Youth participate in shaping Rwanda's development priorities

Location: Rwanda

Early in 2011, 45 young researchers canvassed three districts in Rwanda's capital city, Kigali, block by block and mile by mile, to understand better the living conditions, economic situations and employment possibilities for youth as seen by members of the community and youth themselves. Trained as "youth mappers," these local ethnographers completed 2,526 surveys of young people ages 14–24 and 278 business surveys. Over the past seven years, nearly 5,000 young people in urban and rural areas, in school and out, have used a methodology developed by FHI 360 experts called community youth mapping. They surveyed their communities in Chad, Egypt, Haiti, Jordan, Kosovo, the Netherlands, Niger, Rwanda and Sudan, as well as in more than 150 locales across the United States. The surveys addressed a wide range of issues, including education reform, livelihood development and human trafficking. The findings from the most recent survey in Kigali will now be used to ensure that job training programs respond to the needs of the city's young people.