It’s A New Way To Learn!

Welcome!

The Academy For A Young Africa (AFAYA) is a “blended” learning institution, which offers courses to people across Africa. We combining online learning using a mobile phone or computer, with Action Tasks (4 Daily Assignments per week) to make sure you actually develop NEW SKILLS, as well as with weekly Study Group Sessions to connect you to other students and build a learning community. Finally, as a student you will attend a monthly Evaluation Session with more students in your area, to prove that you have completed all tasks AND to build networks with other students in your area.

We want you to develop real, practical skills that will help you to build a BEAUTIFUL life!

Actually, the most important part of learning through the Academy For A Young Africa (AFAYA) is DOING what you are learning! This is not just a theoretical study programme – the ACADEMY For A Young Africa makes sure that you actually DO what you learn about, preparing you for a productive, purposeful and successful life, whether you are getting ready for your dream career or if you want to start or run your own business in the best possible manner.

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How Our Courses Work

• Our Courses consist of Modules. The number of Modules depend on the type of course.
• Each Module runs over six months. This is a ‘semester’.
• Each semester has two ‘terms’. One term runs over three months and includes ‘Term Holidays’.
• There are no assignments, study group meetings or training sessions during Public Holidays, and there are short holidays during each half-year (semester).
• Please note that our courses are either FULL-TIME Skills Training Programmes or PART-TIME Skills Training Programmes.
• If you are registered for a FULL-TIME Skills Training Programme, you will be expected to focus on your studies FULL-TIME while you are studying at home and completing your daily tasks, 4 days per week, and on 1 day per week you will be attending a Groupwork Session at a venue in your community. Once a month you will need to attend an Evaluation (Test) Session, also at a venue in your community.
• If you are registered for a PART-TIME Skills Training Programme, you will focus on doing assignments online and meeting with your fellow students in online Group Sessions, while your monthly Evaluation (Test) Session will be held on a Saturday at a venue in a town near you.
• We believe in bringing students together, to develop leadership skills, build business networks and friendships for life.
• Also note, the Practical Assignments of our Core Leadership And Entrepreneurship Training Programme will teach you HOW TO MAKE MONEY, from the very first month of taking part in any of our Courses. If you follow the instructions, you will be able to start generating an income while you are studying – EARN while you LEARN.

We will give you the knowledge – but YOU are responsible for your success!

As a LEAP student, you will learn through 6 different ways of learning:

• Personal reading and writing assignments (You will need to get an own pen and notebook. We will help you to arrange books, newspapers or magazines to read)
• Online reading and responding to quizzes (You can read on your cellphone or on any computer that has internet, for instance at a Youth Centre or Public Library)
• Action Assignments (You will be asked to do something, like interviewing a neighbour or shop owner)
• Groupwork assignments – Group discussions
• Groupwork assignments – Practical assignments (You will be asked to organise activities as a team)
• Monthly Assessments – You will keep a record of all your assignments and report on them verbally once a month. You will also write one monthly Assessment Paper.

Develop Leadership Skills

The Continent of Africa has a BEAUTIFUL FUTURE – IF all of us who are living here, work together to BUILD THIS FUTURE.

To achieve this, Africa needs a NEW BREED of LEADERS: leaders who LOVE the people whom they have been called to lead, and who are willing to SERVE these people with their leadership skills.

AFAYA teaches Leadership Skills based on BIBLICAL VALUES. This means that we acknowledge that the BIBLE is one of the oldest books in the world which has helped many civilisations across the world over the past 6000 years to grow strong and successful. The CORE LEADERSHIP PRINCIPLES taught in the Bible are:

1. Recognise that there is a God who has created the Universe, including Earth, and everything and everyone that lives here. Living a life full of GRATITUDE to God, thanking him every day for all the blessings he is giving us, is the foundation of a BEAUTIFUL Life.
2. Acknowledge that there is a force for good (God) and a force for evil (d’evil) and that we humans have to CHOOSE FOR GOOD every second of every minute of every hour of every day.
3. Understand that God is LOVE, while evil promotes the opposite, namely fear. So, as we learn to become leaders, we need to learn to LOVE God, ourselves and everyone we interact with. The Bible calls these ‘others’ our ‘neighbour’. This means that, when we make any choice in life, we need to think about how this choice impacts on our relationship to God, our own identity and self-image, and on the people we interact with – as well as all the people in the rest of the world AND how these choices impact nature (Earth).
4. Realise that we human beings need to honour and respect the basic LAW, as taught in the Bible. This LAW is summarised in the Ten Commandments. Why should we do this? Because in these 10 laws lies the secret of building GOOD RELATIONSHIPS with God and with the people and things around us, thereby helping us to maintain PEACE with God, PEACE with other people and PEACE within ourselves.
5. Understand that LITERACY is the key to programming (further developing) our brain. By being able to read well, the whole universe of knowledge is open to us. This helps us to make better decisions, and gain a better understanding of HOW TO fulfi;l our human potential – and therefore, our roles and purposes – in life.
6. Aspire and learn to become a SERVANT LEADER: meaning, in all humility learning how to place other people’s interests ahead of our own immediate interests, in order to achieve long-term prosperity, social caring and respect among our fellow human beings. The Bible teaches us that the one who wishes to be the greatest LEADER among his or her peers, must become the most humble SERVANT of his or her fellow human beings. The example provided to us in the Bible is Jesus Christ. We see this principle working in doing business as well: the entrepreneur who provides an excellent quality service or product at the most reasonable price to the most people, becomes the most wealthy. Such a person serves others through offering enormous value to his or her clients and customers.
7. The final Leadership Principle is that – in doing all of the above – we become CONSCIOUS human beings, aware of what is actually going on in this world, and so we become better prepared to deal with our situations and improve things. The Bible talks about ‘opening our eyes‘ and about getting to know the ‘truth’. In doing so, we will become free from wrong thinking and live our lives to the full.

During the Weekly Study Group Sessions you will learn to play a leading role within your Study Group. Each student will get a turn to take the lead in one role or another. The leadership roles are based on the roles in a Company, but we use the “Soccer Team” as a model to make things easy. Here are the key Leadership Roles in each Study Group:

• Coach (Chairperson)
• Captain (General Manager)
• Secretary (Provides organisational and administrative support)
• Treasurer (Manages any finances relevant to the Study Group)
• Law and Order Officer (Ensures peace and quiet and that the “Rules” of the Study Group are kept)
• Communications Officer (Coordinates meeting venues and communicates with all Study Group members, together with the Coach)
• 6 Strategic Portfolio Managers:
  • Community Portfolio Manager
  • Culture Portfolio Manager
  • Ecology Portfolio Manager
  • Education Portfolio Manager
  • Health Portfolio Manager
  • Innovation Portfolio Manager

The Study Group Sessions are built around Groupwork Assignments that teach you skills in each of the above leadership functions. So when your leadership role is being learnt, you take the lead on that particular Study Group Session. In this way, each student becomes confident and competent in each of the different leadership roles and learns more about each of the strategic fields.

Develop Practical Skills

AFAYA offers theory courses through an innovative Learning Management System.

In the Learning Management System you will find your Personal Assignments. These are daily tasks that you have to complete. Some of these tasks are about READING, others are about WRITING, some are about RESEARCHING, some are about INTERVIEWING, some are about DOING SOMETHING PRACTICAL. These assignments help you to actually DO a task that helps to build your skills, and helps you to build your self-confidence. DOING something takes away your nervousness (fear) about not being good enough. The tasks build skills on top of each other. This means that in the beginning, the tasks are really simple. Later on, as you develop more skills and self-confidence, the tasks become more interesting and complex. In the end, you will be AMAZED at how much you have learnt to build your confidence!

In addition, AFAYA coordinates opportunities for students to work as community volunteers as part of their practical assignments, ensuring that each student builds work experience, which is so critical to find work or understand how to work within and lead a team, if the student wants to become an entrepreneur.

Student Bonus Opportunities

As a student you will have the opportunity to access the following bonuses:

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 1: EARN POINTS

AFAYA furthermore introduces students to ‘real’ systems and institutions, aimed at helping them to grow their careers or start up a business. This includes participation in an innovative ‘Young Africa REWARDS’ system, whereby students are placed in volunteer community work positions, but can earn ‘Rewards’, based on a ‘points’ system. These rewards include vouchers to gain access further career development, business or related opportunities.

Placements for internships and volunteer positions are coordinated by Young Africa TALENT, an international recruitment and internship and temporary work placement services business.

From time to time the ACADEMY For A Young Africa also introduces BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES in partnership with various businesses and students may access these opportunities through applying their points. The more valuable an opportunity is, the higher the number of points required to access the opportunity.

Similarly, the ACADEMY For A Young Africa negotiates FREE ACCESS to workshops, events – both business events and FUN events – and special training opportunities on behalf of its students. Again, such opportunities are always limited, and students have to use the points they earned to access such opportunities.

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 2: EARN SHARES

Registered students also have the ability to earn shares in ‘Young Africa INVESTMENTS‘ , an investment holdings company which works to build businesses. across Africa, focusing on the following six strategic sectors: Health, Education, Community, Culture, Ecology and Innovation.

Such investment opportunities may be funded through exchanging POINTS for shares.

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 3: BUILD A GOOD CREDIT RATING

Students learn to save and build a credit rating by participating as members in the ‘Young Africa MONEY CLUB‘ – a savings and lending cooperative.

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 4: START AN OWN BUSINESS

As part of their coursework AFAYA students actually start up a new business under the guidance of Young Africa INVESTMENTS and its commercial partner, which offers enterprise development services.

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 5: BUSINESS LOAN

Should a student who has started up a new business require a business loan, such loan finance can be available through the Young Africa MONEY CLUB and other business loan finance institutions. Of course, the student will have to meet the necessary lending criteria. Kindly note that business loan finance is not guaranteed!

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 6: AFFORDABLE INSURANCE PRODUCTS

Young Africa INSURANCE offers short-term and long-term insurance products at a discounted rate to the students and the businesses which form part of the Young Africa NETWORK.

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 7: BULK BUYING DISCOUNTS

From time to time, special offers are made available to students and their businesses, with substantial cost savings, which are enabled through shared buying services negotiated on behalf of the businesses who are members of this network.

STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITY 8: STUDENT EXCHANGE PROGRAMME

At the end of each Term you will have the opportunity to take part in a Voluntary Student Exchange Programme during the Term Holidays. This Student Exchange Programme is aimed at broadening your mind and moving somewhere else for one month, so that you can get to know a different part of the country. There are costs involved for this Student Exchange Programme, which you will have to pay. But don’t worry: if you DO what you learn, you will have enough opportunities to make money, so that you can take part.

Kindly note that the above STUDENT BONUS OPPORTUNITIES will be introduced over time. Some of them form part of the curriculum, and others are optional.

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Get Ready For A Life Of All-Round SUCCESS!

“God did not give us a Spirit of Fear. His Spirit is a source of POWER and LOVE and SELF-DISCIPLINE.”

– 2 Timothy 1:7