Somebody Actually Does Care

In 2019, the Calgary Canadian Sudanese Community Association (CCSCA) senior leadership team recognized the importance of building the leadership skills of youth in the community. With guidance from Mohammed Salih, the former CCSCA president, and an NGO, they collaborated to develop a youth leadership development project (GIADAH) which was approved and funded by the Government of Alberta.

Rawya Gumaa, Ruoaa Adar, Ranya Gumaa, Lana Salih, and Muaz Salih are millennial volunteers with CCSCA. Respected for her compassionate leadership style, Rawya was selected to lead the project team, along with Ranya, Muaz, Lana, and Rouaa. I had the opportunity to mentor the youth leaders about the various aspects of managing a government-funded project over the three years from 2019 to 2021.

Over the course of the project GIADAH’s life cycle, the team encountered an onslaught of challenges. The team’s perseverance and willingness to learn new skills empowered them to exceed the project’s goals. The number of volunteers grew from the 10 to 80 within a year. At the end of the three-year project, more than 60% of the 500 participants expressed their admiration for the work of the core youth leaders and stated an interest in volunteering in future projects. The project built trusting relationships with participants from more than six different cultural communities in Calgary. Their network in the social services sector grew from an initial three to more than fifteen, including new relationships established with three academic institutions.

We met again in August 2022 to discuss how the project experience had impacted all of our lives. I asked them what they felt they had achieved with GIADAH.

Rawya: Before the project, we did volunteer work but did not feel connected to a sense of purpose for doing it. After this project, we better understand the purpose behind the actions, what needs to be done, who we need to engage and the importance of all those things especially the little details that matter and how we could amplify our impact in the future.

Ranya: Personally, one of my achievements as a project leader is the increased confidence of being able to take charge of any situation and make decisions. We had a lot of planning to do and a lot of executive decisions to make. So it definitely boosted our confidence.

Lana: This leadership development project allowed us to learn more about the broader society. We all have had an impact on each other and deeply appreciate how we have worked together to make a difference. Now we can continue to the next phase of our project.

Muaz: Our community continues to grow every day. With more young people joining us, we can mentor them, seek funding and resources, and host leadership seminars. Many of our young people can really be leaders. They can do better than us and have a better impact in the community.

Rouaa: So the fact is that we accomplished this project and showed them that it’s possible. These ideas can actually flourish if they put them into action. Because the first step is just having the idea. And that the ideas can materialize as a project and implemented as activities and events that can make positive changes in peoples’ lives.

More than 500 millennials and Generation Z youths participated in the eight creative project activities. The programs engaged youths in sports, arts, community leadership workshops, career fair, cultural awareness, leadership camp, cultural leadership and multicultural celebration.

Rawya and her team have presented project GIADAH’s success in various community development and academic research meetings. The project had achieved success in transforming youth participants from passive to proactive community members eager to seek out volunteer opportunities, increased active citizenship among project participants’ families and friends, and bridged generational divides between youth participants, older youth, and parents, strengthening their relationships.

Sustaining a successful initiative after funding has ended is a common challenge in the non-profit sector. It had been seven months since submitting the project report to the Government of Alberta. The team was optimistic about their capability to collaborate with businesses, private donors, and funders for the project’s next phase. I asked how they thought the larger ecosystem they had built could sustain their initiative.

Ranya: From a systems approach, businesses and funding agencies could perhaps place an emphasis on open, frequent communication with various ecosystem players so that everyone’s current needs may better guide future social impact decisions.

Rawya: I am proud of what we have achieved. I also see a lot of energy, a lot of time, a lot of effort that went into implementing this pilot project. It will only be sustainable if more young people are involved in the project or decision-making process, perhaps they will continue to feel empowered without us.

Lana: With new funding, we will be able to improve our project implementation by involving more youth. We are more confident in engaging young adults and seniors in our inter-generational activities, which will make a positive difference.

Muaz: If we were to receive another grant, we can confidently manage the project and all of the related work. We can create better opportunities for ourselves and for the youth by organizing more knowledge-based events.

Rouaa: There’s definitely pride and definitely a better sense of community now. We’ve really expanded our outreach to include people from different cultures and backgrounds. Before the project, we were just a community, but now we really have a sense of community, a sense of connection and a sense of belonging.

Part of my mentoring of the project GIADAH team included bringing awareness to and coaching the team to engage actors in their ecosystem who had the capacity to contribute to the success of the project. All credit goes to the team for meaningfully engaging stakeholders and involving them in their decision-making. It has been a pleasure getting to work with Mohammed Salih, Rawya, Ruoaa, Ranya, Lana, Muaz, and the rest of the team.