Our Idea for Real Change

Pakistan at the moment houses the largest number of youth in its history. It is a great tragedy that the majority of these youth can be categorized under disadvantaged young people. Families, communities, schools and religious institutions have hurt these young people badly. It is a matter of the greatest concern for us that we have not been able to benefit from the talents, creative abilities and potential of these countless disadvantaged, socially-excluded and half-educated young people living in low-income communities. They are feeling brokenness, isolation, hopelessness and helplessness because of lack of access to interrelated dimensions such as economic, social and participation in decision-making. These young people, if not valued, will continue to be a prescription for disaster for themselves and for others. It is a time that we should stop walking-by and looking-down at these young people.

We believe that we are sitting on a tickling time bomb. We have already seen that in the recent times so many vulnerable young people in Pakistan have been brainwashed and exploited by the extremist for committing heinous crimes such as suicidal attacks. The numbers of these at-risk young people are increasing everyday in Pakistan. Unfortunately, the number of these young people has never been lit on the billboards of the cities so that everyone can see it. If we spend a small proportion of the amount we are spending on countering terrorism or dealing with terrorism in engaging young people living in low-income communities we would change our country. The reason for growing terrorism in Pakistan is that terrorists find it so easy to reach out to vulnerable young people and offer them things that are missing in their lives such as a sense of purpose, a sense of usefulness, an emotional bond with others, a sense of connection and a chance to build a new identity.

Our idea is based on the concept that we should stop treating young people as empty vessels into which we pour our wisdom and instead we should treat young people as the most promising resource available to us in developing a new societal structure and meeting the high service needs of our communities. It is a program that envisions young people as part of the solution rather than part of the problem and a major force to bring positive change in the communities. We have demonstrated at various locations that once these socially excluded, marginalized, under-served and half-educated young people are provided structured opportunities to prove themselves they can be change champions.

In order to meet our goals of youth re-branding, our current idea of change necessitates that youth demonstrate their capacity for positive effectiveness within society. We assist youth in establishing the opportunity to demonstrate their effectiveness by intervening into disadvantaged areas, wherein our ideas can best be proven (i.e; areas with high numbers of at-risk or marginalized young people, high crime, poverty or illiteracy rates). We have already proven that this idea is an investment with many returns for disadvantaged youth and the communities they serve. It has helped several hundred disadvantaged youth in transforming themselves from victims to leaders.

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