Re-branding the image of Youth
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Youth Engagement Services (YES) Network Pakistan Re-branding the image of Youth |
Home Our Theory of Change Methodology Accomplishments Programs Contact Our Request Our Team Ali Raza Khan Ali is from Lahore, Pakistan, where he earned his BA and Masters in Political Science focusing on Development Politics. He also holds a one-year diploma in documentary making from GNN in Montreal and has completed one-year master program in community organizing and development in McGill University, in addition, to his participation in short training courses in Johns Hopkins University, USA. He is the Founder and Director of Youth Engagement Services (YES) Network Pakistan/PNYS. He has a lifelong devotion to empower every young person in Pakistan, to make significant contributions to their own lives and to revitalize their communities. His driving forces “Action without vision is pointless, vision without action is fruitless combined, and it could lead to great things”. His checklist for change includes “developing the confidence, skills and clear action” to empower youth and achieve results. He has developed modules and materials to mobilize young people of his country to constructive action and has set up many small youth groups throughout Pakistan for collective and self-help actions. He is the CEO and President of YES Network Pakistan. He is implementing his projects in underprivileged rural areas all over the country. He has provided inspiration and vision to large number of young people across country. He has a wide experience of working with youth, which is filled with change and challenge; visioning; planning and program development; innovative and social action initiatives and much cooperative exciting work both within and outside the country. He has extensive experience in conceptualizing, designing and successfully implementing youth development programs. He is a very effective trainer and has conducted over 100 capacity building workshops in the filed of leadership development, gender, communication, participatory learning for action, values, reproductive health, team building, community mobilization, community organizing, etc for all segments of population in partnership with local, national and international organizations. He has played a pioneer role in designing and implementing first-ever youth service and sexual reproductive health programs for under-served and at-risk youth. He is taking a very innovative, pro-active and integrative approach to youth involvement as a way to meet the high service needs of the society and to head-off violence and crime from the society. He is very instrumental in reaching out to heard-to-reach and socially excluded young girls and women living in an under resourced and victimizing environments. His strategies have contributed immensely in creating local women champions and leaders in many of the low-income communities. He with his team of youth service volunteers has established over 150 female multi-functional learning centers in various parts of Pakistan, including border areas where there is hardly any opportunity and infrastructure for the promotion and protection of human rights of women and girl children. These centers have already provided a wide range of services to over 6000 young girls and women. He is continuously seeking for new opportunities and tools to empower disadvantaged girl children and women. Currently, he is using video documentaries to highlight the miseries, injustice and inequality being faced by countless girl children and women in Pakistan. He is committed to innovation and consistently seeks to pioneer new and cost-effective strategies, models and implementation methods that result in solution based youth movements. He believes that creative ideas are needed to resolve problem that continue to plague young people. His model of working with youth is gaining increasing support internationally as a vibrant alterative for at-risk and disadvantaged youth. He has won numerous awards worldwide. Ali is the first male youth from Pakistan who is conferred upon the status of “Sauve Scholar” by the Jeanne Sauve Foundation in Canada. He has also conferred upon the first youth service award by Jawan Pakistan. He is bestowed upon with Government Color and University Blue award. He is frequently invited by leading education institutions in the world for talks on youth. He is also invited by the UN to participate in their High Level Dialogue on youth in Geneva in 2005. He is selected as a fellow by the international leadership program in California for the year 2005-6. He has the honor of meeting with the outstanding leaders of the world. Recently, he had the pleasure of meeting with the former US President Bill Clinton in Washington, DC. He is elected as an Ashoka fellow from Pakistan in year 2006. He is also recently selected as an “Architect of the Future” by Waldzell institute in Austria. His referees call him “an inspirational young leader who is constantly in motion and is infecting others with enthusiasm, optimism and can-do attitude.” He has traveled widely and participated in many international programs ad activities. His vision is “Youth as the solution, not as the problem." As a student, he was named Captain of Government College Lahore Cricket team and best player of the University of Punjab. Ali speaks Urdu, English, Punjabi and Hindi. Ms. Kulsoom A. Meraj Ms. Kulsoom is the Vice President of YES Network Pakistan. Ms. Kulsoom A. Meraj did her Masters (Hons.) in Poultry Husbandry from University of Agriculture Faisalabad in 1998. During her Post-graduation, in 1997, she has been engaged by Action Aid Pakistan and GTZ as a consultant for designing and conducting Initial Research for baseline survey by using PLA techniques; for compiling the initial survey and feasibility reports; analysing the data in Bahawal Nagar and on the existing livestock system and fodder in the area of Choochak. The exposure and experience of working with NGOs motivated her to venture into the field of social development. HEAL became her first love. After completion of her post-graduation, she joined HEAL in 1998 as Social Organizer and remained with them till September, 2005. However, HEAL acknowledged her potentials and contributions. So, she was elevated to Training Officer and ultimately Project Coordinator for “Education Program” and “Adolescent Reproductive Health Project”.During the stay at HEAL, she performed a multitude of tasks pertaining to her responsibilities, ranging from Community Mobilization, conducting and analysis of baseline surveys to development of training material and training roll out. She too has been responsible for preparing DIPs – Detailed Activity Plans – and monitoring the activities accordingly. Since October, 2005, she has been affiliated with JICA – DSP as Senior Trainer. Her assignments include planning of CCB facilitation interventions, development and roll out of trainings. She also has to supervise, support and report the trainings and CIP – CCB Implementation Plan - activities in the model district Hafizabad. She got her potentials harnessed through a wide number of trainings on multiples subjects conducted by most authentic names like NCRD, American Centre, WPF, ECI, CIDA, MDF- Asia, etc. She has conducted trainings on subjects like Communication and Presentation, Supervision Skills, Basic Health Education, Reproductive Health and CCB Rules, etc.She has three Publications and one research thesis on her credit. Rooshey Hasnain, Ed. D. Her objective in life is to develop, teach and direct national and international programs and research projects addressing the needs of individuals with disabilities and their families with a particular focus on diverse ethnic, racial, and linguistic populations. Her education includes Doctor of Education in Special Education, 2001 from Boston University, Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology from School of Education Lewis and Clark College and Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from University of Oregon. She has over 12 years of experience in the disability field working in various non-profit educational and research settings based in USA with a focus on racially and ethnically diverse populations. She has solid professional and academic experiences in project management and teamwork and extensive experience working with state and local agencies developing culturally proficient programs for racial and ethnic minority populations, particularly for new immigrants and refugees as well as providing training and technical assistance on diversity issues and disability, both nationally and internationally. Her professional experience includes teaching and supervising undergraduate students as well as advanced graduate fellows to grassroots community based organizations, to develop capacity-building projects that address issues of stigma and disability from a cross-cultural perspective. She also conducts workshops and presentations nationwide on cultural brokering processes as a means to bridge the gap between service systems and individuals from diverse ethic and cultural backgrounds and their families. She worked also as a Co-Principal Investigator and Project Director, Administration on Developmental Disabilities and Department of Labor Projects, Institute for Community Inclusion, University of Massachusetts -Boston, MA. She supervises and manages community capacity-building and systems change projects focusing on personal networks and employment for people with disabilities from diverse backgrounds. She has developed materials and provided technical assistance to minority agencies in grant development and service delivery; provided consultation to agencies to help them improve funding policy practices and leverage state and federal funding. Her publications are following:
Ms. Aliya Khalid Aliya is working as an Assistant Professor in Social Work Department of the Punjab University. She has been a major driving force to promote and initiate youth related programs in educational institutions. She is teaching course on human growth and behavior, social legislation and communication in Punjab University. She conducts and co-ordinates various trainings and researches for multidisciplinary teams every year. She has a wide range of experience of working in the field of social development. She has launched, assisted and designed several community based projects for the uplift of the marginalized segments of population. She has proven leadership skills of involving, managing, developing and motivating teams of young people to achieve their objectives. She is continuously exploring different and new avenues for the promotion of youth development programs. She is very good at mentoring and coaching students. She has attended a wide range of trainings on social development issues. She is an active member of alumni Association of Social Workers of the Punjab University Social Work Department, board Faculty of Arts, University of the Punjab Lahore and member Academic Forum University of the Punjab Lahore. She has several researches on sensitive topics on her credit. Ms. Tanveer Mujahid Tanveer Mujahid has been working in the area of education for over 30 years. She has dedicated her entire life in educating and training children especially from the under-privileged class. She has inspired many girls and women within her family and community to start-up their own social entrepreneurship programs. She has trained and educated over 5000 children. Many of her students have become outstanding leaders in various fields of social development. She has contributed immensely in the launching and implementing of youth service programs. Her personal philosophy is that the process of women’s empowerment must begin in the mind, by changing women’s consciousness. This means changing woman’s beliefs about herself and her rights, capacities and potential. Ms. Uzma Quresh Ms. Uzma Quresh is working as Project Coordinator, Action Aid, for ‘CIDA Empowering Home Based Women Workers Project’ since October 2006 to date. She did her MSc in Organizational Psychology from Quaid-e-Azam University in 2002. She acted as Managing Editor of the Quarterly Gender Newsletter of Mubariza from 2003-2005. She worked as Program Coordinator for Gender Resource Centre, Pehchan, Rozan, Islamabad from Aug 2004 to Dec 2005. She also acted as Program Officer, Pehchan from Sept 2002 to July 2004. She facilitated trainings and training of trainers (TOT) on gender and development; gender sensitization; gender analysis and planning; self-awareness; emotional health and violence against women and children. She worked as a consultant “Livelihood Workshop Coordinator” at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations from May 15, 2006 – June 30, 2006. Ms. Uzma Quresh worked as Project Officer and Psychologist for Psychosocial Project 'Umeed' for Rozan in collaboration with Danish Red Cross (DRC), International Federation Of Red Crescent Society (IFRC) and Pakistan Red Crescent (PRCS) from Nov 2005 to May 2006. She organized and facilitated numerous trainings for different organizations working in earthquake-affected areas on psychosocial support, gender issues and stress management. She facilitated in conducting numerous workshops for CDSP, NCSW, Mubariza, SANGAT, Church World Services Pakistan, Government Ministry Officials and different national/international NGOs. Mr. Mian Altaf Ahmed He is a renowned sociologist and social development consultant. He has over 40 years of experience in social research, community participation, reproductive health and participatory development. He has directed several projects sponsored by UN agencies as well as international organizations such as Save the Children UK, IAVSC, Pathfinder, Oxfam, etc. Mr. Qazi Juanid He is from Rawalpindi, Pakistan. He earned his bachelor degree in Sociology, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Population and Development and Community Development. He has over 15 years of experience in the field of social development. He has assisted several public and private organizations in carrying out community based projects and activities. He has himself designed and launched several successful community based projects. He has organized a large number of young people for collective action. He has provided guidance, coaching and inspiration to many at-risk and vulnerable young people to take control of their lives and help them to get organized in addressing challenges which are plaguing their lives. He has attended trainings in a variety of areas such as gender and development, participatory planning, PLA/PRA, sexual reproductive health, leadership development, etc. He is a very good trainer and facilitator. His hobbies are reading English, Urdu and Persian literature. He loves poetry and occasionally writes poems. He enjoys working in challenging environments. He believes in the strategy of “nothing venture nothing have”. Mr. Hafiz Javaid Iqbal He is the General Secretary of the YES Network Pakistan. He did his Masters in Social Work from Punjab University Lahore. He has over five years of experience of working in the field of social development. He has been very active to support Youth Engagement Services (YES) Network Pakistan/PNYS in implementing its activities. He has participated in a wide range of community building activities. He has facilitated, arranged and organized several community based sessions and seminars on a variety of topics for creating awareness among the masses on human rights. He has a strong desire to empower the young people of Pakistan. He is currently working for a grassroots based NGO called “Daman”. His work involves identifying under-served, marginalized and poor women and girls for social and economic development. Mr. Sami-ullah-Khan He is from Lahore, Pakistan. His mission in life is to provide education to at-risk children. He has been working in the field of education for the last seven years. According to Sami meeting with Ali (Founder of Youth Engagement Services (YES) Network Pakistan/PNYS) during a HIV/AIDS session held in his community had been one of the highlights of his life as this meeting opened up new possibilities for him to realize his mission in life. During his meeting with Ali, he shared his passion for education and commitment to work for the well-being of his community. Ali was very impressed by his enthusiasm and decided to work with him to test his ideas of involving local young people for the service delivery of education. Looking back, it is clearly evident that this partnership has been very successful for both Ali and Sami in realizing their goals and moving forward with their mission. Based upon his contributions, Sami was elected as a member of YES Governing Body. Site developed by Youth Engagement Services (YES) Network Pakistan |