Healthy Communities • YMCA Global Initatives
Off the beaten path: Andrew's Y Story in Medellin, Colombia
15 March 2016 - by June Findlay
As part of the Henry Labatte Scholarship (part of our Global Initiatives), we sent two of our staff members to our partner associations in Medellin, Colombia and Mexico City, Mexico on informational visits and special projects. This is the first account of Andrew Kowalchuk, an advisor with the Newcomer Youth Leadership Development Program in Toronto, spent 4 weeks in Medellin on a youth engagement project.
My name is Andrew Kowalchuk and it has been three days since my last Tim Horton’s coffee. It’s okay though; the coffee in Colombia is pretty good, too.
An elder in a refugee camp in Zambia once asked me a question that changed my life. I was running a capacity-building program with refugee youth and the elders were pleased with the work. During a discussion about poverty, I pointed out that Africa was not the only place that had poverty, that in fact poverty was the norm around the world. Even Canada, a wealthy country, has tens of thousands of people living on the streets. That is when he asked me, “If they need you at home, why are you here?”
The truth was that I was there because I had always wanted to travel. I wanted to live an exotic experience; not necessarily a good reason.
When I came back to Canada, I challenged myself to find a way to do equally meaningful work in a way that wasn’t about my experience. I found my opportunity at the YMCA. Initially at the YMCA of Northumberland and now at the YMCA of Greater Toronto, I am able to participate in international partnerships and programs that are genuinely meaningful to the lives of people in Canada and overseas.
What I found most special about the Henry Labatte Scholarship is that it is sincerely based on the mutual exchange of knowledge and expertise between diverse branches of the same organization.
I am here in Commune 13 in Medellin, Colombia for one month because the ACJ (Spanish for “YMCA”) requested an exchange of information on the best practices for working with youth. I have this expertise from over a decade of facilitating youth leadership workshops and being a trainer of YMCA Canada’s Healthy Adolescent Development module. The YMCA of Greater Toronto’s evidence-based approach to working with youth is of interest to the YMCA of Medellin.
The staff at ACJ Medellin are also experts in youth leadership as is demonstrated by the amazing results working with youth in one of the most precarious neighbourhoods in the world, Commune 13. A collection of neighbourhoods stretching steeply up the side of the mountains, it has been home to some of the worst violence Colombia had seen in past decades. There are approximately 20 gangs in the neighbourhoods fighting for control over territory for arms and drug smuggling operations.
Through the windy streets and chaotic maze of passageways, the ACJ has been able to be a pillar of the community, speaking up against injustice, promoting healthy living, and giving the young people a voice.
My name is Andrew Kowalchuk and it has been three days since my last Tim Horton’s coffee. It’s okay though; the coffee in Colombia is pretty good, too.
An elder in a refugee camp in Zambia once asked me a question that changed my life. I was running a capacity-building program with refugee youth and the elders were pleased with the work. During a discussion about poverty, I pointed out that Africa was not the only place that had poverty, that in fact poverty was the norm around the world. Even Canada, a wealthy country, has tens of thousands of people living on the streets. That is when he asked me, “If they need you at home, why are you here?”
The truth was that I was there because I had always wanted to travel. I wanted to live an exotic experience; not necessarily a good reason.
When I came back to Canada, I challenged myself to find a way to do equally meaningful work in a way that wasn’t about my experience. I found my opportunity at the YMCA. Initially at the YMCA of Northumberland and now at the YMCA of Greater Toronto, I am able to participate in international partnerships and programs that are genuinely meaningful to the lives of people in Canada and overseas.
What I found most special about the Henry Labatte Scholarship is that it is sincerely based on the mutual exchange of knowledge and expertise between diverse branches of the same organization.
I am here in Commune 13 in Medellin, Colombia for one month because the ACJ (Spanish for “YMCA”) requested an exchange of information on the best practices for working with youth. I have this expertise from over a decade of facilitating youth leadership workshops and being a trainer of YMCA Canada’s Healthy Adolescent Development module. The YMCA of Greater Toronto’s evidence-based approach to working with youth is of interest to the YMCA of Medellin.
The staff at ACJ Medellin are also experts in youth leadership as is demonstrated by the amazing results working with youth in one of the most precarious neighbourhoods in the world, Commune 13. A collection of neighbourhoods stretching steeply up the side of the mountains, it has been home to some of the worst violence Colombia had seen in past decades. There are approximately 20 gangs in the neighbourhoods fighting for control over territory for arms and drug smuggling operations.
Through the windy streets and chaotic maze of passageways, the ACJ has been able to be a pillar of the community, speaking up against injustice, promoting healthy living, and giving the young people a voice.
