Global Citizenship

COLOR YOUR LIFE

Shaan Cre­ations Inter­na­tion­al has ini­ti­at­ed in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Min­istry of For­eign Affairs the project “Col­or Your Life”. “Col­or Your Life” is a project where the young gen­er­a­tion in the Nether­lands is encour­aged to be part of glob­al cit­i­zen­ship. The world around us is get­ting small­er in means of reach­a­bil­i­ty by the capa­bil­i­ties of mod­ern media. Con­tacts with peo­ple and insti­tu­tions from dis­tant coun­tries are becom­ing faster and eas­i­er. There is so much infor­ma­tion avail­able on the Inter­net. The social media brings us into con­tact with peo­ple from the oth­er cor­ner of the world in a mat­ter of sec­onds.

The project “Col­or Your Life” is per­formed in two coun­tries name­ly the Nether­lands and Suri­name.

NETHERLANDS

A glob­al world for every­one!

In the Nether­lands, we vis­it the ele­men­tary and sec­ondary schools in the south­ern region with our project activ­i­ties. Stu­dents of dif­fer­ent schools take part in var­i­ous activ­i­ties. First we do a base­line assess­ment of the knowl­edge on top­ics as: inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion, glob­al cit­i­zen­ship and devel­op­ment among these young­sters (stu­dents). We do this by using a sur­vey form spe­cial­ly designed for this pur­pose. Fol­low­ing this, var­i­ous infor­ma­tive activ­i­ties are orga­nized for these young stu­dents. They get a vari­ety of infor­ma­tion brochures hand­ed to them, get to watch short films and pre­sen­ta­tions based on devel­op­ment, par­tic­i­pate in inter­ac­tive dis­cus­sions, etc. They also have the pos­si­bil­i­ty to dis­cuss their ideas with us, so that we as an orga­ni­za­tion can use these ideas in our fea­ture pro­grams. The inten­tion is that these young peo­ple are inject­ed with a dose of infor­ma­tion on inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion, glob­al cit­i­zen­ship and devel­op­ment through these activ­i­ties.

Con­se­quences of this work­ing method are that these young peo­ple are acti­vat­ed to be active in this field. This means a pos­i­tive behav­ioral change relat­ed to glob­al cit­i­zen­ship and greater involve­ment in inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion and devel­op­ment. They can also take the ini­tia­tive to under­take activ­i­ties them­selves. This rep­re­sents a marked change in the vision of the youth in the area of glob­al cit­i­zen­ship.

INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION AND POSITIVE BEHAVIOUR

Col­lab­o­ra­tion with one vision!

With­out a doubt it is impor­tant to inform the peo­ple in the Nether­lands as much as pos­si­ble about the inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion activ­i­ties of Shaan Cre­ations Inter­na­tion­al. We cre­ate more sup­port for devel­op­ment among the Dutch pop­u­la­tion. This leads to greater under­stand­ing for devel­op­ment, sup­port and rein­force pos­i­tive behav­ior among the Dutch. In real­iz­ing this we under­take var­i­ous activ­i­ties in the sec­ondary and high schools in the Nether­lands. These activ­i­ties con­tribute to the goals of our project and the Dutch cit­i­zens get more involved in inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion and glob­al cit­i­zen­ship. Espe­cial­ly at a time when the whole world suf­fers from the con­se­quences of the finan­cial cri­sis, it is impor­tant that we do not aban­don coun­tries with great eco­nom­i­cal slump. It is the sole pur­pose that we help the under­priv­i­leged in soci­ety in these vul­ner­a­ble coun­tries. The activ­i­ties we under­take with­in the con­text of the prgrams of “Col­or Your Life” include:

1. Con­duct­ing a base­line sur­vey among sec­ondary and high­er edu­ca­tion on the knowl­edge of inter­na­tion­al coop­er­a­tion.
2. Con­duct­ing var­i­ous pre­sen­ta­tions on devel­op­ment projects in devel­op­ing coun­tries.
3. The screen­ing of video films on devel­op­ment projects.
4. The design of var­i­ous project tasks in which the stu­dents can par­tic­i­pate.
5. Estab­lish­ing con­tacts between young peo­ple, schools, insti­tu­tions and orga­ni­za­tions in devel­op­ing coun­tries and The Nehet­lands.
6. Inform­ing young peo­ple about the oppor­tu­ni­ties for pri­vate ini­tia­tives. 
   

   Smile to the world and the world will smile to you!

An impor­tant ele­ment in our project is the focus on sui­cide pre­ven­tion and coun­sel­ing trou­bled and dys­func­tion­al fam­i­lies in devel­op­ing coun­tries and the Nether­lands. If we make a com­par­i­son between the Nether­lands and Suri­name, both coun­tries have high num­bers of sui­cide cas­es. The same can be said for dis­turbed and dys­func­tion­al fam­i­lies. Although the rea­sons for these social prob­lems in both coun­tries dif­fer, there are some sim­i­lar­i­ties to men­tion. We inves­ti­gate the caus­es tak­ing into account the cul­tur­al back­grounds of peo­ple and look at the oppor­tu­ni­ties for appro­pri­ate actions to con­tribute in solv­ing these prob­lems in devel­op­ing coun­tries and the Nether­lands as well.

Take a look at the Glob­al Cit­i­zen­ship Pho­to Gallery