I’m only two sessions into the group of Lilly volunteers taking part with United Way España, PuntoJES and IES Severo Ochoa in #desafíoPRO, and I feel completely motivated by this challenging and exciting project.
DesafíoPRO has disguised itself as social entrepreneurship to fight school dropout. It involves engaging 117 young people from this school in Alcobendas (Madrid) in initiatives with a social purpose, specifically in the area of health and wellbeing. These proposals are put forward by the students themselves based on their own concerns and experiences, as a way for them to recognize their abilities and stay motivated to continue their studies.
Each of the entities that make up #desafíoPRO contributes essential resources to the initiative: United Way, an idea already developed with other companies; the school, the students and the facilities; PuntoJES, all the facilitation; and Lilly, the volunteers, who take part with their knowledge.
“When we have a motivation to solve a problem, we get fully involved. In adolescence, passivity can push young people toward inactivity, but at the same time, at that age, they’re also more passionate. With #desafíoPRO we seek to have that passion lead young people to recognize that they have gaps that need to be filled in order to solve the situation they themselves have raised, and that education can fill them.”
Although I’ve never been particularly active in CSR or volunteering initiatives, I’ve taken part in every one Lilly has proposed. Trying to help people in vulnerable situations, society or the closest community, aside from how rewarding the experience can be, has made me feel very useful. That’s why I was excited about the chance to collaborate with teenagers, at that pivotal moment of change, fear and worry, with an approach that involves them in a project that impacts their immediate surroundings while also possibly contributing to reducing school dropout in our municipality.
With #desafíoPRO, we help them become “agents of change” to truly make an impact on our society. For years we’ve heard that young people are apathetic, that they don’t participate in society, that they don’t think about the future… And with this initiative, we’re encouraging them to become true “gamechangers.”
I work with about 25 students organized into 6 small groups. Drug and alcohol use, gender-based violence and animal abuse are some of the problems they’ve prioritized and will focus on over the coming months to find solutions.
The passion for changing things and seeing what they can contribute to their immediate community through their own ideas can have a very positive impact. When this challenge ends, I hope to share the outcome of their proposals. But more important than that will be knowing these young people felt motivated to stay engaged with their studies.
And I’m sure they’ll manage it, because they’re pleasantly surprising us. They’re very participatory, they don’t stop looking for alternatives and proposing initiatives to tackle problems. I think the access to information they have now has developed their social awareness further, and they’re passing on their enthusiasm and interest to us.
Whether for work reasons or personal interests, we spend our lives learning. When a teenager considers dropping out of school, however clear that decision may seem to them, I’d like them to think about what they can do to change society, what small achievements they want to reach, and how they need to keep training and gaining new knowledge to reach those goals. I hope that, together, as a society, we manage it, and that the school dropout rate in Spain really does go down.