YouthBank International News

<div class="page traditional" style=" background-color: #d6eaec; "> <article> <header> <h1 style=" font-family: 'Oswald'; color: #ffffff;">YouthBank Georgia's Youth Integration Program</h1> By Mariam Kobalia, YouthBank Program Manager </header> <div class="main"> <img src="/uploads/5524eed3691d1.JPG" class="title-pic" alt=""/> <img src="/uploads/5524edf473e88.png" style="width: 137px; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px; background-color: initial;" alt=""><h5>Ms. Kobalia has over four years of experience of managing and monitoring youth integration programs that are focused on promoting volunteerism, civic participation, and community activism both on local and regional settings. In the past three years, she has focused her work on peace and confidence-building between young people of various backgrounds residing in the South Caucasus. Ms. Kobalia has solid program management and monitoring skills, including nuanced understanding of national youth policy and local needs. She has completed several peace building and conflict resolution trainings and has excellent communications skills. Mariam Kobalia is a PhD candidate in Sociology at Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University (TSU) and holds an M.A in Gender Studies from the Centre for Social Sciences (CSS) and B.A from TSU with a major in English language and Literature and minor in Social Work. Mariam is an invited lecturer at Tbilisi State University, where she has been teaching courses in Research Methods and Academic Writing.</h5>Over the years, EPF’s Youth Integration Program has greatly contributed to increased civic engagement of young people residing in 29 communities of Georgia. Currently, the YB Program covers the following towns and communities: Akhaltsikhe, Akhalkalaki, Akhmeta, Aspindza, Poti, Borjomi, Chokhatauri, Dedophlistskaro, Gali, Gardabani, Gori, Gudauta, Khobi, Khoni, Lanchkhuti, Marneuli, Martvili, Kazreti, Ninotsminda, Ochamchire, Sokhumi, Tkibuli, Tserovani, Zemo Bargebi and Upper Adjara. Outcome to be achieved: Enhanced female and male youth volunteerism and civic engagement to address targeted communities’ needs. Outcome to be achieved: Enhanced female and male youth volunteerism and civic engagement to address targeted communities’ needs.Outcomes Achieved during 2008-2013Over the years, EPF’s Youth Integration Program has greatly contributed to increased civic engagement of young people residing in 29 communities of Georgia. Currently, the YB Program covers the following towns and communities: Akhaltsikhe, Akhalkalaki, Akhmeta, Aspindza, Poti, Borjomi, Chokhatauri, Dedophlistskaro, Gali, Gardabani, Gori, Gudauta, Khobi, Khoni, Lanchkhuti, Marneuli, Martvili, Kazreti, Ninotsminda, Ochamchire, Sokhumi, Tkibuli, Tserovani, Zemo Bargebi and Upper Adjara. To achieve the desired outcomes, EPF has been following the Youth Bank (YB) methodology, an innovative way of increasing youth participation through creating groups of young people (aged 16-21) in a given community (the Youth Banks) and empowering them with training and resources to find, fund, and oversee small youth-led initiatives that address salient for local communities issues. The YB concept is founded on the premise that involving young people in projects they design and manage is the most potent way to develop civic participation among youth. Thus, grantmaking serves as a mechanism with which young grantmakers improve their self-esteem and learn about leadership, team-work, fair decision-making, problem-solving, communications, financial and narrative report-writing, and event management. The uniqueness of the YB model is that young people are given the opportunity to independently undertake all the activities involved in the YB grantmaking cycle without constant supervision from adults. Each year, the YBs fund roughly 110 local youth-led initiatives in their communities, which range from 500-800 GEL in value and could address needs as diverse as cleaning a community park through promoting gender equality to preparing first-time voters for elections. During 2008-2013, the Program trained and empowered more than 350 young grantmakers, who, in turn, mobilized more than 2,700 volunteers (both youth and adults) and engaged them in identifying and resolving local problems. More than 255 YB members have engaged in 45 community initiatives outside the EPF-funded projects, contributing to sustainability of results. In addition, the Program also succeeded in mobilizing 12 local governments and 10 local businesses to support youth initiatives either with in-kind or financial contributions. Moreover, the Youth Banks have reported more than 45 cases, when public schools or local NGOs made in-kind or financial contributions to the YB-funded projects. <img src="/uploads/5524efdc1ea15.JPG" style="width: 299px;">           <img src="http://beacon.by/uploads/5524f00003aa2.JPG" style="width: 301px; float: right; margin: 0px 0px 10px 10px;" alt="">  Confidence-Building across Georgia and the RegionThe Youth Bank model is not only a potent civic engagement method, but also provides young people opportunities to engage in a dialogue in a safe environment, learn about each other first-hand, participate in community development, and demonstrate models of tolerance, respect for diversity, and understanding of common values. As a result, youth engagement in the YBs contributes to empowering young leaders from various sides of the conflict divide to act as agents of change within their communities and contribute to initiating the development of mechanisms for managing grievances perpetuating the conflict. Over the years of supporting youth civic engagement initiatives, EPF solidified its belief that young people, if provided with appropriate skills and supported to engage in community decision-making, have a unique potential to bring fresh perspectives, energy, and solutions to these entrenched problems. It is due to these reasons that, in 2010, the Foundation started to work toward contributing to tolerance and confidence-building among ethnic Abkhaz and Georgian youth, through several regional efforts that involved six partner organizations from Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Turkey. While confidence-building is a long and arduous process, EPF believes that it has been able to contribute to improving the perception of the “other” among the country’s youth. 2014-2019 ProgrammingEPF will continue to promote youth volunteerism and civic engagement by building their capacity as female and male civic leaders and community philanthropists, providing opportunities to engage as active citizens in identifying and addressing local needs. To this end, EPF will build the capacity of local youth in grantmaking, gender equality and equity, environmental protection and other issue areas that will be identified during the implementation of the Program. The young grantmakers will also complete social entrepreneurship trainings, so as to give them the tools necessary to become entrepreneurs working toward social good.EPF will foster network building among the YBs from different parts of Georgia by supporting cross-community initiatives that are designed to enhance youth civic engagement. To foster the spirit of volunteerism and tap into the resources of former YB committee members, EPF will continue to engage with “graduated” YB members. Networking on the international level will be fostered through the newly established YB International, led by EPF long-time partner, the Community Foundation of Northern Ireland (CFNI).<img src="http://beacon.by/uploads/5524f056d5443.JPG" alt="" style="width: 688px; float: left; margin: 0px 10px 10px 0px;"> Quotes from YB membersMariam Gabriadze, Tkibuli YBmember “I believe that the work we are doing in the YB program is extremely important for our community. I will never forget the thankful and smiling faces of those kids with special needs, while monitoring one of the projects funded by Khoni YB. I am proud to see that with the help of this project their relationship with classmates, with teachers, and learning process itself became more interesting and fun for them. I am confident that they will hold the spirit!”Kartlos Lomsadze, Gori YB member “Before joining the YB program, I was not active at all. I have never participated in any of the projects, but here, as they say, I found myself! It was like a turning point. Now when I participate in various projects and often ask other participants from various regions, if they know the guys from their regions who are the YB members, they often say – come on, everyone knows them! It’s like, everyone in the community knows those, who are the members of the YB. They are known for being active and motivated; let’s just say that they are known for everything.”Davit Bejashvili, Dedoplistkaro YB member “When we went to one of the local schools to make the presentation on YB work, I remember how surprised the teachers were looking at us, because they expected adults and when they saw us, 16-year old kids, they responded with skepticism and distrust. I will never forget the feeling, when we were able to show them that we, even though we are young, can do important things.” </div> </article> </div>

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Issue 4