How it began
YES Network Pakistan, founded by Ali Raza Khan, developed a trust-based model to transform young people into changemakers, impacting over 20,000 individuals.
In 2017, inspired by Ali's work, Thomas Jakel visited Pakistan to witness the Youth-led Changemaking model in action. After two weeks in the field, engaging with youth and educators, Thomas became an ambassador for the model and co-authored the book YES! Youth-led Changemaking with Ali.
Ali and Thomas aim to share this model with teachers, parents, policymakers, and young people, believing it can revolutionize youth development and education.
YES Network Pakistan's model has been featured in 30+ countries and endorsed by organizations like Ashoka, USAID, GIZ, and the British Council. Through the YES-Challenge program, they hope to expand its reach even further.
How is youth-led changemaking and the YES Challenge different from other programs?
The paradigm shift established by the work of YES Network is a direct turnaround in comparison to existing programs:
- In the new paradigm, the Youth serves vs. Old paradigm in which Youth is being served
- The old paradigm puts focus on problems of Youth, vs. the New Paradigm focuses on Youth engagement
- New paradigm is focused on low cost programs or programs with a direct positive return on investment vs. existing expensive programs
- The YES Network method has long term effects from its programs, whereas many programs are short lived with no or small long term results
- Many programs focus on academics and skill development of Youth, whereas the YES method focuses on All-Round Development of Youth
- Most existing player focus on designing reactive programs, whereas the YES methodology is focusing on designing pro-active programs
The Vision
Our vision is for every young person to have the opportunity to experience creating value and becoming a ChangeMaker. In a world where everyone is a ChangeMaker, equality is built by design, as the power to create change is widespread and accessible. This would be a world of active citizens seeking solutions, not passive bystanders or problem creators.
We also aim to introduce more young people to the self-inquiry tool IBSR (Inquiry Based Stress Reduction) which can help in cutting through limiting beliefs and revealing a clearer mind that sees a kinder world—one filled with hope and possibility, rather than limitations.
Our mission is to raise awareness about Ali Raza Khan’s Youth Engagement Model and help scale it both within and beyond Pakistan. This cost-effective and simple approach is the most successful method we know of to provide changemaking experiences to tens of thousands of young people quickly, with high success rates in launching ventures.
Along with promoting the YES Youth Engagement Model, we document inspiring stories of young changemakers and teach the self-inquiry method, as taught by Byron Katie. This powerful tool helps young people overcome limiting beliefs and stressful thoughts, leading to a clearer, more balanced mind from which positive action can emerge.
We aim to make this transformative tool of self-inquiry accessible to more young people, helping them see a kinder world filled with hope and possibilities instead of limitations.
The Mission
Our Values
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Our Values at the YES Founders Foundation are:
- Honesty & Transparency
- Seeing Potential in every human being
- Caring
- Focus on Youth Driven programs
- Sustainability
- Responsibility
We measure our actions against them and use them for decision making and program design.
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