#RaiseYourHand: Khalaf Ben Abdallah from Al Montada

The Soukie Speaks’ #RaiseYourHand series celebrates young people in the MENA region who are actively and passionately promoting social, economic and cultural inclusion in their communities. This week, Khalaf Ben Abdallah from Tunisia, tells me how his organization, Al Montada, is helping re-shape higher education in Tunisia.

1) Tell me a little about yourself, your family, your educational background and professional experience.

I am a 20 year-old medical student and I have over four years of experience in Tunisian and international civil society. I am very passionate about education, youth inclusion and social entrepreneurship and I have successfully co-founded various social startup projects in Tunis, and its internal regions, which have allowed more than 200 high school students to acquire critical thinking and entrepreneurial skills. Not only did these project focus on empowering students by helping them acquire important life skills, they also focused on social problems, such as nepotism and elitism and ways to overcome them.

In addition to my work with Al Montada, which I will talk about later, I have also succeeded in reserving a spot in the Tunisian parliament as a civil society representative in the Committee of Youth, Culture, Education and Scientific Research to lobby for new policies in the new reform project and I am currently working on establishing a Policy Incubation Lab in Tunisian universities to make policy making more inclusive, visionary and data-driven. I was also recently selected among the top 20 Ashoka Changemakers in the MENA, Europe and Turkey and had the great pleasure to be a part of the Tunisian Delegation that met with Helen Clark, the UNDP Administrator, to discuss how to promote socio-economic inclusion and the implementation of SDGs in Tunisia.

2) When did you become socially active and what is the name of your organization?

At the age of 15, I was one of the many young Tunisians who took to the streets of El Kasbah asking for a new constitution. During the unrest of the Arab Spring, I would lay in my bed and think about other ways that I could change my country. Despite the the threats of indiscriminate tear gas, police repression and violence, I sat in solidarity with many others under a breezy tent in February 2011 to defend Tunisians’ rights to justice, inclusion and a better future.  

The Tunisian civil rights movement was one my biggest moments of growth, because it made me realize the power of unity to overcome corruption and injustice. It also taught me the steep price of exclusion and disconnection. From that experience, I realized that we, as a country, needed to invest more in youth and follow an inclusive strategy to achieve prosperity. This decision led me to join forces with other passionate Tunisians in the Al Montada organization, which aims to empower a generation of youth by rethinking higher education in Tunisia.

Currently, I am a Project Manager and Partnerships Coordinator at Al Montada, which means forum in Arabic. I lead the Forum Project, which aims to increase students’ inclusion in the reform process by bringing together different stakeholders in our society, including students, professors, deputies from the parliament, university presidents, employers and civil society representatives, so we can achieve the objective of quality education together. Moreover, through Al Montada, I also contribute to driving research about the Tunisian higher education system with a special focus on the topics of academic curriculum, governance and administrative management.

3) What is unique about your organization?

Our organization is working on rethinking higher education in Tunisia by fostering, structuring and developing the discussion about reforms and we are using entrepreneurial thinking to make our organization as effective and agile as possible. The Al Montada approach is a three pronged approach based on:

1. Research: to promote empathy and make informed and comprehensive contributions to the field of higher education.
2. Discussion: to bring together different stakeholders and make the reform process more inclusive and data driven.
3. Advocacy: to train advocates to lobby for education reforms, tangible projects and policies.

4) What are your organization’s short-term/long-term goals?

Not only do we aim to be an active communication platform for youth and passionate education advocates in Tunisia, we also aim to be an “engine” that powers the critical  discussions needed to realize the visionary concept of Tunisian higher education that our youth hope to see in the future.

5) What has your organization achieved so far?

So far, we have followed the lean startup method of “build, test and learn” and we’re working at a very fast pace. In less than one year we have

• Directly impacted 1125 youth throughout Tunisia.
• Conducted a national survey on the youth’s vision of education in Tunisia
• Launched tone forum bringing together different stakeholders to discuss education reform.
• Organized Cafe Talks bringing youth from different backgrounds together to discuss problems and brainstorm solutions.

Now, we’re developing a policy incubation program for youth with policy ideas. This program aims to stop the stagnation of this movement and to make legislation in higher education more visionary and data-driven. Ultimately, we believe that people who trust themselves and share their ideas become better citizens and more active partners in social development.

6) How can people learn more about your activities? 

We invite everyone to visit our website and follow our Facebook page to keep up with our
latest updates!

Like what you see? Join the Soukie Speaks email list and follow my Twitter, Instagram, Facebook accounts, so we can enlighten, support and empower the Arab leaders and entrepreneurs of the future together. 

#RaiseYourHand: Reem Hantoush from Masaari

The Soukie Speaks’ #RaiseYourHand series celebrates young people in the MENA region who are actively and passionately promoting social, economic and cultural inclusion in their communities. This week, Reem Hantoush, from the UAE, shares how she, and her co-founders, are promoting educational-job market alignment in the UAE with the Masaari initiative.

Full disclosure: Reem and I are both members of a wonderful community initiative called E7 -Daughters of the UAE, which aims to inspire, train and connect young women in the UAE to create initiatives that benefit their communities. You can read more about the program and my experience as a member of the pilot class here!

1) What is the Masaari initiative and who is your target audience?

The Masaari initiative offers job shadowing opportunities for high school students in the UAE, where they can rotate in different companies and workplaces. So, they can discover what their passions and interests are at an early age and, eventually, what they want to major in at university.

2) Why did you choose the name Masaari?

In Arabic, Masaari means my path and the reason we chose this name is because we wanted to encourage students to choose their own path, instead of having somebody else choose it for them. We considered other names like Discover or Your Passion, but we felt that Masaari was more appropriate, because it really emphasized the message that this is your life, you need to choose what you need to be and you shouldn’t let anyone do it for you.

3) How many team members do you have and what are your educational backgrounds?

There are three of us in the Masaari team and we come from diverse educational backgrounds, but we are all passionate about education! Here’s a little more about us:

 

Reem Hantoush

As you already know, my name is Reem and I am an architect and urban designer by
profession and I currently work in the Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council. I am passionate about education and I want to transform the local educational system by promoting creative and independent thinking, instead of rote learning.

 

Gahwar Ghazanfar

Gawhar is a third-year student at the University of Paris Sorbonne in Abu Dhabi and she is studying Economics and Management. Gawhar loves to learn and she is a determined to use her passion for learning to advocate for the right of education for all.

 

 

Mariam Bader

Mariam is an educator and therapist, who recently graduated from the Higher Colleges of Technology and is currently working at the New England Center for Children in Abu Dhabi. As a young and dynamic teacher, Mariam is looking forward to using her passion to develop and transform the educational system in the UAE.

4) How does the Masaari initiative work?

The whole aim of the Masaari initiative is to give young students the opportunity to job shadow. However, the whole program can be divided into 5 different stages.

Stage 1: The Career Exploration Workshop

The aim of this workshop is to help students better understand themselves and their interests. We recently conducted our first Career Exploration Workshop in November, where we invited high school students from Sharjah to come to the Sheraa Entrepreneurship Center to work with a career coach. We also hosted a panel discussion with different industry experts, where they talked about their career choices and how they ended up where they are today. It was really exciting for us to have the students listen to the different speakers, because it allowed them to hear about professional success from different perspectives.However, the ultimate objective of the panel was to tell students that it’s okay to not know which professional path they want to pursue, but to at least go out there and explore, which is what the Masaari initiative is giving them the opportunity to do.

Stage 2: Orientation Session

This will take place 1 week before the students start their job shadowing program. The aim of this session is to prepare students for the workplace and connect them with their mentors. During the session, we will distribute a job shadow handbook, which will be compiled by the Masaari team, for both mentors and students. The handbook will highlight various things including the difference between job shadowing and an internship, what mentors and students can expect from our program and some guidelines and tips to help students get the most out of their job shadowing experience. We will also give our mentors the opportunity to speak, so they can connect with their mentees before the program starts.

Stage 3: Job Shadow

Students who are selected for the Masaari initiative will be given the opportunity to job shadow in to 2-3 different companies for the duration of Masaari program.

Stage 4: Debriefing Session

Only students are invited to this session and it will be an informal meeting to hear how the students felt during the Masaari program and what they learned from their experience. The students will also do a short presentation on their experience, so the Masaari team can have documentation of their participation and the students can reflect and learn from their experience.

Stage 5: Graduation!

At the end of our pilot program in February 2017, we are going to host a Masaari Forum, or graduation ceremony, where we will be inviting the Ministry of Education, KHDA, teachers, mentors, parents and students who want to come. During this ceremony, we will give students and mentors an appreciation certificate and we will give students the chance to share their experiences with the audience and show their journey and how impactful it was. Then we will announce the opening of registration for the 2017 cycle of the Masaari program.

5) How many students will be participating in the Masaari pilot program?

Due to the small size of our team, and the fact that Mariam and I work full-time and Gawhar is a full-time student, we are starting with a small group of 7 students- both male and female- for our pilot year to see how everything goes. By next year, we aim to expand the team, so we can accept about 20 students to our program-insh’Allah.

6) When will the job shadowing for your pilot program begin and will you follow the same timeline for the 2017 cycle?

This year we are launching our program in the winter break from December 18-29. After the orientation session, each student will have two companies to rotate in, but next year it will be three companies. In 2017, we will launch the second edition of the Masaari program in the summer and we aim to have a larger group of students job shadowing for a longer period of time.

7) What was the biggest challenge that you faced as a team while you were developing the Masaari initiative?

When we started implementing our program, we realized that we had to change our strategy, which was a difficult decision to make. Initially, we planned to head to the Ministry of Education (MoE) to get their support and approval to go into the schools and share the Masaari mission. While the MoE was very happy with our initiative and efforts, we spent about 3 months trying to communicate with them to get the required approval. Since we were eager to start implementing our pilot program as soon as possible, we decided to change our strategy by inviting students from different schools to register for our program online. That was our biggest challenge and from it we learned that we have to be very flexible about our plans and timelines. We learned that when you set a plan you have to have plan A, Plan B and Plan C just in case, because you never know what will happen, especially when you are collaborating with big institutions in the public and private sector.

8) Do you have any advice for other young Emiratis and  residents in the UAE for how they can contribute to the growth and the well-being of the UAE community?

I think the most important thing is that you have to be willing to get out of your comfort zone and get active, because comfort is your worst enemy. You have to be ready to be pro-active and explore, so you can contribute to your community and yourself as an individual.

9) How can members of the wider UAE community support the Masaari initiative?

At the moment, we are looking for companies who are willing to host Masaari job shadowers. We are trying to find contacts within different organizations, so we can meet with them and get them excited about our initiative!

a) How can companies support the Masaari initiative?

If you are a company who is interested in working with the Masaari initiative, please send the follow information to info@masaari.ae:

• Email Subject : Interested in Joining Masaari Job Shadow Database- [Company Name]
• Contact details for point of contact
• Company’s industry

b) How can students join the next Masaari cycle?

Students of all nationalities can apply to the 2017 cycle by sending the following information to info@masaari.ae

• Email Subject : Interested in Joining Masaari Student Database
• First name and last name
• Contact number
• Field of interest
• Suggest companies that they would like to work in [optional]

 10) Is the Masaari project only based in Dubai?

While the students in our pilot are from both Sharjah and Dubai, in terms of work placement, they can work in Dubai, Sharjah and Abu Dhabi, if they provide their own transportation and accommodation. For example, we have some students who are going to be job shadowing in TwoFour54, because they have relatives in Abu Dhabi. So, they will be staying with their family for a week and providing their own transportation while they are job shadowing in Abu Dhabi.

11) How can readers learn more about you and your future activities?

We invite anybody who would like to keep up with our updates to visit our website and
follow our Instagram, Twitter and Facebook accounts!

Like what you see? Join the Soukie Speaks email list and follow my Twitter, Instagram, Facebook accounts, so we can enlighten, support and empower the Arab leaders and entrepreneurs of the future together. 

 

How to Establish a Global Culture of Community Building

Two weeks ago, I launched the #InMyBurkini Photo Series initiative, where I shared pictures of myself doing funny and mundane things in my Burkini for 5 days to promote inter-cultural dialogue and understanding.

[Pssst: did you miss the photo series? No worries! You can check out all the pictures right here: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5]

When I announced the initiative, I didn’t really know what to expect, which is why I have been so overwhelmed by the response that I have received. Not only was I lucky enough to have friends in my personal and entrepreneurial circles sharing the #InMyBurkini message, I even had the honor of having a surprise feature in Emirates Woman by Emma Hall. It was truly an exhilarating experience, especially since when I introduced my #InMyBurkini intiative I said:

“ I don’t know if this photo series will change anybody’s opinion of Muslims or Muslim women, or any minority for that matter. However I am determined to step out of the stereotype that is attached to my identity and be exactly who I am for myself, and others….”

After completing my initiative, I received a message from a dear university friend from the U.S.A, which only confirmed how important it is to be positive, vocal and open to dialogue with others, because it really can have a lasting effect on the people around you. The message read…

Lovely Lady,

I just saw someone spewing garbage and painting Muslims into the same category as extremists. And while it made me angry and upset I realized that for every comment like that I see, you probably see 5 more.

So, I wanted to give you a ray of sunshine and risk redundancy by telling you things you already know. I wanted to let you know how wonderful and special you are, how wise and reasonable every post is that I see from you. That you made a lasting impression on me the very first time we met 7 (!!!) years ago and have continued to do so ever since. Keep the faith in humanity that you seem to always be able to carry, even on the worst days. The world needs more people like you.

Your sister in Abraham ,
Kayla

When I read this message from Kayla, I couldn’t help but feel grateful for being surrounded by people like her, who value me for who I am and strive to promote tolerant attitudes to make feel included wherever I am. But this is not the first time that Kayla has extended her hand to me and made me feel accepted. On September 11^th 2011, the 10-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, our university, the University of Delaware, hosted a candlelight vigil that I was hesitant to attend as a visibly American Muslim. Despite my hesitation, I went and Kayla, a speaker at the memorial, asked me to light a candle for the victims. A small action that turned my fear of exclusion into a powerful “moment of inclusion” that still resonates with me today.

[You can read my full account of the event here]

These moments, and many others, give me the courage and the drive to continue creating “moments of inclusion,” because I know from personal experience how powerful it can be for someone to create a safe space for you to be who you are. I know that there are many people out there who live in communities where xenophobia is on the rise, which is pushing them to isolate themselves. But we can’t allow “cultures of isolation” to become a part of the fabric of our societies, because we are stronger together then we are apart. So, the questions remains, how can each one of us proactively create “moments of inclusion,” like Kayla, to promote community building in our respective communities?

1) Host an Event or Activity

Whether you choose to host a public campaign like my #InMyBurkini Photo Series or you choose to host a culture night in the privacy of your home, make sure you try to regularly create “safe spaces” for different people to learn about and understand each other. Not only do “moments of inclusion” promote positive dialogue and co-existance, they also promote a sense of global citizenry, which will make community building a vital building block of our increasingly globalized world.

2) Participate in Inter-cultural Activities

If you are not hosting “moments of inclusion,” make sure you attend events or activities where you can experience a “cultural aha” moment. If you find an event to go to, make sure to take a friend or a colleague that you think would be interested in sharing your “cultural aha” moment, so you can help others experience the powerful impact that a “moment of inclusion” can have on an individual or a community. If you can’t attend an event or activity yourself, make sure to “share the love” by sharing it with your network via social media or email.

3) Share your “Moments of Inclusion”

Unfortunately, nowadays, it seems like any video or photo that portrays social injustice goes viral instantly. While it is important to be aware of these injustices, so we can change them, it is also equally as important to share acts of empowering solidarity. So, next time you experience a “moment of inclusion” share it with your community, if only to remind yourself, and others, that being stereotyped doesn’t justify stereotyping. We all play a role in perpetuating stereotypes and we can all play a role in dismantling them too.

I would like to take this opportunity again to thank all the people who supported the #InMyBurkini Photo Series and continue to help me create and participate in “moments of inclusion.” I look forward to hearing how you will promote cultures of community building in your communities.

Like what you see? Join the Soukie Speaks email list and follow my Twitter, Instagram, Facebook accounts, so we can enlighten, support and empower the Arab leaders and entrepreneurs of the future together. 

Photo Series Day 4: Having a Sense of Humor #InMyBurkini

Photo Credit: The Relaxed Photographer

As, you might have noticed already, this is not me, but the Rachidi family dog Eva. Eva believed the #InMyBurkini initiative so much that she decided to wear my Burkini in solidarity. Yes, I am goofy like that, which is why I’m always amused when people meet me and are surprised by the fact that I have a sense of humor. I know in their heads they’re thinking “I didn’t think Muslim people were allowed to laugh.” That being said, I do understand where this stereotype comes from. How many times have I been faced with “religious” people who had a permanent scowl on their faces, because they felt it “made them more religious?” The irony of the fact is, is that there is an Islamic hadith, a narration of the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH), that equates smiling in the face of your fellow human to an act of charity. So, why aren’t more people smiling? Let’s just say that I’m very charitable.

Be inspired: I’m not the only Muslim gal with a sense of humor! Linda Sarsour, the executive director of the Arab American Association of New York and a prominent civil rights activist in the U.S.A, was recently featured in a funny Huffington video titled “The Struggles of Fasting in a Non-Muslim Office.” Make sure to check it out here!

Photo credit: The Relaxed Photographer

The day I received my driver’s license was one of the most memorable days of my life. In fact, I was so excited to get it that I couldn’t decide where to go first. So, I decided to drive my mom to the closest Lebanese restaurant and I bought her a shawarma! Being able to drive has been such an empowering skill for me, because it has given me the freedom to go to events and meet with people, who have helped me grow immensely as an individual and a professional. The ability to drive is a privilege that not everyone or every woman has, which is why I am very grateful for it.

Be inspired: Check out the inspiring TED Talk that Dr. Sakena Yacoobi, founder and Executive Director of the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL), did on how she is “driving change” (you see what I did there? Punny no?) and empowering women, and other disenfranchised communities, in Afghanistan by providing education and health services to thousands in rural and poor urban areas

Photo Series Day 1: Surfing #InMyBurkini

Photo credit: The Relaxed Photographer

There is nothing more exhilarating than gliding on a perfect wave and then plunging into the cold water of the Atlantic. For me, surfing is all about learning how to overcome failure, because when you wipe out you don’t get out of the water. You go back in and you catch the next wave with determination. I love this sport because it reminds me that standing up isn’t nearly as important as learning how to fall and get up again. A lesson that resonates in every part of my life.

Be inspired: Check out the teaser of the documentary “The Most Fearless” which shares the powerful story of Nasima Akter, Bangladesh’s first female surfer, who is challenging her community’s conservative social norms and making waves!

Changing the World #InMyBurkini

This fall, I spent 6 weeks in Morocco in my family’s beach home in Mehdia Plage, where I got to surf, swim and catch up on my reading. Every day that I sat on the beach in my burkini, I couldn’t help but think about how this simple act is currently considered a major political statement in some places. In fact, in some countries, it’s actually a violation of the law. Sometimes, I struggle to understand how wearing a lot of nylon could be offensive or even illegal. But then I remember that it’s not about the glorious amount of nylon that I wear when I swim or the fact that I cover my head. It’s about the lack of constructive dialog about these topics in our global communities. It’s about people’s insatiable desire to take offense to everything and shut down or to make hasty judgements with incomplete or inaccurate information. Neither side is doing justice to themselves, or others, and yet both sides feel justified in their incorrect behavior.

That being said, this post isn’t an analysis of why global Muslim populations are facing challenging situations with the rise of xenophobia or extremism. It’s about a 5-day photo campaign that I’m hosting on my blog called the #InMyBurkini Photo Series. This series will depict me doing mundane things, dare I say funny, in a burkini to remind people that nothing we wear, or don’t wear, should deprive us of our humanity or humor. Why am I doing this? I’m doing this because I believe that the first step to creating meaningful dialog between people is to make sure that they can connect with each other and that can never happen if we’re not willing to let our guard down. Unfortunately, many of us are raised with the “us versus them” mentality, especially in minority communities. However, we live in a global village, which is made even smaller by technology and social networks, and we simply don’t have the luxury to shut down anymore when we hear critical comments about who we are and what we believe.

No one said that creating dialog was easy. It is the ultimate act of vulnerability, because there is no guarantee that the wrong that was committed will be made right by the conversation. Having said that, it is the only way to move forward. More often than I would like to admit, I meet people who are conditioned to believe that “things never change,” but in my experience this is not the case. It is a convenient lie propagated by a few who benefit from the discord that comes as a result of this “social insolation” of our world’s diverse communities. I don’t know if this photo series will change anybody’s opinions of Muslims or Muslim women, or any minority for that matter. However, I am determined to step out of the stereotype that is attached to my identity and be exactly who I am, for myself and others, in the very thing that people seem to misunderstand and fear: my burkini. If we want change, we must have the courage to be vulnerable, the patience to listen and the wisdom to speak with compassion.

Starting tomorrow, make sure to comment, like and share the #InMyBurkini Photo Series on Soukie Speaks’ Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts, so we can start more meaningful conversations, connect with people and be the change we want to see.

Special thanks to my very talented cousin for the pictures that she took for the #InMyBurkini Photo Series! To see more of her phenomenal photography check out her Instagram account: The Relaxed Photographer and DM her for inquiries!

Club Courage: Noha Mahdi from The Mawada Project

Every week, the Soukie Speaks’ Club Courage series celebrates a brave entrepreneur in the Arab startup ecosystem, by sharing their story and the impact that their startup is having on the community. This week we interviewed Noha Mahdi the founder of The Mawada Project.  

1) Tell us a little about yourself, your educational background and how you got into entrepreneurship.

My whole life, I’ve been a dreamer and a bit of an idealist. I can’t stop myself from thinking of all the wonderful ways the world and our experience in it could be made better. I care for the well-being of our communities and I am always thinking of ways to make our collective experience on Earth a better one. It was this very sentiment that started me on my journey towards entrepreneurship.

I first studied biochemistry at Mcgill University and then completed my master’s degree in Educational Neuroscience at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Since then, I’ve been passionate about education and believe it holds the power to truly transform individuals and societies, which is why I founded The Mawada Project.

2) What is The Mawada Project and what can participants expect from it?

The Mawada Project is a startup aimed at creating community-service learning experiences for children (aged 9+) in the United Arab Emirates.

Essentially, we provide opportunities for children to engage in meaningful service-work in a consistent, safe and structured way, while building and developing life skills and character. This includes doing things like hospital visits (reading or entertaining hospital patients), teaching under-privileged children, caring for the elderly or orphans, environment clean-ups, etc. The list of options is endless. Our job is to give you the chance to interact with pockets of need within our community and do meaningful work that will uplift those around them, in small or big ways.

The character and skill building comes with the service work. Not only do we teach children to “give” and “serve”, we also want them to learn from the experience and use it as a means to broaden their horizons and experience settings in situations they wouldn’t otherwise have access to and develop core skills that will empower them in school and beyond.

P.S. “Mawada” is Arabic for unity, goodwill and compassion. To us, it represents the core of what we hope to experience ourselves and bring to others.

3) Who is your target audience and why?

For now, we’re focused on providing these experiences for children aged 9-18 in the UAE. We’re starting with a focus on Sharjah and Dubai and hope to expand to other cities eventually. Why 9+? Because we truly believe in the transformative power that these experiences have on children and want to develop their sense of “social awareness” and “service to others” from a young age. That way, it will become an ingrained habit.

Because the UAE is a fantastic place to live, children are rarely exposed to the areas of need in a society and don’t get to interact with those who are struggling in different ways. We want them to have that exposure and to use it to build on and add to what they’re learning at school.

While our focus is children for now, we will likely expand to providing similar opportunities for adults in the near future. That would include corporate trainings and corporate social responsibility (CSR) events for employees.

4) In many Western high schools and universities, students have to complete a certain number of community services hours in order to graduate. Unfortunately, in many educational institutions in the MENA region this requirement does not exist. Why do you think this is the case?

I think the structure of society is quite unique in the UAE. Thankfully, most of the people here are fortunate and blessed in many ways. What this does is it keeps the areas of “need” and “struggle” slightly out of sight. Whereas in a place like the U.S., you see homeless people on the streets, we don’t have that here. I think the fact that there is thankfully less need and it’s less visible means that this requirement isn’t as pressing here as it is elsewhere.

I also think we’re simply not used to seeing structured and organized efforts of community-service work and volunteerism. It’s not yet part of our social fabric, and we don’t grow up seeing it all around us, like you would in other countries. While it’s in our DNA to do good and be kind where we can, it’s the structure and organization around it that I think is lacking, and that’s what we hope to bring. We would love for community-service hours to become a graduation and even work requirement across schools, universities and companies across the UAE, and have been happy to see a slow, but growing, movement towards that in many places.

5) Does The Mawada Project intend to work with UAE schools to introduce the culture of volunteerism? If so, how?

Yes, definitely. We plan to take our programs and events to schools so that students can participate more regularly and have access to these kinds of experiences directly through their schools. We’ll do this by organizing weekend and after-school programs that fit into the school schedule. While we will always offer our services to individuals, we hope that by going through schools, more students are transformed by the experiences and we do more good!

6) What advice do you have for young people who want to be socially active, but whose parents don’t see the value in volunteering, because it takes them away from their studies and family responsibilities?

We need to start looking at the long-term, big-picture of things. Of course, studying and family responsibilities are important, I am certain that the experiences and learnings that can be gained from service-work and volunteerism will only add to and not detract from them.

Students who have given their time in service realize the importance of their privilege, the importance of their education and the ways in which they have a responsibility towards others. This makes them better students, better learners and more mindful, caring, positive individuals. There’s also research that suggests that “giving” increases levels of happiness. It’s a win-win-win for everyone, on all levels. Don’t give up and show your family and parents and loved ones that by giving your time to others, you’re also helping yourself and them.

7) What advice do you have for parents who want to make their children more socially aware and active? What if their children aren’t interested? What can parents do to make volunteering appealing to them?

One thing that we’ve seen in our programs is that most people don’t realize how great the experience is going to be until they try it. Students and children may fear that they’re not going to know what to do or that it’ll be awkward in some way. As soon as they get into it and immerse themselves in the experience (with our training and support, of course) they love it!

Being able to make a positive difference in someone else’s life is empowering and intoxicating in the best of ways. Give them the responsibility – have them come up with the ideas and solutions rather than telling them how or what to do. Encourage them to try it once or twice and I’m almost certain they’ll warm up to it.

 

8) Is there any way that members of the wider UAE community can support The Mawada Project? If so how? 

There are a few things that would be helpful to us at this stage.

1. Spread the word – if you know any children (or their parents) between the ages of 9 and 18, let them know about us and our program. We’d love for as many kids as possible to join us and be transformed.

2. Service opportunities (areas of need) – if there are areas of need that you notice or know of around you, please let us know. We’d love to find ways to organize our events and programs around any areas of need in the community.

3. Group packages – if you are in charge of a school or company and want a large number of your members to experience what we offer, please feel free to reach out. We’re more than happy to create custom solutions and packages that will meet your needs and allow you to learn through group service-work experiences.

9) What project(s) is The Mawada Project working on currently and how would you like to see the startup grow?

We’ve just had a few small pilot programs and we’re ready for a full launch. We’re currently working on our fall set of weekend service-programs. These will be available in packages of 8-10 weekends and we’re excited to engage as many students as possible.

10) How can people learn more about you and your project(s)?

Make sure to visit our website (which will be renovated and updated soon) and follow us
on our social media accounts on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, as we start to generate content and stay tuned to our updates! Or, feel free to email: be@themawadaproject.org to be added to our mailing list.

Like what you see? Join the Soukie Speaks email list and follow my Twitter, Instagram, Facebook accounts, so we can enlighten, support and empower the Arab leaders and entrepreneurs of the future together. 

3 Ways Conferences Can Build Youth Capacity: ROTA Empower 2016 Case Study

This year, I had the great honor of being invited to attend the Reach Out To Asia Empower 2016 youth conference, where 450 delegates between the ages of 17-30 gather annually to discuss pressing issues that impact global communities. Unlike many conferences hosted in the MENA region, the Empower conferences are unique, because they are planned by youth for youth. In fact, I don’t believe the average age of the conference organizers or participants exceeded 23 and that young energy was definitely tangible.

Youth Conference Best Practices

I have attended many conferences before, but I feel that the Empower 2016 conference has a special place in my heart, because it consistently strived to promote youth empowerment and leadership through every aspect of the conference’s brainstorming, planning and execution process. Luckily for us, Reach Out To Asia’s annual Empower conferences have created a simple and repeatable model that any country can use to creatively start building human capital in young people. Here are the 4 elements that made the Empower 2016 conference a success for me and the reasons why global youth conference organizers should start incorporating these best practices.

1-   Skillfully Defined S.M.A.R.T Objectives

The most important ingredient for the success of any organization or enterprise are S.M.A.R.T (Sustainable, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound) goals. Passion is nothing without discipline and that’s why having well-defined goals or aligning yourself with an existing vision is important. By choosing to focus on the theme of youth social entrepreneurship and how it can be used to engage youth to contribute to the achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Qatar 2030 National Vision, the Empower 2016 organizers skillfully tried to redirect all of the delegates’ energy and efforts to fulfill the macro goals of each of these global and national visions. Nowadays, our problem isn’t a lack of ideas, money or talent, it’s a lack of direction. Imagine if every youth conference held across the world decided to redirect all of its participants’ activities  towards a specific national or global agenda? The world would be a different place. However, it isn’t only the responsibility of conference organizers to make sure that social enterprises are aligned with nation or global-wide development initiatives, it is also the responsibility of individual entrepreneurs to make sure that their efforts are also contributing to the “bigger picture.” So, whether you’re an organizer or a delegate, next time you attend a conference, think about how you can leverage your enterprise to fuel a larger vision.

2- Represented Youth in Every Aspect of the Conference

Every August, a committee of several Qatari-based youth come together to choose the conference theme, speakers and activities, which take place during the jammed-pack 3 day Empower conference every year. Not only are youth responsible for choosing the theme of the Empower conferences, they are also involved as volunteers and speakers. No matter where you Iooked throughout the Empower conference, you saw young volunteers herding participants to sessions, giving them their lunch vouchers or answering their queries. Furthermore, almost everyone of the 48 workshops that were offered over the 3 days was conducted by a young person between the ages of 17-30, which was a very exciting thing for someone who has only ever attended workshops conducted by seasoned professionals. For the first time in a long time, I really felt that age had nothing to do with experience or the potential impact that young people could have on the world. According to the Deloitte Millennial Survey conducted in January 2014, 75% of the global workforce in 2025 will be made of millennials. With that in mind, it is crucial that more conferences adopt the Empower conference model, so we can hone the skills, confidence and passion of this age group over the next 10 years. Nobody understands the shortcomings in our labor markets, socio-economic structures and educational systems more than our youth and it’s time that we give these “experts” more platforms to share their problems and hopefully their solutions.   

3- Created Global Opportunities through Networking

Anybody who works in marketing will tell you that you can have the greatest product in the world, but if you don’t market it it will never be successful. During the Empower 2016 conference, I was so impressed by the passion, ingenuity and innovation of all the participants involved. Their tenacity was truly admirably, but unfortunately, many of them had been laboring in isolation or obscurity until the Empower 2016 conference. Every person I met had a unique story, which gave me a new perspective of the world and my role in it. Also, with every new person I met came the opportunity to expand the influence and reach of our respective projects, by exchanging contacts and exploring mutual synergies. As the conference progressed, the question that often came to my mind wasn’t “are we dreaming enough?” the question became “are we dreaming big enough?” because I felt that every person I met had the capacity to grow their enterprise and impact, if they had the right guidance and support. While every aspect of the Empower conference was valuable, I believe that the most valuable was the networking opportunities it provided, because it allowed us to establish new and global advocates that would give each one of us the courage and resources to persist in our respective nascent entrepreneurial ecosystems.  More conferences need to shed the light on youth-driven social enterprises like Empower 2016, because it is these entrepreneurs who are helping the world innovate its way to a better future.

Conclusion: We need to change our narrative

My participation in the Empower 2016 conference cemented one important idea: the time for change is always now. As a young global citizen, I am fed up of hearing the tired old narrative of the self-absorbed “Me Generation” with their selfie sticks and their hashtags. Yes, I do take the occasional selfie and I might jokingly using hashtags in my conversations, but I am not self-absorbed and neither are the hundreds of delegates that attended the Empower 2016 conference. We care about our communities and we want people to pay attention to the growing number of youth who are innovating despite the harsh socio-economic realities they face on a daily basis. The Empower 2016 conference helped me realize that each one of us has the ability to change our narrative, but we can’t do it alone. We don’t need anyone’s permission to shine, but we do need more platforms to promote cultures and ecosystems that will allow us to share our passion with others.

My generation has decided to take back their narrative, now the only questions that remains is what role will you, social influencers and decision-makers, play in our new narrative?

Like what you see? Join the Soukie Speaks email list and follow my Twitter, Instagram, Facebook accounts, so we can enlighten, support and empower the Arab leaders and entrepreneurs of the future together. 

5 Questions Every Entrepreneur Needs to Ask Themselves Before Starting a Business

Since joining the world of entrepreneurship in September 2014, I have learned a lot about startups, team building and lean business models. But I learned even more about myself in the process. At the risk of sounding like a self-help cliché, I really think that entrepreneurship is one of the most rewarding, yet exhausting, journeys that a person can take into themselves. While many might blame the lack of investors, limited budgets or an unprepared team for the failure of a business, I’ve found that most successes and failures stem from an entrepreneurs’ unwillingness or inability to understand themselves.

Business is all about personalities. So, while you may have an MBA from UPENN or Stanford, if you don’t understand your strengths and weaknesses and how “to hack” your
personality, that degree isn’t going to do much for you. In the startup world, understanding what you’re all about is even more important for two reasons. Firstly, a startup’s “persona” is heavily dependent on the personality of its founder. So, whatever strengths or weaknesses you have as an individual will inevitably be reflected in your startup in some way shape or form. Seeing as most startups have small teams with tight budgets, they don’t have the luxury of outsourcing your “weaknesses” to another department. Consequently, it is imperative for startup leaders to know themselves if they want to be successful.

Another important thing to realize is that the startup world is completely different from the corporate world. So, don’t think that an ivy league education or a long career in fortune 500 companies will completely prepare you for grassroot entrepreneurship- especially in the Arab world. Whether you “fail” or succeed in entrepreneurship, there is so much that you can learn about who you are, what matters and purpose. If you are open to change, that is. If you are considering joining the startup world, in the MENA region or beyond, here are 5 questions you need to ask yourself before you take the leap:

1) Why am I doing this?

This is one of the most important questions to ask yourself, because your reasoning will inform all the decisions and actions that you take in your entrepreneurial journey. Having the right intention is crucial when you are trying to do something and succeed. Wanting to become an entrepreneur because you want to be rich, famous or Steve Jobs is not good enough. This kind of thinking will not carry you through the tough times, and there will be many of them, which is why you want to choose a reason, or reasons, that will provide you some kind of sustainable momentum. Passion will ebb and flow, but if your intention is good, i.e. to improve people’s lives, make the world a cleaner, more sustainable place etc, you will always find a way to propel yourself forward. Thought is the basis of any action, so make sure that your thoughts are clear and purposeful, so your actions are the same. Be real and you will find real purpose.

2) Do I have a positive relationship with myself?

For some people, this might seem like a strange question, but believe me when I say that your personal and entrepreneurial success rely heavily upon the kind of relationship that you have cultivated with yourself throughout your life. If you are the kind of person who is overly self-critical or self-loathing, you’re probably also the kind of person who looks for external approval. In an ecosystem that is defined by risk-taking, quirky personalities and a colorful array of positive and negative feedback, an entrepreneur with low self-esteem will not do well. Entrepreneurship is all about breaking social, economic and cultural norms, so by its very nature entrepreneurship is an act of rebellion that goes unappreciated by most. Being able to be comfortable with who you are, making mistakes, admitting you are wrong and, last but not least, being able to recalibrate accordingly are all  traits that make a great entrepreneur. Be comfortable in your skin and you will find the confidence to navigate any situation.

3) Am I a reflective person?

The ability to review what you have done in the past and identify new ways to improve yourself and your business is essential when it comes to running a successful startup. Nobody grows by staying the same and the only way you can stay the same is to persist in a never-ending state of denial. Just remember, you can’t be good at everything, but entrepreneurship is not about being the best solo act in town. That’s why you have a team! Not only can finding the right team mates optimize your strengths, they can also reduce your weaknesses as a business. So, make sure to take some time to understand your quirks, ticks and triggers, because the more you understand them the easier it will be for you and your team to deal with them and thrive. By regularly reflecting on your life and business you will be able to understand what each needs, which will ultimately help you make the decisions that need to be made to make your startup a success at each stage. Be willing to understand yourself and you will make wiser choices.

4) How do I like to work?

Do you work well under pressure? Do you like to work at night? Can you work at home? These are all questions that you should have the answers to before you take the entrepreneurial leap, as they will help you streamline your schedule and improve your efficacy. One of the reasons that most entrepreneurs leave the “conventional workforce” is because they don’t like the rigidity of the 9-5 life, so why would you try to reproduce it in your own startup? Sometimes the uncertainty of the entrepreneurial lifestyle makes us slip into old routines and “comfortable” habits. But the problem is that those habits were never comfortable because you liked them, they were comfortable because you got used to them. That being so, entrepreneurship is all about “hacking” your lifestyle, so don’t slip into old habits, especially if they promote inefficient and unproductive workstyles. With that in mind, take some time to identify when and how you do your best work and make sure you do it that way. Be true to your internal rhythms, so you can find that “optimal groove.”

5) Do I know how to say no? 

Setting boundaries for yourself can be difficult, especially if you live in an Asian, African or Arab context. In these cultures, saving face is a big deal. So, if you’re new to the Arab and entrepreneurial world, you will probably find yourself asking: was that insh’Allah a yes or a no? Is that person avoiding my calls, so they don’t have to say no and disappoint me? These are just two examples of how someone might try to politely say no in the Arab world. In fact, if you grew up in the East, you might find yourself using some of these strategies, especially with family members. While the “cultures of no” may differ around the world, one thing remains true: saying yes may feel easier than saying no in the moment, but every yes has a “cost.” Regardless of your culture, you should try to train yourself to say no when it counts, because saying yes all the time will affect you and your startup adversely at some point. Be willing to say no, so your family, friends and team mates will appreciate it when you say yes.

Like what you see? Join the Soukie Speaks email list and follow my Twitter, Instagram, Facebook accounts, so we can enlighten, support and empower the Arab leaders and entrepreneurs of the future together.