• economic growth, agriculture and trade;
• global health; and,
• democracy, conflict prevention and humanitarian assistance.

USAID has set up Grand challenges which include such acute development needs as installing piped drinking water for households, deploying high-quality irrigation systems with locally-accessible replacement parts, and using the latest mobile technologies for banking, sharing vital health data, paying salaries, and checking commodity prices.

Some of their mobile phone initiatives right now are SMS together with radio in Haiti, $100 Million project opportunity for mHealth in Malawi.

Read more on their blog and become a fan on Facebook.

Midnight sun in Kiruna, picture source Wikipedia

MKFC Stockholm College and MKFC Helsinki College takes off for our annual summer break during July.

With midnight sun in Sweden we gather our families in our ’summer homes’.

Until August, Happy Holidays!

Sharing Awareness ™ -team in Stockholm and Helsinki

Patrick Awuah was born in Ghana and shares his experiences in the subject. He tells about the importance to train and to get educated in leadership. I am glad to know what teacher training can do in those areas

My week 5 assignment is entrepreneurship, when I went in classroom and asked the learners about entrepreneurship, no body knew about this word. I explain the meaning of entrepreneurship I details to learners. I told them it means to start and run their own business and entrepreneurship education seeks to provide students with the knowledge, skills and motivation to encourage the entrepreneurial success in variety of settings.

Its focus is realization of opportunity. Opportunities can be realized in several ways. The most popular one is through starting a new business. Another approach is to promote innovation or introduce new products services or market in existing firms.

In short, entrepreneurship is like a creativity, empowering and earning. And learners decided themselves what product they would like to sale, according to their interest and hobbies.

After my lecture, during student discussion, we came to know that we have already an entrepreneur in class. Her name is “Kausar Sultan” told the learners and me how she started her own business of embroidery and knitting. All students want to know her story.

Kausar Sultan telling her story

She said, I had learnt this work from her grandmother in childhood. Due to some financial problems, I could not able to continue my further education. So I decided to do something for her education and to increase income. The main reasons to choose this work are, first of all I started this work with very low budget. In this work I have no need of any helper. Secondly such type of embroidery clothes is highly demanded by the people of area due to cultural and social values. It is also remain in use in all types of weather like summer and winter wears. In earlier stages, I did this task only for my friends and family members. But with the passage of time, when people of my area know about my skills and quality of work, they appreciate my work. Now I have expanded my work in market. During my studies and educational activities, I remain in contact to my market and potential customers through cell phone. They book their orders on cell phone. I can fulfill their requires. I am not having any outlet and display center. I did this work with the meaningful use of cell phone.

In the end of the discussion we urged the meetings by a combined resolution that all participant will come the next week with new ideas of business and we will pool and share the knowledge regarding this issue.

Next week the learners came in class with full of excitement and different ideas. My colleague and I were much surprised to know about the different ideas of learners. So we decided to arrange a workshop in which the convert their ideas in practical form after one week. Today is a workshop day, every learner are much excited and enthusiasm.

Shah Bano with her Model Home

(1) Model of living room

First of all, a learner “Shah Bano” made a model of living room with different types of empty boxes like match box, sweets box, cookies box etc. She said, my mother threw these empty boxes in waste daily. One day I collect them and recycle them in the shape of beautiful model of living room.

Kausar Sultan with her Embroidery Work

(2) Embroidery work.

“Kausar Sultan” also brings some items of her handwork. She said, I would like to appreciate a great contribution of my respected teacher Mr. Babar Maqbool Khan who opens a great horizon of knowledge and discoveries with the help of I.C.T tools. Through I.C.T tools, he opened a word of knowledge regarding the new fashion and dress designing from all over the world. I saw all these upcoming designs and get inspiration and knowledge of word clothing and embroidery trends. He also gave me information how do I use MMS by the help of my cell phone. In this way, I got required ordered designed from my customers and do the task as their selected designs. I.C.T tools and my cell phone (MMS) is great blessing of God for running my sole proprietor business remaining under the limited resources.

Fatima with her Plastic Bottle's Garden

(3) Decoration pieces with plastic bottles.

Another learner, “Fatima” made very beautiful and different flowers, baskets and trees with empty plastic bottles. She said, I saw many empty plastic bottles in my storeroom. They are all useless. So I decided to utilize these bottles and make different type of decoration pieces like flower basket, trees and decorate window of her classroom. These items made by very low cost and every one can buy this due to their low price and present to friends and family members on any occasion.

Rukhsar Ansar with her Friendship Band

(4) Friendship bands.

A learner “Rukhsar Ansar” made a very beautiful friendship bands with ribbons and beads. She said that now a days friendship bands are very popular in students. They exchange these bands on different occasions. This item is highly demanded in my locality. So I made variety of bands and they are not much expensive as compare to the market.

Suman Nawaz with her Ice-cream Sticks Decoration

(5) Use of ice cream sticks.

A learner “summan Nawaz” made beautiful things like pencil box, tissue box, model of hut and baskets with ice cream sticks. She said that she loves to eat ice cream. So I decided to make different items with these sticks.

Aqsa Hayyat with her Greeting Cards

(6) Greeting cards.

“Aqsah Hayyat” made greeting cards with colorful charts. She told us that I am living in rural area. There is no shop of greeting cards. There is a big problem for us on any event to exchange our emotions of love and care through cards. So I decided to make these cards and I think these hand made cards transfer more love, affectionate and affiliation to others than printed cards. These are highly demanded in youth of my area.

Farah Qasim with her Art Work

(7) Artwork.

“Farrah Qasim” said, I love to do oil paint. I want to become a professional painter. She told that she can paint different types of dresses, pillow covers and table covers etc. Women like my artwork because it is durable and not much expensive than other boutiques. And it also looks very beautiful.

Afshan Sultan opened a Beauty Parlour at School

(8) Beautician.

Hi I am “Afshan Sultan”. I want to become a beautician. She said, I have God gifted skill to make different designs of Hinna Mehndi. These designs are popular in Asian’s women. They make these designs on arms, hands and feet. She said, I also compiling the Hinna tattoos book that is highly demanded.

I am also very thankful to Teacher Babar Maqbool Khan who shows me different designs of hinna tattoos through you tube, which increase my knowledge and give me more designs.

After this workshop, I think what happened when to take a bunch of ordinary kids and really challenge them. I feel every kid can be extraordinary in right situation and entrepreneurship grooming the creativity, innovation and sustainability in students. This workshop giving the children the memory of lifetime in which they launched their first business.

The people of Pakistan have not so much awareness about entrepreneurship. In Pakistan, there are not so many job opportunities; Most of degree holders are still jobless. If we groom their thinking about entrepreneurship from school level, I am sure that in practical life, they will become a good businessman. I think if students aware about entrepreneurship, they can increase their life and health standard and also give the financial support to their family.

This is our first workshop in Faisal Public School. After a very good response and find the passions from learners. My colleague and I decided that we would continue this activity.

Entrepreneurs with School Principal and C.E

Students buying things from Entrepreneurs

The theme for this year is “Home”, reflecting the work of UNHCR in trying to help refugees find new homes – in their native countries or abroad. The theme also highlights the increasing difficulties in doing just that, in a world where many armed conflicts have escalated in recent years.

Several different events will be held around the world to bring attention to World Refugee Day, and UNHCR encourages everyone to get involved.

Follow UNHCR on Twitter, or read more about their work on Flickr where updates are posted regularly.

Written by Fanny Johansson

Picture: Millennium International Documentary Film Festival

Tomorrow, June 12, marks the start of the second Millennium International Documentary Film Festival in Brussels. This week-long festival, supported by the United Nations, will show films that deal with different aspects of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

One of the festival’s main aims is to show the realities – the real lives of real people – behind the eight MDGs. Some of the topics that will be addressed are the Congolese civil war, a Polynesian community dealing with the effects of climate change, and the harsh working conditions of the Kenyan flower industry. Several different documentaries will be shown between 12-18 June, and there will also be panel discussions, special events and live performances.

For more information, please refer to the Millennium International Documentary Film Festival official homepage or the UNDP homepage.

Source: UNDP.

Written by Fanny Johansson

Paul Polak is founder of Colorado-based non-profit International Development enterprises (IDE)—is dedicated to developing practical solutions that attack poverty at its roots.

Polak share his experiences and practical strategies in this video clip. You can also find more information on his homepage and Twitter.

Mr. Babar is MKFC teacher training student from Pakistan. The video shows his and his learner’s reflection about MKFC learning that what they have achieved in their learning environment after joining MKFC teacher training course. Since Babar has joined MKFC teacher training many changes has became visible in his school in the form of enhanced; students interest in learning, parents and teachers participation, awareness about health, cleanliness and environmental issues, entrepreneurial skills and learners role in society. MKFC learning is based on action learning and implementation of problem based learning in the classroom environment to enhance learner’s concepts not only through theoretical ways but more in practical ways.  The new pedagogical methods supported by ICT further increase student’s enthusiasm and eagerness to learn and know more about the subject.  MKFC teacher training assignments embeds practical practices with theory where student’s needs to involve his/her authentic learning environment in his/her course.

Human Rights, Childrens Rights, democracy and gender are in focus in the MKFC discussions with Catherine Isaksson, Secretary General of Centerpartiets Internationella Stiftelse. CIS, among others, runs ongoing projects in South Africa to improve shanty town pre school activities, and another one aiming to improve the quality of teacher educations at a college near by. MKFC could contribute with high quality educational content as well as the e-learning method End-to-End eLearning™.

In the discussions so far we have a similar opinion on the power of change for development in learning activities, and on the huge potential in good e-learning, including the use of different social media.

Olle Lundberg

Mobile phones are transforming health care in many developing countries, reports BBC.

The use of mobile phones worldwide is becoming more and more widespread each day, which makes it an ideal tool for health workers gathering vital information. Using an application called EpiSurveyor, critical data collection concerning, for example, vaccines and HIV rates, has now been made faster and more efficient. The application has been used successfully in several projects, for examle in a malaria study in Nigeria.

Read more here.

Source: BBC.

Written by Fanny Johansson