Global Changemakers

The following blog entry was written by one of the UK Changemakers who took part in the Latin America and Caribbean Youth Summit. It is just one of 60 impressions of the event and how it has affected the participants.

I have just returned home to the UK from Brazil, where I was participating in the British Council Global Changemakers Latin American & Caribbean Youth Summit. I’ve returned filled with energy, ideas and inspiration, determined to help create positive change both in Latin America and in my local community.

Why did you participate in the summit?

I decided to apply to participate in the summit, to assist me with my social activism both here in the UK and in Peru. My current role here in the UK is as a digital village project worker, where I am trying to bridge the digital divide and improving social cohesion within a housing association. My last project I ran was in Peru, where I was living and teaching within one of the largest shantytowns 2hrs from Lima. During the 3 months I spent working in this community I developed a strong connection with the issues affecting the region.

The summit gave me an amazing insight into the issues that affect us all from the perspective of 60 talented like minded individuals from across the world, including 50 from Latin America. The week was packed with innovative training activities such as the skills marketplaces where we all were given the skills required to create successful and meaningful projects. We furthermore had various astounding talks from speakers around Latin America; one of my favourites was by Prof. Jacques Marcovitch who gave an impressive talk of bridging the gap between the issues on the ground and the bigger regional picture.

Another one of the highlights were the educational visits, I visited ‘Observatório de Favelas’ which is a social organisation based within a favela that undertakes research, consultancy and public actions to produce knowledge and elaborate political proposals focused on slums and urban issues. The Observatório aims at implementing an agenda of “Rights to the City” based on a new definition of the slums.

Can you say anything about any of your ideas or projects you want to work on?

Throughout the week many changemakers formed into small groups including myself to create RAP’s (Regional Action Plans) these are new methods in which we can create positive change collectively within Latin America. As a team we created a concept for a RAP that gives Latin American youth led organisation a platform to better communicate and share resources from physical items to educational resources. We are planning to hold the first Latin American youth involvement day which will run simultaneously in over 10 countries including here in the UK for people with an interest in Latin America.

I have also already started working on a media based project for my community action plan, where I am planning to set up a summer school teaching film production skills to 12 to 18 year olds living in Pachacutec one of the largest shantytowns in Peru. The youth living in the shantytown love viewing online content on such sites as YouTube but never in a 1000 years do they feel they can be part of the digital revolution. I hope with my summer film school I will be able to provide the participants the skills and technology enabling them to share their creativity through short films with the world.

I have returned a changed person, reenergised and ready to tackle the social issues I work on with a new perspective, knowing I now have help of the incredible international network of Global Changemakers.

- Sadiq Miah, Global Changemakers

Further casual reading on the event can be found at www.youthsummit.wordpress.com.