African Education Program (AEP)

I am applying to The Elevate Prize because after years of developing a life-changing model that empowers young women and men to be the changemakers their communities need to end poverty in Kafue, Zambia, my work leading the African Education Program (AEP) is on the cusp of expanding throughout Zambia and Africa. 

AEP’s pilot after-school learning and leadership center is in the final stages of development. Currently serving 400 youth, the model is unique because it invests in its members for over a decade, starting as early as the age of five and continuing all the way through college. AEP knows that such a depth of investment in a child results in the leaders that their communities need to create lasting change.

If selected as an Elevate Prize winner, I would use the funding and support to amplify our work and find our place on the global stage as a thought leader on youth empowerment and quality education access. The Prize’s mentorship would be invaluable as AEP assesses how to package their model for replication so that we can begin to foster leaders eager to create change in a way that ripples throughout Zambia, Africa, and the globe.

Growing up, my Zambian soccer coach started practices with barefoot ball dancing to Zambian music while sharing about the challenges young Africans face. Inspired by our coach, two friends and I founded AEP in high school and shipped a container of books and computers to Kafue, Zambia. 

A grant-funded trip to Kafue allowed us to meet the community and this trip changed my life forever. Inspired by my Zambian peers, and responding to their pleas for a space providing an educational, creative, and safe environment, AEP opened its pilot after-school learning and leadership center in 2006.

Over the years, AEP’s model focused on providing resources, knowledge, and skills so young women and men in the program could reach their highest potential and be healthy, critically thinking, innovative leaders that seek to be changemakers in their community.

My vision is to replicate our model across Zambia and Africa so that thousands of young people can become the changemakers their communities and nations need. My purpose is to be a social impact influencer and lead by example, inspiring others to take their impact work to the next level so that together we can elevate humanity and end systemic poverty for good.

In Zambia, Africa, and globally, too many youth do not reach their full potential and become changemakers because they lack access to quality education, self-esteem building, and creative, critical thinking, and leadership skills development.  

66% of Zambia’s population (18 million) is under the age of 25, 60% live in poverty, and only 22% of boys and 17% of girls complete 12th grade. Worldwide, hundreds of millions of children reach young adulthood without the most basic skills, let alone the building blocks for a fulfilling life and leadership skills.

Factors contributing to this problem include lack of access to quality schools and quality teaching, food insecurity, lack of quality healthcare and housing, gender inequality, and lack of mentorship and leadership development.

At AEP’s after-school learning and leadership center, over 400 youth take advantage of programs focused on quality education through academic tutoring, leadership development, volunteerism, entrepreneurship, gender equity, self-esteem building, menstrual and overall health, HIV/AIDS, nutrition and food security, the arts and creativity. AEP also awards scholarships so youth can continue their education in secondary schools and colleges. AEP’s model is based on creating opportunities so youth can build resiliency, reach their full potential, break out of poverty, and become leaders.

AEP’s model is innovative because unlike most organizations that focus on a singular solution like scholarships, AEP takes a holistic approach to providing resources and opportunities so youth members can overcome any challenge they face to reach their full potential as critically thinking, innovative leaders. 

The model is disruptive because it stops poverty at the root by empowering young people to break the cycle of poverty at their individual, family, and community level while instilling a desire to be leaders and changemakers nationally and globally.

The model is innovative because it considers the unique challenges that each child faces over the years. Children and youth members come to the center several times a week over the course of many years, providing countless touchpoints to address the challenges holding a child back. AEP’s model is not a quick fix, it is a decade long investment. Once fully immersed, if a child wants to pull themselves out of poverty, they can take advantage of the resources provided maximizing their chances of success. This model creates opportunities for youth to discover their own unique gifts and talents and helps them break their cycle of poverty while becoming inspired leaders eager to create change.

AEP is having an impact on humanity by empowering young Zambians to reach their full potential and become the leaders that their communities, nation, and world need to break systemic poverty. 

AEP developed its model over the past fifteen years and its pilot after-school learning and leadership center is witnessing the fruit of this work. Alumni of the program, each of whom started in high school and went to college, are now real changemakers, creating solutions to bring their communities and Zambia out of poverty. Febby is working to change the landscape of special education for girls and boys with disabilities. Brighton is currently working on a solution to help his community overcome food insecurity in the face of climate change. Benard is training community members in entrepreneurship to improve their small businesses. And Mirriam will begin medical school soon to become a gynecologist as she hopes to change the reproductive health landscape for women in Zambia. 

The next step is to package AEP’s model so that it can be replicated across Zambia and Africa so that leaders are not being empowered in the hundreds, but in the thousands, ultimately creating an unstoppable force for social good and elevating humanity.