Rise Up: Global Impact, Local Youth-led Solutions

Dear Donor,

2024 has been quite a year so far, during the first week of September we celebrated the LATAM Summit for the first time completely in Spanish, bringing Changemakers from México, Paraguay, Venezuela, Perú, Argentina, El Salvador, Honduras, Uruguay, Ecuador, Colombia, Bolivia, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Brazil to network and learn new skills. Now, as we enter the last quarter of the year we are preparing to host the Global Youth Summit 2024 in Cape Town from October 21st - 25th. Having two summits in one year also meant we needed grant cycles that could offer these new changemakers a way to fund and launch their projects and ideas to create a positive impact in their communities. For that reason we are also very excited to announce that we have officially supported 500 projects across the world.

These great milestones are not possible without funding and your ongoing support is more than ever essential for us to continue to support the young people that are rolling their sleeves to make their communities and our world more sustainable, equitable and fair.

Grant Cycle for LATAM

Our mission at Global Changemakers is to support youth-led projects to create positive change and we know that one of the main struggles when launching a project can be funding to get going. We are happy to announce that this year we launched 2 grant cycles, the latest focused on educational projects in the LATAM region. Whether it is teaching marginalized communities new skills and helping them to access college education in Peru and Colombia or creating awareness about water pollution in Lake Uru Uru in Bolivia, the projects supported for this latest grant cycle will create a huge impact on their local communities. This grant cycle ran for the first time in Spanish, allowing our Changemakers in the region to apply for funding in their own language.

Global Youth Summit

The return of the Global Youth Summit is just around the corner, for the first time since the pandemic we are bringing together a global cohort to Cape Town for a life changing experience. Global Youth Summits are a unique opportunity where young changemakers from all over the world get to connect with other realities and learn from their peers how positive change is being created across communities. 50 young leaders from over +30 countries will be reunited from October 21st - 25th so stay tuned to the amazing stories that will come from this Global Youth Summit.

Global Youth Summit

The return of the Global Youth Summit is just around the corner, for the first time since the pandemic we will reunite a global cohort to attend Cape Town for a life changing experience. Global Youth Summits are a unique opportunity where young changemakers from all over the world get to connect with other realities and learn from their peers how positive change is being created across communities.  46 young leaders from over +30 countries will be reunited from October 21st - 25th so stay tuned to the amazing stories that will come from this Global Youth Summit.

Young Changemakers Podcast Season 6

As part of our mission to inspire young people to create positive change in their communities we have released the 6th season of the Young Changemakers podcast, a Global Changemakers production that showcases inspiring stories and conversations with young people making an impact in development, Meigan Diaz , alumnus and host, interviews Changemakers from our network to share about some of the current challenges and problematics they are facing and how they have paved a way for positive change. As part of our efforts to extend the reach of Young Changemakers Podcast we divided the season into three episodes in Spanish and three episodes in English. This season we learned about entrepreneurship lead by people with disabilities with Diego Mariscal and about education for sustainable development with Brenda Villegas from Ashoka, delved into sexual and reproductive health, with Lela from Liberia and discussed maternal health and violence against women with Diego Tabares and mental health with Vidhi who reached over 10,000 individuals with her programmes on mental health.

LATAM Youth Summit

For over a decade, Global Changemakers has focused on creating growth and upskilling opportunities for changemakers everywhere. However, we noticed that our call for applications had lower participation from Spanish speaking countries. We recognized there was a language barrier we needed to overcome and for the first time since the start of the Summits we held the first event fully in Spanish for people in the Latin America Region.

The LATAM Summit was held in Mexico City from September 2nd to September 7th and it had the participation of 36 changemakers from +13 countries of the LATAM region. For a week they engaged in several activities and workshops to connect, discuss the complexity of achieving sustainable development in the region and shared knowledge on how to tackle these issues. This event also had a special focus on showing the Changemakers a bit about Mexico’s ancestral agriculture techniques and ecosystem.

• Full September 2024 Report (PDF)
  

Dear Donor, 

This first couple of months from 2024 have been full of exciting news for Changemakers. Against all odds, our organization has been a true catalyst for youth empowerment and change for over 10 years. We have been able to provide and share some amazing growth opportunities for the young people in our network. This year GCM celebrates a huge milestone of impact with an important announcement:

Global Youth Summits are back!!!

After the hiatus caused by the pandemic, Global Youth Summits are finally back!

Last year we held a regional summit in Cape Town where 45 changemakers from all over the continent were able to connect and learn from each other. This year our summit goes global again. Applications are currently open and we are extremely excited about the number of applications coming our way. This year’s summit will be held in partnership with ATKV in Cape Town and will receive 50 changemakers from all over the world for 5 days of training, connection and skill building. Stay tuned for more updates on one of our 2 summits happening this year.

LATAM Youth Summit Selected Participants

As you may already know, this year we will be hosting two summits for changemakers, the LATAM Summit will be our first in-person edition for the Latin America region and it will be held completely in spanish. The selection process is over and we are happy to announce that we will have the presence of changemakers from México, Paraguay, Venezuela, Perú, Argentina, El Salvador, Honduras, Uruguay, Ecuador, Colombia, Bolivia, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Brazil. 

First Grant Cycle of 2024 

Our first grantees of 2024 have been selected and we are happy to announce that we will be supporting 9 amazing projects focused on education across the world. From STEM training with young girls to renewable energy schools and Sexual Health Education, we hope this new cycle of grantees keeps creating positive impact in their communities for the upcoming months of 2024.

10 years of GCM

This past April GCM celebrated its 10 year anniversary and we are grateful for the amazing journey we’ve had so far. We had the chance to celebrate this with alumni from our different programs through our annual alumni meeting and we are very grateful for the incredible changemakers that make our community. It was certainly a monumental occasion for Global Changemakers as we celebrated a decade of supporting young leaders, activists, and innovators worldwide.

This year we are having two different life changing summits. One for our Latin American Changemakers, for the first time in Spanish and the other for our Global community. Although we deeply believe in the importance of bringing Changemakers together in person, and know how crucial it is to create a sense of community and build lifelong relationships, sponsorship for events is very hard to get by. We know you as Changemakers understand this better than anyone, and therefore, we ask you, if you can afford it, to contribute, in any amount possible, to help us fund these travels for these amazing Global Changemakers.

• Full Report (PDF)