THE MENTORING AND CAPACITY BUILDING PROGRAM AT OLUBI MEMORIAL GRAMMAR SCHOOL, MOLETE IBADAN, OYO STATE ON 16TH OF MARCH 2017

The Mentoring and Capacity Building Program organised  by Youth Aid Development Initiativeheld at Olubi Memorial Grammar School, Molete Ibadan on Thursday March 17, 2017 achieved a stellar success.

The capacity building session was a great stride that positively impacted all the classes in senior secondary (SS1 - SS2) with the population of well over three hundred students (300), on thematic areas – “Career Development, Self Discovery, Entrepreneurship, Leadership Development, Effective Communication and Literacy, Child Rights and Basic Fundamental Human Rights, and the 17 United Nations SDGS as it relates to Civic Responsibilities”,
materials were distributed to the students that documented all the thematic discourse, while the training started exactly 8.30am and ended at 10.15am.

The training was pragmatic, interactive and well engaging, as all the students were asked questions relating to their career, ambitions and also taught on developing passion. Fidelis Bonaventure Uzoma introduced YADI and the operations of the organization and exposing them to the need to enjoy the sessions. Edward Itoyum, facilitated the Career Development, he taught on developing career path with the right attitude, passion, determination, and focus, citing accomplished people as a case study.  Omolara Alabi and Adelana Adebayo, both handled the same session on Self Discovery, facilitated with so much energy while they shared their experiences and stories as it relates to discovering oneself without thinking of one’s background as barrier. Francis Ezeudu, furthered the discourse on Leadership Development, having so much experience in training young people on leadership skills, he gave them few points empowering themselves as true and positive leaders in their communities. Mitchel Nnamdi Amaechi empowered them with Literacy Skill and Effective Communication while Kehinde Muraina taught them on how to build enterprising skills aside academics with self dependent spirit. Claire Elueze gave them few child rights and basic fundamental human rights, exposing them to the need to protect their respective rights and the right of others. While the thematic discourse ended with the clear understanding of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and as it relates to Civic Responsibilities by Afolabi Williams.

More so, after the training, a one-to-one interaction was done to impact the students individually with the facilitators. While on this process, a mentor mapping was done, while at least 5 students were mapped to each volunteer to create a long lasting relationship of progress on the students.

The unflinching support of the team cannot be underestimated following the roles of every resilient volunteer, Fidelis Bonaventure (Convener, YADI), Afolabi Williams (Project Director), Ehijozie (Graphics/Media), Edward Itoyum (Facilitator), Claire Elueze (Resource Officer), Kehinde Muraina (Group Secretary), Mitchel Amaechi (Facilitator), Omolara Alabi (Facilitator), Francis Ezeudu (Facilitator), Adelana Adebayo (Facilitator). 

Young African Diplomats Network is a non-profit organization; a youth and social development initiative established in 2014 with the aim of building a generation of young leaders, professional volunteers, aspiring captains of industries, and civic leaders towards becoming global leaders, ambassadors of transformational change and world class trailblazers in all sectors. Our mission is to educate, empower, mentor and improve the lives of young people especially under-served youths in urban and rural communities by promoting leadership development, entrepreneurship, training in life skills and diplomatic soft skills, mentorship program and enhancing life-long learning. Our overall goal is to bridge leadership gaps through literacy, youth capacity building and civic engagement initiatives in a bid to effect sustainable change and impact in the society.

As a pool of change-agents, the refinement of young minds and building of young leaders is central to our vision. It is our deep conviction that the African young person is a highly creative, innovative, specially gifted individual with a great potential for incredible transformation in the world. 

To achieve remarkable relevance for the African youth in the 21st century, YAD-Network dedicates itself to human capital development, grooming of leadership traits as well as training of young African minds by employing the decency of diplomacy.

Also, a noble course of sanitizing young people who characterize one-third of the world’s population, YouthAid creates a platform for young progressive thinking people all over the world, (especially Africans) to uphold the top-notch values of human service and humanitarianism as well as collaborating as “Think-Tanks” in solving educational challenges.A

few recommendations below will help us for sustainability.

Firstly, as much as we are impact driven, we will ensure effective communication with the school to address their challenges and bridge the government gap and other NGOs to help build their school.

Next, it was strongly observed that there are brilliant and exceptional students in that marginalised community on several subjects pertaining to their classes, both literature and mathematics. Therefore, we’ll introduce book clubs, competitions (e.g Maths Competition, Reading Competition, Spelling Bee etc.) that would assist these young students financially and expose them to opportunities, or award program that can be organised for them, this would create a better platform for students in marginalised communities.
Lastly, we believe in synergy and collaborative efforts in building a society that is resilient and developed, however, we would channel several partnerships and with as many other young people that can take up responsibilities in ensuring this project replicates in other places.

Afolabi WILLIAMS,

Project Director.