Co-host of Citi TV’s Breakfast Daily show, Dziffa Ametam is in New York City to meet with partners of a Non-Governmental Organisation she co-founded known as Elevate Her.
According to her, the trip is to enable her “present Elevate Her to our supporters from the NYU Wagner community and connect with other nonprofits in New York City to learn from each other and exchange ideas on how best to help our communities grow.”
She has more on her trip and Elevate Her below:
Tell us a bit about Elevate Her?
Elevate Her is a non-profit founded by myself and AJ Sarpong to help young girls in Junior High School develop their confidence, encourage them to speak up about issues they are struggling with as teenagers and connect them to mentors.
We provide safe spaces for the girls to openly discuss any personal challenges they face both at home and in school, engage the girls in public speaking workshops, and introduce them to a series of books that will help them see how other successful people overcame challenges life threw at them in their teenage years.
Our ultimate goal is to grow the confidence of the girls and expose them to a world of possibilities so they know that irrespective of the economic limitations of their environment, they can achieve anything they set their minds to if they work hard and believe in their potential.
How long have you been working on Elevate Her and What Schools are you currently in?
We have been working on Elevate Her since March 2019: researching, ideating, meeting possible schools, and brainstorming the resources we will need to make it a success. We finally agreed on All Saints Catholic School in Adabraka, the girls are lovely, the teachers are supportive and it is not far from our workplace. We currently work with 50 girls from form one and form two. We will be working with them for the 2019-2020 academic year. We hope to scale the model to more schools in underprivileged neighborhoods once we are done with All Saints.
What Inspired the two of you to work on Elevate Her?
We both struggled with issues of identity, finding a sense of purpose, struggling to speak in front of people, allowing fear prevent us from going after opportunities we knew we were qualified for because we doubted our abilities and battled with lack of confidence for the most part of our teenage years.
We were lucky enough to find relevant books, safe spaces, and mentors to help us overcome those challenges to become the fearless, confident women we are today. Unfortunately, not every young girl gets the privilege we had to overcome those challenges and as a result, they grow into women whose fears and lack of confidence prevents them from reaching their full potential.
We believe that the Junior High School years are very delicate and if young women are supported to boldly discover who they are and how powerful their potential is, they will develop a strong sense of self and ambitions that will mold them into unstoppable women in the years to come. Elevate her is our way of paying forward the investments others made in us to become the women we are today.
Why are you at New York University?
NYU Wagner’s Ghanaian Women’s Social Leadership Program (GWSLP) has been very instrumental in the formation and implementation of Elevate Her. I got into the program earlier this year along with seven other brilliant young women leaders in Ghana doing remarkable work in their respective industries.
The program matched me with a mentor, Nana Asantewaa Afiadzinu (Executive Director of West Africa Civil Society Insitute) who helped us at every point, Amparo Hofmann-Pinilla (Director of GWSLP) who also supported us through the ideation and incubation process and a group of amazing women whose feedback helped shape Elevate Her. I’m at NYU to present Elevate Her to our supporters from the NYU Wagner community and connect with other nonprofits in New York City to learn from each other and exchange ideas on how best to help our communities grow.
What’s Next For Elevate Her?
From our interactions with the girls, we have noticed a series of challenges they face that are beyong AJ and I and as a result, we will be relying on our strong community of family and friends to help us best serve the girls. We noticed for example, that confidence is a luxury for a girl suffering from a yeast infection that she has not been able to treat due to lack of funds or a girl who doesn’t have the financial means to buy sanitary pads and has to experience a week of shame and embarrassment every single month. We will be doing a drive to get sanitary pads for the girls so they don’t can concentrate on their schoolwork and overcome the insecurity that comes with having control over their period days.
We will be rolling out a series of workshops and book reading with the students and will need all of our friends to get on board. We are currently contacting resource people in Ghana to host a series of workshops to help the girls learn how to handle puberty better, overcome their shyness and nervousness, speak up and boldly take their place in their community. We have identified relevant books we will like to buy for the girls and would appreciate any commitment our friends can make to get books for the girls. We want to get the sticky notes to write messages around their classrooms so they are always reminded that they are brilliant and can achieve anything they put their minds to.
How do we contact you if we want to support Elevate Her?
The best way to reach both of us is via email: Elevatehergh@gmail.com