided intensive one-on-one expert speaker prep coaching and support. To promote them in their networking at the Conference, all Young Leaders in attendance also received a personalized set of business cards.

Closing

This June, Women Deliver welcomed over 1,600 young delegates under the age of 30, including 53 delegates under 18, to Vancouver, Canada to attend the largest global conference on gender equality and sexual and reproductive health. At WD2019, these young people engaged, learned, and led alongside world leaders, influencers, advocates, academics, activists, and journalists, demonstrating #ThePowerOf youth. The Women Deliver Young Leaders Program invests in solutions and aims to produce trained and highly capable advocates who are passionate about driving lasting and positive change, and the team is looking forward to building on the incredible momentum of WD2019 toward a gender equal future.