Kathmandu, February 14, 2018: Ujyalo Foundation has successfully concluded EmpowHER Junior Graduation Ceremony on February 10, 2018 at Alpas Café, Lazimpat. The changemakers had undergone 10 intense sessions learning about gender equality, opportunity optimization, health rights, leadership development and other ways to improve on their project concept.
Haushala Zimba, Founder and CEO of Children and Youth First, gave the keynote speech. Accordingly, Yajaswi Rai, Program Lead of EmpowerHER and EmpowHER Junior announced the top three projects and she declared that for the first timeUjyalo would be equipping mentorship to all the changemakers to aid their projects.
Anugya, Priya, and Sanskriti were the winners from the pitching and each of them bagged Nrs. 15,000 for the implementation of their project. Anugya’s project ‘Prabhav’ wills to improve students’ hygienic behavior, schools’ sanitation and hygiene to enhance the overall well-being. Priya’s project ‘Crossing the Red Line’ aims to provide self-defense training to students of Ullens School of grade 10 in order to make them capable of protecting themselves, and equipping them with the confidence to step out into the world.
Sanskriti’s project ‘Sports Competition for Girls’ focuses on solving the problem of ‘Gender Inequality’ by organizing sports competition for girls of grade six to nine from four different schools in Kathmandu Valley.
Project ideas of Sneha and Aria were also selected. Sneha’s project ‘Don’t use PLASTIC be FANTASTIC’ aims to create awareness about the negative impact of plastic bags and promote the use of cotton bags at Arniko Higher Secondary School in Biratnagar. She wants to distribute cotton bags and create awareness through presentations.
Aria’s project ‘Pahichaan’ aims to provide a stage for individuals between the ages of 12 to 16 years who have been victimized by bullying. She wants to help them portray their stories in the form of plays by encouraging them to speak up and accept their inevitable past.
At the end, certificates were distributed to the participants. Amuda Mishra, Founder and Executive Director of Ujyalo Foundation, delivered the closing remarks for the programs. Although the program ended the changemakers, parents and other guests stayed back to interact with the Ujyalo Foundation’s team and each other.
After ten weeks of severe entrepreneurship and leadership training and the activities linked to it, EmpowHER Junior had concluded its final pitching at Xavier Academy and preliminary interview at Alpas Café. Based on the pitching and interviews of the candidates, the Advising Committee gave scores to select three project ideas that would get the seed fund money.
EmpowHER Junior is an idea incubation and leadership developmental program run by Ujyalo Foundation with a motive of enabling young women leaders and entrepreneurs. The program was officially launched on 18 November 2017 by Ujyalo Foundation. It had brought 12 young girls aged 12 to 16 and they were all facilitated with wide range of facilitators from diverse backgrounds. Two changemakers had been assigned a single mentor to guide them through this journey while the five member Advising Committee was formed to judge the changemakers. Ujyalo Foundation is a U.S and Nepal based non-profit organization established with aims to create sustainable development through innovative technologies in Nepal.
