Dare to Innovate: Inspiring Change in Guinea

On August 18^th, twenty-one youth arrived at The Dare to Innovate Center to join the eleven facilitators already there preparing their arrival. Over the course of the week, we welcomed the president of a mutli-national corporation, a minister, some of Guinea’s most successful entrepreneurs and representatives from Peace Corps, USAID, and the American Embassy. I can honestly say that nobody left the center without experiencing a profound change and forging a commitment to making Guinea a leader in social entrepreneurship. It was not easy, but it was exhilarating and something that will stay with me forever.

We had our fair share of speed bumps. The day before the participants were supposed to arrive, we were finally informed that our bunk-beds would not be ready in time since they needed a machine hooked up to city electricity and there has been less than expected. We wracked our brains to come up with a solution and ended up having the carpenter rent out a workshop in a town next to a hydroelectric barrage that has 24/7 electricity. A third of the beds arrived around 11pm on the first night of the conference and so PCVs, participants, and carpenters worked together into the night putting them together and hanging up mosquito nets. It was far less than ideal, but at least there was a valuable lesson for the participants that if they want to be an entrepreneur they need to be ready for the less-than-ideal. On day 2, we received the second third of the bunk beds. On day 3, something broke in the electrical system and the farm as well as the carpenter lost power for the duration. We used a generator when necessary and when water got really short (the electricity pumps it out of the ground), the participants happily went down to the stream to wash claiming that they enjoyed the opportunity to enjoy the nature. Anyone who knows Guinea, knows that young men here do not appreciate nature, so this statement alone showed us that we were rubbing off on them.

 In terms of the actual conference, everything went incredibly well. Some highlights…

• ·      A social entrepreneurship fair where participants learned about what other like minded individuals around the world were doing
• ·      Giving partners a challenging critical thinking puzzle and having them work on it during free time until the last night, when one group finally figured it out
• ·      Seeing my students get excited about business model innovation
• ·      Watching our inspiration wall grow over the course of the week to be full of quotes and drawings
• ·      Finding out that our participants had a secret meeting to talk about how it was on them to make sure that the Dare to Innovate model spreads so that Guinea can become a country of changemakers
• ·      Being stopped for the 10^th time on my way to bed by participants wanting to talk through some aspect of their idea
• ·      Seeing my counterpart, Mariama, facilitate challenging sessions with utter joy
• ·      Watching our mentors impart their wisdom on the youth and really engaging with their mentees. They have all given their job the seriousness it deserves.
• ·      Watching the youth transform into social entrepreneurs and hearing the presentation of the ideas they will begin to research during the upcoming month

I could go on and on. It was a truly inspirational week and I get reminded of it whenever I visit our facebook page and see that although they are now spread across the country, they are still engaging in meaningful conversation and encouraging each other.

Some of the ideas that were presented were a private high school that integrates technology into the curriculum and fosters a creative atmosphere, the planting and transformation organic bananas to fight malnutrition and protect biodiversity, a rural seed and fertilizer bank to help farmers improve their harvests, public pay-toilets on the national highway to improve sanitation, a preschool that strives to give kids a headstart and free their mothers to enter the workforce, a mobile veterinary clinic, a sports education center that helps aspiring soccer stars have employment options if their goals do not work out, and the transformation of trash into recycled projects. We will see how they have all developed after a month when they return for the business plan competition.

The conference was anything but easy. We developed a new curriculum pulling from many places and hoped that the process we created would work. We faced the week with lots of nervousness. Although there were some things that can be (and will be) improved, for the most part it worked! It was exhausting, but it worked!

Our medium term goal is a national movement and so now my task is to formalize the work we have done, to update our materials, to find funding for employees, and set up a structure. Luckily, I have many partners who believe in this project and are ready to help me make it a reality.

All of this would not have been possible without the help of my amazing team. So, although you probably don’t read this Chico, Chris, Hilary, Emma, Abe, Wiatta, Kenny, Maren, Chalupa, Mariama, and Yans merci, merci mille fois.

I will keep updating as this unfolds, but if you are interested in following the conference more closely and want to see pictures, feel free to follow our blog, OsezInnover.com.