E-Course ' Youth and the MDGs'

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ABOUT THE E-COURSE

The free online grant awarding course – “Youth and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)” – has been successfully conducted in its first phase with the help of a unique partnership process between UNFPA Pakistan, Youth Action for Change (YAC) and Youth Dividend in 2010. With the aim of promoting awareness among the youth regarding the 8 MDGs, now in the third phase of the course, it reached more than 120 participants from over 33 countries around the globe.  Five course participants also received small grants to conduct community development projects around the theme of the MDGs. Building on the success of the first course, UNFPA Pakistan, YAC and Youth Dividend are planning to run six more sessions of this course in 2011. UNFPA Pakistan expressed their interest in providing technical and financial support for these courses and this document presents an evaluation of the pilot course run in 2010, along with a proposal for the courses to be run in 2011. 

                                         Objectives


1.      To provide youth participants in developing nations with an understanding of what Millennium Development Goals and their indictors are;
2.      To provide participants with the knowledge on the MDGs processes;
3.      To provide participants with knowledge on how to increase their participation in promoting MDGs
4.      To help participants learn about how they can contribute towards helping their communities achieve the MDG outcomes and empower them with the knowledge to design and start small community projects designed around the MDG outcomes
5.      To support funding for small community-based projects which engages young people in the achieving MDGs.
 

                                   Course Organizers

The details of the partner organizations are given below:


UNFPA Pakistan
UNFPA in Pakistan advocates and provides technical assistance for a multi-sectoral approach to improve sexual and reproductive lives,MDG’s,HIV/AIDS and gender issues, and overall well being of young people. The goal of UNFPA global framework for action on adolescents and youth is to provide access to health, including sexual and reproductive health information, education, RH commodities and services. The basis of youth program is on 4 key areas highlighted in the UNFPA Global Framework for Youth:

1) Support policy development
2) Provide education on sexual and reproductive health
3) Provide sexual and reproductive health services
4) Engage and work with young people. 
Focal Person: Ms. Sadia Atta Mehmood, [email protected]

Youth Action for Change(YAC)  
YAC is an innovative international non-profit organization run by youth volunteers from across the world. It implements unique programmes which equip young people with knowledge and skills that enable them to directly get involved in improving their communities’ livelihood.

YAC implements its work through two key streams – conducting outcome-oriented free online courses and promoting grassroots-targeted youth empowerment projects.
YAC now reaches thousands of young community leaders, students and youth activists in over 130 countries worldwide, and due to its innovative programs, it is a recipient of the Youth Action Net Award by the International Youth Foundation and Nokia, the World Aware Education Award of the North-South Centre of the Council of Europe and has been featured in many national and international media outlet, including the World Bank's 'World Development Report 2007', several publications by the UN, Oxfam, Associated Press, SBS Radio, La Repubblica, RAI, etc. Last year, YAC successfully completed seven free online courses and is currently exploring a number of potential partnership opportunities to grow even further this year. It is also expecting to launch courses in Spanish and Portuguese this year.

Youth Dividend
Youth Dividend is a dynamic youth-led organization in Pakistan working to develop, inform, inspire and mobilize young people through leadership training, peer education, awareness raising, skill building, policy and advocacy. Youth Dividend is primarily working to promote social entrepreneurship on national and international level.
Youth Dividend is committed to undertake the projects of Youth, Gender, Health and Education and serve the mankind as detailed below:  


1)  Create greater awareness on emerging youth issues, social, cultural, economic, legal and environmental.
2)  Empowering youth to come up with sustainable solutions
3)   Health and HIV/AIDS: Awareness, Prevention, Rights, Care & Support
4)   Providing Life Skills Based educations
5)  Build public awareness on reproductive health rights of young people and women so that they are able to exercise their Sexual Reproductive Health Rights.
6)   Awareness of achieving Millennium Development Goals
7)   Strengthening the decision making power of youth through training & advocacy.
8)   Secure commitment from Government and relevant ministries at policy level to prioritize young people's sexual and reproductive health rights, including comprehensive sexuality education & information, and youth friendly health services.

Focal Person: Hira and Hajra Hafeez Ur Rehman, [email protected] , [email protected]

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