YOUNG AND RICH AFRICAY.A.R.A

Paving the Road to Prosperity

COMPANYPROFILE

What Does It Really Take TO HELP THE YOUTH

get out of poverty,ADD VALUE TO THE MARKET PLACE

IT TAKES UNDERSTANDING.

To know, understand and learn about what makes a long-term difference in peoples’ lives, you need to personally relate with them, understand their thought pattern, behavioral pattern, what drives them, what motivates them etc. And we do this through our near peer-peer mentors.

IT TAKES IDEAS.

IT TAKES YOU.

IT TAKES HEART. It’s tough to walk the talk. YARA meets and engages youth in different crises every day. Poor students, young girls and school drop outs and the completely hopeless youth, facing burdens that seem insurmountable. But we can’t give up – there are too many low-income youth depending on YARA’s services

Poverty is among the most difficult of all challenges – but we can’t let that be an excuse. The need for new ideas, creativity, attitude shift etc never ends.

Often, the tougher a problem is; the more help it takes to solve. Your help – whether it’s a gift in support of one of these programs, your work as a volunteer, or your participation in the many other ways, YARA depends on – brings us that much closer to making a real difference in the lives of youth.

& Become Successful in Life

YOUNG AND RICH AFRICAY.A.R.A

WHO WE ARE Young and Rich Africa. (YARA) is a movement of young people fighting poverty and restoring the economic health of communities through personal & professional development, financial education, and social entrepreneurship through creative solutions and innovative approaches.

WHAT THIS PORTFOLIO IS ABOUT YARA’s success in helping youth is built on not only dedication, hard work and empathy – but also on creative ideas. This portfolio highlights some of the most significant new ideas at YARA. We invite you to learn more about these innovations and others by contacting us at info@youngandrichafrica.org or by visiting our website at www.youngandrichafrica.org.

THE CHALLENGE

FINANCIAL

More than half of the young adults admit to knowing very little about how to manage their finances, more than half of the adults don’t have a budget. One-third doesn’t pay their bills on time. Almost third carry lots of debts over from one month to the next, the trend therefore is carried on from one generation to the next.Money pervades the fabric of everyone’s life. Money funds our life-résumés, from our most basic needs to our most extravagant experiences, but it is also the leading contributor to divorce, domestic abuse, stress, and low high-school and university persistence rates.Given the considerable influence of money on the normal Joe’s psyche, one may imagine our society, government, schools, and families; would go to great lengths to promote proven financial education strategies but no, this is not the case.

EDUCATIONCan mean the difference between a dream achieved or a dream deferred

A nation is more than just the sum of its parts. It’s not just individual Ugandans or Africans

who feel the effects of being ill-prepared for the finan-cial realities of adulthood – we all do. As more and more students enter the workforce unprepared, our economy

weakens, losing its strength, output, and productive potential.

A better educated populace means better-prepared individuals, a robust economy, and more stability. By spreading financial smarts, our country as a whole will prosper. Therefore, managing money is

essential to achieving personal and professional goals.

We recruit and train university volunteers to serve as near-peer role models, university mentors, and financial coaches to low-in-

come, urban-rural teens in high school classrooms and youth overall within our communities.

In partnership with schools and community organiza-tions, our volunteers lead A ‘level students through a

21-week program and the rest of the school through a 14 week program; focused on

the real-world financial decisions that people face.

THE INNOVATION

For so long a lot of attention has been paid to what we know and not who we are. Education systems especially in Africa have so much focused on equipping youth with knowledge but have over looked a major critical factor to their suc-cess which is their level of personal growth. This is usually left to churches, communities, and par-ents who usually do not have the time and when they do have the time, rarely the consistency and patience to make sure they are embedded into the lives of their children.

The working, leadership and entrepreneurship world has now evolved and needs youth with not only skills and knowledge but with the personal growth to be innovative in tough situations, moti-vated in seemingly impossible circumstances, self-driven in mediocre situations, disciplined in immorally tempting situations and always seeking to better themselves, their skills, those around them hence resulting to an all-round positive output of excellent service and innovative prod-ucts, the kind that our nations need to push Africa forward towards the prosperity we all want.

THE CHALLENGE

DEVELOPMENTPERSONAL

You get paid for the value you bring to the market place.

TheWe have recognized the critical need of first building and helping to increase the level of personal growth of the youth by being there to assist with teaching the youth what the now days busy working class parents may either be ignorant of or simply not have enough time to deliv-er, or inspiring and mentoring the youth who have not had the opportunity to be within reach of life impacting mentors mostly due to factors like coming from disadvantaged backgrounds.This will be through focusing on essential personal growth habits like:-Reading (The mentality and acceptance of the concept that the best way to hide money from an Africa is by putting it in a book will be fought strongly with the aim of literally putting it to an agonizing end)-Discipline (Time is our greatest asset, time management skills will be taught making sure the mentality and accep-tance of an absurd concept like African

time is abandoned) Learning (The mentality is learning ends with Univer-sity is widely acknowledged by even many adults in Africa, the youth will be taught and shown the importance of continually improving themselves and their skills especially after being done with school)

-Communication (Essential life skills like effective communication and pre-sentation are over looked yet that is the axle of great leadership, relation-ships, and active citizenship).

To mention but a few, these and many more different critical success factors will be taught to the youth who are several steps behind their counter-parts in the developed world with all this information more easily accessible to them.

THE INNOVATION

EntrepreneurshipSocial

When businesses grow, the economy thrives.

Despite a steady nominal Growth in Africa’s economy youth unemployment still remains a big threat to the sustainability of Africa’s Economies.

Africa’s population is growing extremely fast with a slow demographic transition, implying in the near future the youth will take up a big proportion of the total population. Currently youth make up 37% of the working-age population with 60% of the total unemployed, majority of these unemployed youths live in urban areas, the ones employed have a big tendency of underemployment, a high concentration in the informal sector, and sometimes ‘working longer hours under intermittent and insecure work arrangements characterized by low productivity and meager earnings’

THE CHALLENGE

Social entrepreneurship is a highly effective way to solve the greatest challenges facing society and the environment: extreme poverty, the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS and other diseases, the alarming rate of deforestation and climate change, and the lack of educational access and quality. Social entrepreneurship brings market based solutions to these problems that have the potential to scale to reach millions of people and create “generational” change – change that does more than just affect a small few, but rather impacts an entire generation and the course of a society

In addition, Social entrepreneurship combines economic growth with positive social and environmental impact – in doing so social entrepreneurship drives sustainable development. The link between social entrepreneurship and sustainable development is becoming more and more accepted. (Adopted from the Educate Curriculum on Social Entrepreneurship)

Secondly, we have incorporated Seminars and Young Entrepreneurs Conference: We realize that for an economy to grow, businesses have to be started and running. Yet these businesses cannot be started if people do not have a proper background, knowledge and the right skills and

training to run them.

The YARA Young Entrepreneurs Conference (YARAYEC) therefore provides highly motivated students from rural and urban high schools an opportunity to connect with the broader Uganda business community. The Conference is structured into two parts: a business development workshop and pitch competition

THE WORKSHOP

The workshop serves as a platform for students enrolled in YARA’s Financial Life Skills and Entrepreneurship programs to develop their business ideas into a professional pitch.

THE PITCH

The second portion, a pitch competition, invites highly influential associates at banks, start-up companies, consulting agencies, and non-profit organizations to participate as judges and audience members, as the students present and defend their business plans.

Using the judges’ evaluations, a winning group is selected to receive an externship opportunity as a prize.

We have recognized the critical need of first building and helping to increase the level of personal growth of the youth by being there to assist with teaching the youth what the now days busy working class parents may either be ignorant of or simply not have enough time to deliv-er, or inspiring and mentoring the youth who have not had the opportunity to be within reach of life impacting mentors mostly due to factors like coming from disadvantaged backgrounds.This will be through focusing on essential personal growth habits like:-Reading (The mentality and acceptance of the concept that the best way to hide money from an Africa is by putting it in a book will be fought strongly with the aim of literally putting it to an agonizing end)-Discipline (Time is our greatest asset, time management skills will be taught making sure the mentality and accep-tance of an absurd concept like African

THE INNOVATION

THE CHALLENGE

Leadership Comes from WithinTeens building skills for stronger communities and brighter futures.

For many rural and urban youth, having alternatives to risk-taking behavior is crucial to survival. Too often, a lack of healthy community activities leaves them idle and in danger. Neighborhood programs that teach teens how to communicate, lead, overcome challenges and set goals can often be the difference between a dropout headed toward prison and a youth with a diploma, headed toward a good job.

YARA offers an array of high-intensity, youth-centered programs that are welcoming and motivational for young people “on the edge” of making poor life choices.

In Creative and Critical Learning, teens create films, poetry, paintings and other artworks while building literacy, teamwork and project management skills.

Young Ladies for a Better Tomorrow brings young women together to discuss their issues and share experiences and goals through speaking and writing. Eighteen 101, a series of workshops and case management sessions for older teens, provides university search and application supports, career counseling and job readiness activities and life skill instruction to prepare teens to live independently.

Youth Engagement Forum meets youth within their communities and engages them through high intensive debates on issues affecting them and what solutions they have come up with to solve these issues. The program is aired live on radio so as to reach a wider audience. Each of these programs brings teens together to learn about their peers and communities, and equips them with basic skills for school, work, and life

Social entrepreneurship is a highly effective way to solve the greatest challenges facing society and the environment: extreme poverty, the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS and other diseases, the alarming rate of deforestation and climate change, and the lack of educational access and quality. Social entrepreneurship brings market based solutions to these problems that have the potential to scale to reach millions of people and create “generational” change – change that does more than just affect a small few, but rather impacts an entire generation and the course of a society

In addition, Social entrepreneurship combines economic growth with positive social and environmental impact – in doing so social entrepreneurship drives sustainable development. The link between social entrepreneurship and sustainable development is becoming more and more accepted. (Adopted from the Educate Curriculum on Social Entrepreneurship)

Secondly, we have incorporated Seminars and Young Entrepreneurs Conference: We realize that for an economy to grow, businesses have to be started and running. Yet these businesses cannot be started if people do not have a proper background, knowledge and the right skills and

training to run them.

The YARA Young Entrepreneurs Conference (YARAYEC) therefore provides highly motivated students from rural and urban high schools an opportunity to connect with the broader Uganda business community. The Conference is structured into two parts: a business development workshop and pitch competition

THE WORKSHOP

The workshop serves as a platform for students enrolled in YARA’s Financial Life Skills and Entrepreneurship programs to develop their business ideas into a professional pitch.

THE PITCH

The second portion, a pitch competition, invites highly influential associates at banks, start-up companies, consulting agencies, and non-profit organizations to participate as judges and audience members, as the students present and defend their business plans.

Using the judges’ evaluations, a winning group is selected to receive an externship opportunity as a prize.

THE INNOVATION

For many rural and urban youth, having alternatives to risk-taking behavior is crucial to survival. Too often, a lack of healthy community activities leaves them idle and in danger. Neighborhood programs that teach teens how to communicate, lead, overcome challenges and set goals can often be the difference between a dropout headed toward prison and a youth with a diploma, headed toward a good job.