SAGE Nigeria prevails at the 2015 Child and Youth International Awards held at the House of Lords in London, hosted by Baroness Valerie Howarth, Baroness of Breckland.

A SAGE Nigeria student of Junior Secondary School Airport ,Abuja Ms.Amina Abdulsamed has won the 2015 CYFI  Youth Financial Inclusion Innovation Award.The ceremony held at the House of Lords in London ,hosted by Baroness Valerie Howarth, Baroness of Breckland on the 10th Dec.2015.

The ceremony recognized the efforts and success of those working to achieve economic empowerment for young people .The Youth Financial Inclusion Innovation Award category recognizes the ability of  children and youth to make use of the innovative technology and /or media means to create new ways of facilitating the use of child friendly financial products and banking services .

Mr.Tunde Akinfolarin  the SAGE team  coach who was also at the event in London stated that “Most of the games on financial literacy like Monopoly and our own Bizkidz are hard copy games or computer games. This is a mobile app that anyone can have access to.” 

Money Maker is a smartphone game providing financial education in an innovative way. The mobile app teaches people, particularly youth, about savings, investment, starting small scale businesses, measurement of profit and loss and general business principles/rudiments as youth unemployment is a very pressing issue in Nigeria. 

Most of the games that already exist teaching financial literacy, like Monopoly and their own game “Bizkidz”, are hard copy games or computer games. Money Maker, on the other hand, is a mobile app that anyone can have access to as most people have phones which are more portable than laptops and desktops. 

The Money Maker app was developed in order to be dedicated to combing the importance of financial knowledge 
with the importance of today’s young future leaders in

a manner that is relevant to the digital lifestyle of youth 
today. Via this app, youth learn about the practical aspect of business, and the application shows that success in business requires skill and an element of luck. 

Most of the young people who have used the award winning Money Maker app appreciate the concept and the 
easy way it uses animation to teach young people what they can do with small amounts of money. 

•  Money Maker is an eco-friendly game which discourages the use paper/falling of trees to reduce the menace of global warming. 
•  Money Maker has won the Best Entrepreneurship Project at the 2015 SAGE competition in Abuja, Nigeria. 
• Most of the people who have played Money Maker appreciate the concept and the easy way it uses animation to teach youths what they can do with small amount of money. 
•  Money Maker’s main focus is to imbibe the culture of self-reliance and self-employment from their youth. 

L-R Mr.Tunde Akinfolarin- SAGE Team Coach ,Ms.Amina Abdulsamed and Jeroo Billimoria -Founder /Director -Child and Youth Finance International 

In the past few years, SAGE Nigeria in partnership with the Central Bank of Nigeria has been at the forefront in championing financial inclusion and education in Nigeria ,through the SAGE programme students learn hands-on how to save,invest and bank!

A Secret Weapon Against Terror: Educating Youth Through Social Entrepreneurship

SAGE Founder & CEO, Dr. Curt DeBerg, wrote this for the Huffington Post in June of 2007. It’s entitled, “A Secret Weapon Against Terror: Educating Youth Through Social Entrepreneurship”. Given the recent events in Paris, his words are prescient. Two years ago, SAGE welcomed Pakistan to our growing network. This year, we have added Iran. Here is Dr. DeBerg’s post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-curtis-l-deberg/a-secret-weapon-against-t_b_52623.html

"One of the best weapons against terror is youth empowerment through education, and SAGE is part of the secret arsenal," Major Miemie Winn Byrd, Deputy Economic Advisor, U.S. Pacific Command, told me after she served as a judge/panelist at a recent SAGE competition in Los Angeles. Byrd is now one of our biggest fans. "It's time to let the secret out of the bag," she said.

SAGE (Students for the Advancement of Global Entrepreneurship) is a youth education program that combines commercial entrepreneurship with social entrepreneurship. I founded this program in 2002, and besides serving as its director, I am also a business professor at California State University, Chico.

Now operating in 12 countries, SAGE is a partner of Youth Venture, an Arlington, VA-based international youth organization that promotes social entrepreneurship.

The program pairs high school student teams with advisors from universities and businesses. The student groups receive business start-up funds of up to $1,000, with which they use to create a business and/or social program. At the end of the year, student teams are judged at SAGE tournaments, with the referees coming from the business and civic communities.

Last week eight state champion teams from six states came to New York City to compete for the title of USA SAGE champion and a place in the upcoming SAGE World Cup competition in Odessa, Ukraine. This year's winners were students from Northwestern Lehigh High School in New Tripoli, Pennsylvania. They launched a parfait and lollipop business that earned $1,500 in its first year. Bryan Klass, the team's faculty adviser, said that he was equally as pleased with their community outreach projects. One project included importing Peruvian bracelets from Cuchuma, Peru, with most of the profits going back to the Peruvian village to build greenhouses. This project was one of many that fell under the "Hungry to Help" general theme of this year's team.

"SAGE gives students the opportunity to apply their classroom knowledge by completing real-world ventures," Klass said. "All teams were fantastic, and I am proud that Pennsylvania will represent the U.S. in August at the international competition."

After the NYC competition, team photos were taken next to the 9/11 Memorial and Fire Station on Liberty Street, which is the southern border street where the Twin Towers collapsed. The photo of the winning team was taken with a U.S. flag (see photo attached). According to Klass, "The flag was lent to us by a firefighter that survived the collapse of the World Trade Center Towers. He told us his story and was very proud of the flag and what it represents! He wished us well in representing the USA at the world competition!"

The SAGE World Cup takes place in Odessa, Ukraine 31 July to 4 August. Please seehttp://www.csuchico.edu/sage for details. The World Cup also includes a day of cultural exchange. Countries participating include Brazil, China, Ghana, Nigeria, Philippines, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Ukraine and the USA. Singapore and Germany will observe.

SAGE's combination of social entrepreneurship, service-learning and interscholastic competition is potent. It is a powerful new education model whose time is come. Our Brazilian friends in Sao Paulo refer to SAGE as the Student Olympics for Sustainability. SOS--SAGE to the rescue! Next year, we plan to grow by five countries, including our first Muslim country, Morocco.

The three-day conference on the theme: 'Advancing Youth Economic Empowerment for Inclusive Growth" held in Ghana brought together African financial experts as well as stakeholders from more than 22 countries to work towards establishing regional and national -level strategies to address issues of financial education and entrepreneurship among the youth. This event was organised by the Child and Youth Finance International in collaboration with Micro finance and Small Loans Centre  (MASLOC),Youth Enterprise Support (YES) with support of other organizations.

The youth summit which focused mainly on creating an enabling environment for the growth of youth enterprises which involved workshops and plenary sessions that helped define specific challenges of young entrepreneurs in Africa and identified innovative practices that can help address these challenges .

The Eary Bird SAGE Team in Ghana were part of this deliberation to create an action plan to actively further financial education and inclusion in the African region by making list of wishes for government and stakeholders to create policies and the enabling environment for children and youth to be financially included.

The President /CEO SAGE Africa Agwu Amogu conducted a workshop on "Financing Youth Enterprises through Innovative Practices and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), He stated that  the major key funding areas of youth enterprises are  Supporting training programs for youth entrepreneurs by financing training carried out by enterprise development organizations, mentoring youth entrepreneurs, with local business people providing guidance to new business owners,Providing grants or credit to young entrepreneurs to start businesses etc .

the Early Bird SAGE Team made a  Social Enterprise Business Presentation as a case study to showcase that Creating better futures through social enterprises, socially responsible businesses and community service would surely help identify  innovative practices that can help address these challenges .

FUNTAJ INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL ABUJA EMBRACE ENTREPRENEURSHIP EDUCATION THROUGH SAGE IN NIGERIA

SAGE Nigeria team led by the project manager Mr.Kingsley Eke introduced the SAGE programme to FUNTAJ-INTERNATIONAL-SCHOOL Abuja, known for creating tomorrow’s leaders.

Students who join the SAGE programmeg gain knowledge and skills to become successful entrepreneurs and dynamic leaders. They are engaged in hands on project-based learning, with heavy influence in STEM areas.

SAGE students get the opportunity to showcase and compete with their business and community service projects at SAGE competitions. The SAGE international competitions- SAGE World Cup offers participants a friendly platform for multi-cultural integration and global business networking.

The principal of Funtaj International School George Bowery spoke on the urgent need of entrepreneurship education and finical literacy in the high school curriculum; he also believes that the SAGE program is the best strategy in reducing youth unemployment across the world. He urged his students to show commitment and passion in the programme which provides them entrepreneurship curriculum, mentoring and competition. 

INACAP INTRODUCE CHILEAN YOUTHS TO THE SAGE NETWORK

From what I observed on my recent visit to Chile was on 18-30 October, there is great hope for Chile’s future. While I was in Chile, I witnessed dozens of outstanding entrepreneurial ideas and presentations by teenagers in six cities: Arica, Punta Arenas, Coyhaique, Osorno, Temuco and Santiago. These six cities hosted Go! Innova competitions directed by INACAP.

Prior to these competitions, nine other cities hosted similar competitions sponsored by INACAP. The winning team from each of these 15 regional competitions advanced to the national competition in Santiago on 19 November. It has been reported to me that the top three teams at the national event came from Santiago, Arica, and Temuco, with the Temuco team claiming national honors. The Temuco teens are from the village of Vilcún. They wrote an outstanding business plan and created a prototype to sell special teas from their region. The teas are arranged in a unique fashion and packaged in a hand-painted wooden box highlighting the heritage of their regions’ ancestors.

As the national winner, the Vilcún teens will now represent Chile at a global tournament in Manila, Philippines in August. This national tournament is hosted by Students for the Advancement of Global Entrepreneurship—SAGE—a non-profit organization that I founded in 2002.

Not only do I run the SAGE program, I am also a university business professor at California State University, Chico. I have long been interested in the powerful formula of commercial and social entrepreneurship, employing a virtual untapped army of community service providers who can apply their textbook theories to real-world problems. These service providers are university students (e.g., INACAP students) who work as coaches to teams of innovative and industrious high school students who start real businesses by participating in Go! Innova.

With today’s technology, the university and high school students are beginning to build a worldwide network of business colleagues and friends, leading to the creation of economic, social and political capital. This capital can increase the standard of living for the entire world. Currently, SAGE is present in 22 countries (Chile is #22!). My goal is to be active in 40 countries by 2018.

The SAGE idea, like Go! Innova, is modeled after interscholastic competition. A team of innovative high school students is formed, either by the students themselves or in conjunction with an entrepreneurial teacher. The team can be part of an existing class, or it can be co-curricular. At the end of the academic year, the teams travel to a tournament to present the results of their innovations to a panel of jurists recruited from the business and civic community. Unlike sports, where teams are judged on their athletic prowess, SAGE teams are judged on creativity, innovation, and market viability.

Like Go! Innova teens, a SAGE team must launch and operate a business enterprise during the year. The enterprise must be either a socially-responsible business, where the primary goal is to make a profit, or a social enterprise business, where the primary goal is to address a community problem using entrepreneurial skills.

As is now being done in Chile, under the direction of INACAP, SAGE teams then enter a regional tournament, where the top teams go on to represent their region at a national tournament.

The best teams at the national tournament, like the teens from Vilcún, will represent their country at the SAGE World Cup. The next World Cup takes place in Manila, Philippines on 11-16 August, 2016.

Now in its 14th year, the SAGE World Cup host cities the past eight years have been Shanghai, Odessa, Abuja, Brasilia, Cape Town, Buffalo, Moscow, and Seoul. No other teen entrepreneurship programme has such a global presence, and I am pleased that INACAP and SAGE have formally entered into a strategic partnership.

In closing, I would like to thank INACAP for introducing Chilean youth to SAGE through its Go! Innova program, and we look forward to seeing Chilean teens in Manila next August. I wish them the very best at their first SAGE World Cup competiton.

Curtis L.DeBerg
Founder
SAGE Global
www.sageglobal.org