Youth Challenge International (YCI) is a youth-centred, non-profit, non-religious, non-governmental organization focused on international development issues. It aims to equip developing country youth with skills and resources to contribute positively to their communities along with engaging Canadian youths in international development and social justice issues. Over 201 Canadian youth volunteer overseas annually with YCI.
Overview
The organization's mission is to "build the skills, experience and confidence of young people to effect positive change in their communities"(3).
YCI's operations and programming is rooted in 4 core principles: Youth Involvement: Youth take active decision making and leadership roles in YCI's projects Volunteerism: The spirit of volunteerism as central to, and a key force motivating YCI's work Partnership: Working with local, youth-led or youth focused organizations Youth Capacity Building: YCI seeks to help both youth and youth development organizations build the capacity to work autonomously as effective change agents in their respective communities
YCI operates on the belief that truly effective aid must have an explicitly youth focus – economic and social development outcomes cannot be improved without youth-specific programming. Youth represent a large share of the Global South's population structure with 1.3 billion young people aged 12 to 24 now living in developing countries. As the largest cohort of developing country youth in history, this group now makes up well over half the population of most developing countries. A critical challenge facing this population is youth unemployment, compounded by the HIV/AIDS crisis, gender inequality and disenfranchisement. Taking into account these factors, YCI's program rationale focuses on targeting these issues to promote positive youth-focused change in the developing world.
Typically, YCI operates programs in countries characterized as politically stable, less developed countries that have an existing development relationship with the northern partners of YCI such as Canada and Australia. Organizations that YCI has collaborated with include: Youth Challenge Guyana in Guyana, Reto Juvenil International in Costa Rica, Youth Challenge Australia in Vanuatu, ZANGOC and Faraja Trust in Tanzania, YMCA-Ghana in Ghana, Association for Adolescent Development and the Program for Adolescent Mothers in Grenada, and Emmanuel Development Association in Ethiopia. All of YCI's partners are fully autonomous non-profit organizations with an indigenous board of directors and local staff. An international complement of field staff joins this base to help deliver field projects in each country. YCI's long term development goal is to assure that each partner has the stability and capacity to develop a greater regional role in designing, managing and evaluating important development, health and conservation projects, along with increasing the participation of local youth and community stakeholders
In addition, YCI has built relationships with other Canadian organizations including most recently, YMCA Canada and YMCA GTA as well as Club 2/3 and Oxfam Quebec, developing collaborative programming in both Ghana and Benin.
History
Youth Challenge International was born as a charitable organization in 1989. Inspired by the UK-based Operation Raleigh (1984–1988), Canadian alumni from this project, along with new volunteers and sponsors in Canada, organized to send a group of Canadian youth to Guyana to work with Guyanese youth on community identified projects. In 1990, YCI sent 40 young Canadians, who, side by side with 40 Guyanese youth, worked on major community projects in conservation, infrastructure and health. Also, during its inaugural year, YCI partnered with the Adventure Club of the Soviet Union, sending a team of Canadian and Russian youth to the Arctic to participate in community service activities and conduct scientific research.
In 1991, a similar program to the one in Guyana was also launched in Costa Rica. The following year, the mutual successes of these programs eventually led to the establishment of autonomous organizations in both these countries. Around the same time, Australian alumni from the original Operation Raleigh, initiated Youth Challenge Australia to provide similar opportunities to Australian Youth.