Our global community grows: Check out where we are this year!

Fellows Costa Rica 

Fellows Zambia

Fellows Paraguay

The Fellows program is also returning to Asunción, Paraguay through our partnership with Centro Comunitario Cultural Santa Ana. As recruitment begins, we look forward to sharing more about our collaboration. A special shoutout to Domingo Alonso and his team, Monse and Julio!

Fun fact: Domingo and the Centro are among LearnServe's oldest partners!🤯

Fellows DC

LearnServe students speak with
DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb!

DC's Office of the Attorney General hosted LearnServe students for a discussion on October 10th. Our students asked DC Attorney General Brian Schwalb questions about gun violence, education, and gentrification. Thank you AG Brian Schwalb, Aaron Jenkins, and Lauren Massey from the Community Engagement Team for facilitating this incredible opportunity!

Incubator

We've just wrapped up Week #5 in our Incubator. This advanced program in social entrepreneurship brings together students from DC and Zambia over Zoom, all whom have graduated from our Fellows program. So far, students have:

• Practiced constructivist listening: listening for the benefit of the speaker, to understand instead of respond
• Dived into interview prep: students are beginning the customer discovery phase for their venture
• Discussed the importance of understanding identity, assumptions, and intersectionality when designing social ventures (See a comic below for an illustration used in one of our sessions!)

What do you notice about the rhino's paintings in this comic by Scott Hilburn?

The rhino's horn is in every painting. We used this image to illustrate how our lived experiences, assumptions, and intersectional identities influence the way we see the world. What are the "horns" in your life?

Summer 2024 marked LearnServe’s first return to global travel since the pandemic. This year, we united 8 U.S. students and 14 Zambian students from our Incubator for a two-week cultural and learning exchange in Lusaka and Livingstone. The exchange provided a long-awaited opportunity to connect with fellow changemakers.

During the trip, students visited partner organizations such as Njira Skills Youth Centre, Africa Directions, and Chikumbuso to gain a deeper understanding of social entrepreneurship. In preparation for the journey, students planned a service project with Care Youth Community Foundation School. They successfully fundraised to purchase 50 school uniforms and supplies to paint the school’s walls.

The Global Zambia cohort also visited Victoria Falls and the Mosi-oa-tunyi National Park!

In their own voices:

Analyze. Innovate. Act. Reflect. Our Global Zambia students have written several blog posts reflecting on this capstone experience. Check them out below:

• Aanya recounts Day 1 of their journey

• Lauren shares thoughts on the importance of intentionality

• Chama writes about their visit to Twin Palm Secondary School —  where they met Zambia Fellows —  and cooking classes at the Kalulu Kreativez Centre for the Arts and Culture

• Nathan offers a poignant reflection on his identity as a third-culture kid and how the trip ignited his desire to embrace all cultures

• Mwansa discusses personal growth and the meaningful bonds formed during the exchange

• Jackie highlights how a single bus ride opened up a world of conversation

• Niyea writes, "This trip wasn’t just about learning more about marketing, business, or entrepreneurship. Instead, it was about how you create friendships through experience."

• Bright reflects on building relationships and discovering a sense of family through LearnServe

• Jordan says that aside from building transferable skills during the trip, the students built something even more important: community.

As one of our interns this year, Lauren is mobilizing LearnServe's Community Action Project (CAP) Committee, a group of US and Zambian students from the Global Zambia trip. The CAP committee is developing a fundraising project to support Njira Youth Skills Centre. "Our project is like a block of wood, and we started chipping away at it," she explained in an interview. “None of this would have happened if we didn’t make so many great connections, and create a family [in Zambia],” said Lauren. 

"We want to create open, equitable, diverse spaces." 

During her Fellows year, Lauren created a venture to understand the prevalence and impact of code-switching at her school. She presented her findings at her school assembly alongside the Black Student Union and also ran a workshop about code-switching at LearnServe's Student Action Summit. 

"We’re getting the ball rolling."

In our Incubator, Lauren developed a Big Little Book Club -- a venture targeting reading proficiency loss among grade 4-8 students after the pandemic. Seeking to spread her love of reading, Lauren is now implementing this venture for her senior project at Potomac School.

You can read the full intern feature on our blog below⬇️

Save the date!

Giving Tuesday is coming up on December 3rd. If you’ve been following the news about global and local violence, climate disasters, and increasing inequalities, you know the tremendous toll these events have taken on our communities – especially young people. Students often feel like bystanders watching the world fall apart around them.

Your support is more crucial than ever to sustain the momentum of young people who are channeling their passion into action. Our goal is to raise $10,000 to empower young changemakers as they face uncertain times -- and we need your help!

We're hiring!

LearnServe is seeking a Community Outreach VISTA to build capacity in our volunteer program and develop local engagement strategies. To learn more about this opportunity and to apply, click here. To learn about AmeriCorps VISTA, click here.