by lwang | Feb 25, 2015 | AIL, Education, Kravis Prize, Sakena Yacoobi
In the pages of the Christian Science Monitor, Afghan Institute of Learning founder Sakena Yacoobi offers a passionate commentary about lowering the cultural barriers to educating women and girls with outreach that includes males, too. “The women who come to our centers feel the same way,” she says of AIL’s centers, whose health and education efforts were recognized with the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Nonprofit Leadership in 2009. “Men and boys need to be educated, not ignored.” Development efforts in disadvantaged countries can cut two ways, especially when those efforts highlight and publicize one group to such a degree that another group feels forgotten. Yacoobi’s Monitor article, “In Afghanistan, teaching men that education is not a threat,” points out that while AIL’s work has focused on one specific segment, the actual goal is more universal, more all-embracing than her organization’s stated mission. “Educated, wise men,” she writes, thinking of her own father, who supported her pursuit of an education (she holds U.S. degrees from the University of the Pacific and Loma Linda University), “do not abuse women or children and recognize the worth and value of women and children.” Since AIL’s founding in 1995, the lives of more than 10 million people have been affected by the organization’s work. Yacoobi, however, acknowledges that this impact must be broader, and more inclusive, as she shares in the following anecdote, which is included in the Monitor article: One day in early 2002, I went with my female staff to visit one of our Women’s Learning Centers in rural Kabul. Suddenly a group of teenage boys with weapons appeared, blocking the...
by lwang | Jun 17, 2014 | Education, Entrepreneurship, Kravis Prize, Sakena Yacoobi
“Mission creep” is a pervasive and extremely debilitating problem that afflicts all too many nonprofit organizations. According to presenters Kim Starkey Jonker and William F. Meehan III, it is the No. 1 reason why nonprofits fail to achieve the impact for beneficiaries that they desire. Yet mission creep is easily preventable and easily curable. By attacking it head-on, nonprofit leaders can not only prevent suboptimal performance, but also open the way to taking on outsized challenges. Learn how to take your organization to a higher level by joining Jonker and Meehan—along with guest presenter Sakena Yacoobi—for a discussion of organizational mission. In this webinar, Jonker and Meehan will expand on their Stanford Social Innovation Review articles “Mission Matters Most” and “Curbing Mission Creep.” Jonker and Meehan will discuss the countless external and internal pressures that cause mission creep, and they will present tools for counteracting these pressures. Recognizing that mission statements are one of the most useful (but most underused) tools available to any nonprofit, Jonker and Meehan will also outline seven characteristics of an effective mission statement. In addition, they will discuss ways to build a mission-focused organizational culture. Webinar registrants will have the opportunity to ask Jonker, Meehan, and Yacoobi questions during the last 20 minutes of the webinar, which will be moderated by Michael Slind, senior editor of SSIR. This complimentary webinar is for anyone in the social sector—nonprofit management and staff, board members, funders—anyone who seeks to create, support, and grow an organization that can align its mission with its efforts to increase impact for beneficiaries. Thanks to the generosity of the Henry R. Kravis...
by lwang | Nov 14, 2013 | AIL, Female Empowerment, Health, Kravis Prize, Sakena Yacoobi
Sakena Yacoobi’s long efforts to improve the educational opportunities for women and children in Afghanistan have been awarded this year’s Opus Prize by the private, independent nonprofit Opus Prize Foundation. Yacoobi, 2009 recipient of the Henry R. Kravis Prize in Leadership, received the top $1 million prize for humanitarian work along with two runner-ups who each received $75,000. Yacoobi founded the Afghan Institute of Learning in 1995 to first establish learning centers in Afghan refugee camps in Pakistan. Prior to this, her own education in medicine and public health care occurred in the United States, where she studied at the University of California, Stockton, and at Loma Linda University. She began her career as a professor at the University of Detroit before being hired to survey a refugee camp in Pakistan by the International Rescue Committee. That was the beginning of her life’s work. Today, AIL is the largest Afghan NGO. “At that moment, as soon as I arrived … I said, ‘I have to do something, and what could I do as an individual? How could I help them?’ ” she says in an interview conducted for the Opus Prize. Yacoobi’s fellow Opus Prize recipients this year are Fahmina Institute, a center of progressive Islamic research in Cirebon, Indonesia; and Sr. Carol Keehan of the Catholic Health Association. The Opus Prize, according to the prize website, is a faith-based humanitarian award “given annually to recognize unsung heroes of any faith tradition, anywhere in the world, solving today’s most persistent social problems.” RELATED LINKS: About the Opus...
by lwang | Jun 18, 2013 | AIL, Education, Female Empowerment, Sakena Yacoobi
Sakena Yacoobi, Founder and Executive Director of the Afghan Institute of Learning, was among an esteemed group of recipients who were presented earlier this month with honorary degrees during the 266th Commencement Ceremony at Princeton University. Yacoobi, who was selected for her efforts to educate women and children in Afghanistan with her organization AIL, was joined on the Princeton stage by novelist Toni Morrison and architect Frank Gehry, among several others. Also in June, the Huffington Post featured a piece by Sakena Yacoobi entitled, “Literacy and Networking for Afghan Women Through Texting.” Yacoobi writes about the lack of literacy in Afghanistan, especially among women. The article documents the efforts of her organization to empower women through education and to improve conditions in Afghanistan as a whole. Sakena writes that the organization could be used as model by other nations that wish to accelerate literacy education and provides a network for Afghan women to build relationships and foster more interaction and dialogue in their society. In the West, we take this sense of interconnectedness for granted, but for the women of Afghanistan, Yacoobi says, it is an exciting, new development: “The women of Afghanistan become energized by learning and they are also excited to have a way to communicate with one another. This program could be used in other nations to help accelerate literacy education, but the impact that access to mobile phones and knowledge of how to use them has on Afghan women is far greater than just accelerating literacy. The women can build and maintain relationships with other women to whom they are not related, something which is incredibly difficult in Afghan society....
by lwang | Dec 28, 2012 | Education, Female Empowerment, Health, Sakena Yacoobi
As the keynote speaker at Global Washington’s Redefining Development Conference, Kravis Prize winner Sakena Yacoobi inspired and challenged her audience to help educate the women and children of Afghanistan. Yacoobi was selected to deliver the event’s opening address in recognition for providing education and health services to more than 9 million Afghan women and children since the founding of her organization, the Afghan Institute of Learning. Global Washington published an article by contributor Nina Carduner, who detailed Yacoobi’s speech. Yacoobi began by describing her own “happy and secure” childhood in Afghanistan. Her family did not have much, but their needs were met. After travelling to the U.S. to complete her education, Afghanistan was invaded and Yacoobi and her family became refugees, unable to return to their home. But Yacoobi’s heart remained in Afghanistan, and so she pursued a career in public health in hopes of someday returning to provide medical resources to women and children. The turning point in her career, Yacoobi said, came during a visit to an Afghan refugee camp. Her shocking testimonial described how women “were like animals. … They felt less than human,” as their fathers, husbands, and brothers were taken away from them. Yacoobi rejected the idea that women were incapable of doing things for themselves, and dedicated her life to educating Afghan women and children. She began in Pakistan, where a majority of Afghan refugee camps were located. Met with criticism at first by religious leaders who believed that education was not appropriate for children, Yacoobi eventually convinced many of them to become teachers themselves. According to the article, she reached 27,000 children...
by lwang | Aug 10, 2012 | AIL, Community Development, Education, Female Empowerment, Health, Sakena Yacoobi
In June, Voice America’s Audrey Kitagawa interviewed Sakena Yacoobi for her radio segment on love, spirituality and forgiveness. Yacoobi discussed her work at the Afghan Institute of Learning and her reasons behind focusing on providing education and health care services to people in Afghanistan: “Ninety-five percent of people of Afghanistan live in poverty so health education is very, very important. [If] a mother is healthy, she will make sure that her child is healthy. And if her child is healthy, you know and I know that a child that is healthy can learn better. … I believe in education and I think that education is the key issue for really reaching out to people.” She also shared AIL’s goal and the impact that the organization is attempting to achieve: “The issue is that we want to transform life. We want to change the status of the life of the people … We are trying to make people educated, we try to help people to be healthy and we try to make people to be economically sustainable that they have a better life.” Given the progress AIL’s made, it’s safe to say they’re not only improving people’s lives in Afghanistan, but also imparting hope on those who have suffered in the past! Listen to the full radio interview...
