Grooming Brilliance

My name is Elijah Moses, I hail from Nigeria, I'm 21 years old, I'm a senior undergrad student, studying Physics at the federal university of technology, Owerri. I am a social-entrepreneur with a focus on Community building and Literacy. I started this cause of change 5 years ago in 2015, though I was quite young in stature yet my passion to drive mutual transformation within the context of Literacy specially within peri-urban communities has ever been burning even after recently given an ambassadorial privilege from a renowned global literacy foundation.

In 2018, I and some group of young passionate individuals began a communal education program for 30-80 children and young adults within a rural community in Lagos state, Nigeria. Giving free tutoring to the less privileged who couldn't afford the tuition fee for private schools, this has yielded great results putting smiles on the face of countless families.

We believe in Literacy as the core for lifelong learning and education, so when we help someone to acquire literacy skills, we empowering them to afford better opportunities in life and breaking the poverty cycle.

The Grooming Brilliance initiative is aimed at driving grass-root development through the agency of Literacy geared towards sustainable growth within lagged communities.

1) People completely or functional illiterate face the prospect of poor health outcomes, welfare dependency, gender inequality and a lack of social cohesion, our project aims at reducing this growing margin.

2) Literacy significantly enhances a person’s ability to access, understand and apply information about health to make accurate decisions thus building the social fabric of any Nation.

3) Illiteracy costs the global economy $1.5 trillion annually. Literacy is the foundation of community and economic development. We are bridging the difference gap between the communal underdevelopment and urbanization.

It's estimated that nearly more than 750 million adults around the world are functionally illiterate, and two-thirds of them are women. Another 250 million children of primary school age do not have a grasp of basic literacy skills, more than 35% of the Africa population are unable to read and write. This results to the growing gap of underdevelopment mostly among nations with high population scale thus leading to increased tension between respective socioeconomic fabrics; Statistics has proved that poverty thrives predominantly with illiteracy.

The problem we are trying to solve is helping grass-root communities gain access to practical educational resource thereby increasing the positive growth margin and well-being of nations.

We believe that Illiteracy is a problem because without the right literacy foundation to foster growth and economic development, the risk for heightened social dissonance, war, underdevelopment and corruption will keep being a prevalent issue drilling through communities which are the basic structure for a functional society.

The Growing Brilliance Initiative is a literacy based project aimed at proffering creative and critical tools (often innovative services) for improving communities using educational utilities for social impact.

The Growing Brilliance Initiative does the following:

1) Empowering of children within the ages of (9-16) with the basic and advanced learning advantage. Also, it provides opportunity for young adult who yearns to do more mentally with a focus on social change.

2) The project aims at building knowledge driven communities having access to digital tools geared at both individual and communal progress.

3) Furthermore, this project is creatively designed to offer young individuals within the ages of (17-25) the entrepreneurial launchpad for achieving their dreams in life which ultimately transform their communities and nation at large.

We were given a free social space by some communal authorities,wide enough for delivering our services. Merging digital technology and innovative educational practices covering entrepreneurship and relevant social guide are the learning toolbox we plan on using in achieving our goals. So far, there has been good result with few feasible testing.

Communities that are functionally challenged specifically in areas related to literacy are our central focus. Our project targets children and young adults who are mentally mild and functionally illiterate. 

We carry surveys to understand the challenges that faces these communities categorically. We organize awareness programs that are focused on helping these people to understand the relevance of literacy and their overall inputs to the development of the community.

We bridge the gap that exist between opportunities and literacy, ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education thus helping communities to thrive.

Here is a short review we got from a senior citizen who had two grandchildren to cater for, among the several others; she said with tears in her eyes "I am grateful to you for giving my grandchildren the privilege to be able to see their dreams come true, keep helping others get better, it'll pay off in due time!".

Our Project crisscross several dimension of social impact; we are not just integrating people for social development, we are also breaking negative belief cycle thereby extracting opportunities from prevalent unsolved problems.

Growing up in a rural community opened my eyes to see a lot of opportunities disguised as problem. Though I was young, yet I have always known within myself that I was capable of proffering answers to the impediment which faced countless lives within my social space.

I taught for three years in a school and four tutoring centers, this further sharpens my critical and creative skill, giving me a practical guide towards the idea generation and development.

My team and I began working on this initiative fully on January 1st, 2018, though the idea was born in 2015. We were just three initially, currently we're a group of ten persons with a handful of contract volunteers.

My family were the first supporter of this initiative, after a while other individuals showed sincere interest

I was out of school for 3 years during the formative period of my life, thanks to my mom who took up the role of a tutor, teaching all my three siblings and I to brilliance. She kindles within me the flames of creative change.

Tears comes to my eyes when I see little children roaming the streets aimlessly, sometimes they play with dumps. Seeing young adults engage in social vices and community nuisance pulls the strings of my heart, I just can't watch others grinding in the dust of mediocrity and ignorance. 

I love my community, the social landscape and cultural diversity ignites within me the passion to drive socioeconomic change.

Although in 2017, I almost gave up on the Idea but my primary conviction kept me going.

I am an educator though self-trained with over three years of experience, I am also a communicator and a public speaker, currently I'm a programmer with a focus on (Data Science and AI).

I'm also a seasoned content developer, a public relation personal, A strategist and an Innovative design thinker, working remotely for three growing startups in Nigeria. I have a knack at creative and critical skills and much more. I have volunteered for a couple of community development programs which has instilled within me the essence of responsibility.

Presently I'm enrolled in a one year program on global leadership and a six month ambassadorial program on world literacy.

Having gone through some of these training and gathered experiences from the past, I have gained the right sets of lenses to view the world in relation to community development and my nation at large. These skills and many more have proved to be productive in my quest so far.

There was certain scenario which had the potential of crashing our initiative, certain persons thought initially that we were too young to "transform our community, not to consider the world", the inexperience, financial restrain and societal setbacks we encountered during the primary development of the idea awakened within me the desire to learn problem resolution tactics with a focus on communal cooperation. Irrespective of the naysayers and pessimists feedback, we persevered up till this day.

During the first six month, we had scarce financial resources, but budgeting the available was sufficient for feasibility testing which created a good turnout and public image.

The challenges we faced when we started were premium indicator for our Idea sustainability.

Most rural and peri-urban communities face the high tendency of social nuisance due to underdevelopment and narrowness of perspective among the settlers.

There was dispute between two ethic race within the community which could have raised an unfavorable ethic clash resulting to social vices, through pragmatic and tactical problem resolution intervention, I was able to pull out the logs from the flames amicable.

Being able to resolve and build cooperation between the offended parties, making them to view the problem without biases had the most profound effect upon them.

We are merging digital technology and innovative educational practices covering entrepreneurship and relevant social guide are the learning toolbox we are using in achieving our goals.

Digital literacy is also our cutting edge amidst the global pandemic challenge. We have plans on grooming sustainable communities that are digitally driven to achieve tangible regional cumulative results.

From our survey, this project from an overview is centered on 85% of the community which includes 40% of young adults and 45% of children. Though, out of this large chunk, we are for now specifically focusing on 30% of the children and 25% of the young adults in comparison to the vast social space.

Each classes are held in theory, practical reviews, methods and processes of interaction are creatively designed, knitted with social entrepreneurship as a driving force.

Our main objective is to help each of the participants gain competencies and ethics in conducting, and harnessing problems within their social space and much more.

Our students over a short period of time develop critical and creative abilities thereby utilizing deductive, absorptive and strategic reasoning in proffering answer to the pressing issues they confront.

Our long term objective is to create a cumulative impact in the nation forged out of the resource and talent pool which will emerge from this project.

We know if all things being equal, we will be able to smoothly run our operations irrespective of the local policies for land usage and community levy. 

Currently we are serving over 80 people with a minimum growth potential of 400 people in 2021 and a minimum of 3000 people in 2025. The numbers are bound to geometrically increase with sufficient funds being available and effective budgeting.

By 2021, we plan on empowering over 300 children and 200 young adults with quality literacy skill and digital exposure.

By 2025, we would have empowered over 1900 children and 1100 young adults within 20 communities. After 2025, we plan on branching into neighboring countries such as Cameroon and Ghana. We know this is feasibly possible because if it can start with one, it can work for all!.

The only barrier that exist is financial (insufficient funds), we have done a lot with what we have but 45% of the families we offer our services to are average income earners while 55% are low income earners. With good funding, our targets and social impact will progressively grow.

One good resource we have currently at hand are noble volunteers who are willing to accept little compensation just to ensure that each child is groom well.

We write proposals to social organizations soliciting for fund so as to expand our impact, this has proven to be great in recent times.

Most support we had up till this time came from willing parents and religious organizations who believed in our Vision.

We are giving out creative and critical tools (often innovative services) for improving communities using educational utilities for social impact. Our major value offer is quality learning experience and digital exposure for both children and young adults.

No one wants to be ostracized; Our quality resource assets of free categorized books, lectures, seasoned programs and entrepreneurial training pulls the communities towards us.

We help our market( children, parents and young adults) accomplish their dreams through uncompromising subsidiary which includes our services. 

As of now, we have a partial sustained income due to the rising literacy demands in these communities. We try as much as possible to ensure that the primary donations and profits made from our services are re-invested into the business to build our foundation stronger. 

We have defined predictive financial model that will take effect once we receive sufficient grant and revenue improves. This has been our hope for better outcome and business growth.

Donation so far from 2018 till date has been $350. In 2020, we had $100 from donations, though this might look small but we've accomplished much. From our initial investment of $100, we have been able to raise $180 in revenue. Total revenue minus current expenses equals $130.

From our calculation, we estimated that we will need $95,000 for full operation, covering intensive training, logistics and programs. We plan on building a school in the nearest future, fashioned with both entrepreneurial and digital literacy where these children and young adults are groomed adequately to lessen the social problems that befalls the vast majority within these communities.

Our current expenses so far for 2020 is $150, we try as much as possible to reduce any financial fatigue this year.

The only barrier that exist is financial (insufficient funds), we have done a lot with what we have but 45% of the families we offer our services to are average income earners while 55% are low income earners. With good funding, our targets and social impact will progressively grow.

I am applying for the elevate prize because of the potential it presents for this project, with the aid of this prize, we would be able increase our social impact by a factor of 300%, weeding out present limitation and fostering a consistent growth path for all participants. My only desire is to put smiles on the faces of the countless children as they are efficiently and effectively equipped to make their dream a success.

I cannot estimate fully the number of lives that will be helped through this grant but I'm certain that the future of these developing communities will get better through this aid.

Apart from the prize given to us, we would also love to be mentored by professionals who have tremendously advanced in fields related to us. We don't want to be like the rest who began in previous years but stopped due to restrains, we believe in excellence for "what is worth doing is worth training for".

We would love to partner with UNICEF, ECOWAS, UNESCO, UNO and organizations who are focused on sustainable development specifically in the area of education and gender equality.

Partnering with these organization can aid our national acceptance and relevance thereby giving us a voice in the decision making process of these communities, states and nations at large. We are ready to build, all we need are the right connections to make our vision a sustained reality.