As students grow up and go to high school, opportunities to help their community begin to present themselves. Clubs, volunteer organizations, and other programs of the sort allow adolescents to come into their roles as active adult members of the South Windsor, and worldwide community.
(Lauren Hensel)
One such opportunity is called the Leadership Initiatives International Scholarship. It is run by the Leadership Initiatives Program – a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping rural communities in sub-Saharan Africa with challenges related to healthcare, education and economic development.
The program offers high school students the unique opportunity to work with project coordinators and community leaders in northern Nigeria to come up with innovative solutions to these problems. The program is split into three tracks: business, public health and advocacy.
“In each program, interns create teams of 3-7 people from their area to work with throughout the year,” program director Marshall Bailly explained. “Teams meet weekly with a facilitator from Leadership Initiatives, and monthly with a project coordinator in Nigeria to review their progress.”
According to SWHS sophomore Erin Fang – who is participating in the public health track of the international internship – the program requires about three hours of work each week.
Fang discovered the program when attending a summer internship through the same organization in Washington DC.
“I’ve always been passionate about healthcare, and I’ve been wanting to take action on helping underprivileged communities get the facilities and resources they need,” Fang said.
Fang wants to major in pre-med, and attending Leadership Initiatives summer program gave her hands-on experience and a wealth of information, specifically on the issues that people in Nigeria face related to public health.
“That program gave me a huge opportunity, and I wanted to elongate that impact for as long as I could, hence my application for the international program,” Fang said.
The programs for this year have already started, but students will be able to apply during the summer of 2025, when the sign-up window reopens.
