Mary MacKillop Today’s Youth Entrepreneurship project is helping to grow the next generation of entrepreneurs in rural Peru.
Becoming an entrepreneur and running a successful business is the dream of ambitious young people all around the world. But it isn’t as easy as just coming up with a good idea and having a good work ethic. More than anything, you first need the learning opportunities that will make that dream achievable.
For many young people in the rural region of Moquegua, Peru, those learning opportunities aren’t as accessible as they are in other areas of the world. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic and a shortage of qualified teachers, it can be difficult for high school students in Monquegua to access the entrepreneurial training they need to succeed.
To help bridge this gap, Mary MacKillop Today’s project Youth Entrepreneurship in Rural Peru, run in partnership with CEOP Ilo. This project focuses on giving students in rural areas the skills, tools, and knowledge needed to develop entrepreneurship proposals and ideas relevant to the needs of their communities.
Meet María Fernanda, an aspiring participant of the Youth Entrepreneurship project from the province of Ilo.
María’s ambitious spirit has led her to becoming the mayor of the student committee at her high school, where she is already applying some of the skills she has received through the entrepreneurship program.
“In my role as mayor, I have benefited a lot from the training. At the beginning of my position, I was not such a confident person. I was not so extroverted, and I was afraid to express myself in front of all the students.”
“But with these talks that I have received through the project, having interacted with the different members of other school municipalities where they shared their way of working in their educational institutions, it is something that helped me to accommodate my work plan.”
Thanks to the training she has received, María now has a community of young, like-minded leaders to help her see and integrate what’s possible for her at school and beyond.
“These activities have especially helped me to have more confidence in myself, to have a more global approach and be more empathetic,” says María.
María now has the skills to communicate her ideas with confidence and has gained a broadened perspective of what she can do for herself and her community.
With her newfound excitement for entrepreneurship, we look forward to seeing what María and other young Peruvians like her can accomplish.
Thanks to your kind support, students like María can access entrepreneurial skills, giving them an opportunity to change the lives of their families and community forever.
Youth Entrepreneurship in Rural Peru receives support from the Australian Government through the Australian NGO Cooperation Program (ANCP).
