Women LEADCorporate Deckwww.women-lead.orgccharamnac@women-lead.org617.642.6820www.facebook.com/womenLEAD I @womenLEADnepal

Organization Snapshot• What we do: leadership development for young women

• Who we serve: 16 to 18 year old female students in Kathmandu, Nepal

• Who our staff are: 3 employees (including the 2 co-founders)

• Who funds us: 2 foundations, 1 private donor, several small donors

• When we were founded: June 2011

• Significant awards: Echoing Green Semi-Finalists 2012, Women Deliver’s “Top 50 Solutions Delivering Women and Children”

Vision and Mission

• Vision: To have women and girls taking key leadership positions alongside men

• Mission: To provide young women with the personal and professional skills to pursue their vision for change

Sponsorship BreakdownWhen you sponsor a girl, you sponsor her year-long training, which includes:• Partnerships with the schools we work with• Materials for the training and their activism campaigns• The Closing Ceremony at the end of the year that celebrates their

achievements • Monitoring and Evaluation of our programs to make sure they are

responding to the needs of our girls • Transport • Office overheads• Seed funding for the Social Entrepreneurship Program • Internship placements • Recruiting mentors • Mentorship events

Before the LEAD program, I never felt like I could lead things, but now I feel like I can lead anything at any time. I believe in myself much more than I could ever imagine. After Women LEAD, everything changed.” -Sharmila Dhungana, Women LEAD 2011 Participant

Who We Are: The FoundersClaire Naylor (Executive Director, Nepal)• Knowledge of Nepali culture and language, based

on lifetime experience living and working with young women in Nepal

• 5 years experience working on women’s rights, youth, and social entrepreneurship in Nepal and US

• Manages the Kathmandu office; researches, designs, implements and evaluates programs, Nepal NGO registration

Claire Charamnac, Executive Director, US • 5 years experience working on conflict

resolution/women’s rights in United States and Singapore

• Runs fundraising, outreach to partners, communications, board relations and US 501c3 registration

TeamLocal staff (Program Manager and 6 interns)• Sonu, our Program Manager, has several years experience combating human

trafficking through the judicial system and empowering survivors at SASANE.

US Board: our 3 Board members have extensive experience in • non-profit and human rights law• human resources management• business consulting, leadership training/coaching and organizational

development/change management

Advisory Committee: our 3 Advisors have experience in • social entrepreneurship• start-ups• economic/political empowerment of women in South Asia

Problem• The lack of female leaders is one of the most enduring

forms of inequality in the 21st century.Women hold fewer than 20% of national decision-making positions around the world.

• There are many problems facing women, especially in Nepal..

Women in Nepal face overwhelming challenges: 1/3 of girls aged 15 to 19 are married and 60% of women are illiterate.

• And they are not equipped to deal with them.Less than 2 cents of every development dollar goes to girls and 9 of 10 youth programs are aimed at boys.

Our Solution: What we do

• Despite the challenges facing women, there are also opportunities, such as increased political representation for women (33% quota for women in Parliament), but schools and civil society fail to equip women with the tools to access and leverage these positions.

• Young women have the passion and vision to solve Nepal’s development challenges, but simply lack the necessary resources.

• We invest in a small group of diverse young women (16-18 years old) that have the potential to become the next generation of female leaders in Nepal. We build the capacity of future female leaders to tackle root causes of poverty and discrimination.

We deeply invest in the lives of extraordinary young women. We empower them to self-identify as leaders to interrupt existing cycles of discrimination and oppression, so they can break free and create new cycles of empowerment.

She is paired with a young female professional in Kathmandu who acts as a mentor over the course of the year, providing individualized guidance, support, and focused professional development (deeper skills-building and self-awareness).

On the Entrepreneurship Track, she designs and lead her own social venture through a structured social entrepreneurship program. In her team, she receives training, guidance and seed funding to launch a sustainable and scalable project in response to a community need they have identified and are committed to solving.

On the Leadership Track, she is trained to lead weekly leadership workshops for students aged 14-15 in local schools. The program explores both leadership skills and youth issues, equipping her with the skills, confidence and support needed to launch a school-based activism campaign at the end of the program.

On the Development Track, she is matched with volunteer opportunities according to her passions and career goals. She will volunteer 5 hours/week throughout the school year and do a summer internship (25 hours/ week) with outstanding NGOs to build her professional skills and gain experience, while directly addressing Nepal’s most pressing challenges.

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She is paired with a mentor

Her year-long program

She joins one of four leadership tracks, depending on her academic and career interests

On the Advocacy Track, she will be equipped with the knowledge and skills to plan, implement, and evaluate a community-based advocacy campaign on her chosen issue.

ADVO

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Impact“I realized I can have so much influence over others and that my knowledge increases as I share it.” – Aishwarya, LEAD Participant 2011

Our leadership programs help young women gain confidence in their abilities and skills, empowering them to raise their voices to advocate for change and negotiate the issues in their lives on stronger terms .

We help young women form and articulate their career goals. They are better equipped to seek and leverage the opportunities at their disposal.

Participation in the LEAD program helps young women gain a deeper understanding of the key issues facing their communities and nation. It nurtures their civic and political awareness and activism.

Menuka’s Story Menuka, a participant from the minority Gurung ethnic group, came into the program knowing that she wanted to go into business. We first knew Menuka was extraordinary when she took the initiative to speak to her community on their treatment of child domestic workers after attending our workshop on domestic violence. After learning from leading female entrepreneurs during our program, she was selected as our Social Entrepreneurship fellow and is currently starting up her own venture. We have seen remarkable growth in her as she works with her mentor and team of other WLEAD participants to establish water booths throughout Kathmandu valley. As she strives to provide clean, affordable and accessible water to underserved urban populations, we know she will continue to engage her peers and younger girls through her work with WLEAD and her community.

Milestones• Our LEAD program has grown increasingly reputable,

with our application rate increasing by over 100%. • In one year, despite limited resources and rampant

gender discrimination, we have grown from a 2-week pilot program serving 28 young women to an organization with 3 yearlong programs serving over 200 youth.

• Our LEAD program trains 30 girls annually. Each girl is expected to impact an additional 25 young women through our programs. By 2017, we will have trained 400 leaders (60/year starting in 2013).

How we’re unique• Many programs focus on primary and secondary education for girls,

but we are the only organization in Nepal specifically focusing on empowering adolescent girls to be leaders.

• We intensely invest in a selective group of young women over a significant period of time (at least one year) to ensure permanent change because we know leadership can’t be learnt in a day or a week.

• We are youth-driven and youth-led: Women LEAD is run by passionate, driven young women under 23- over half our team are LEAD alumnae.

• We address the critical gap in services needed to bridge basic education and adult success.

• We multiply our effect: our programs have a greater impact as our participants not only transform their own lives, but directly impact up to 25 other young women’s’ lives through our programs.

ConclusionMany of our participants had never written a resume or spoken up in public before attending our programs.

The skills and resources we provide them with will enable them to access and leverage leadership positions.

This new generation of qualified female leaders will work with men to transform Nepal’s unjust structures, building a culture of gender equality in their schools, communities and nation.

What would our world look like if we gave these tools to 10 000 16 to 18 year old young women around the world to

become leaders and solve the most pressing problems in their communities?

Appendix: Our Story• History of Women LEAD… from inspiration to conception to

research to pilot program to now, to the future!• January 2010: The idea for Women LEAD was born at Youth

Venture’s DC Start Up Scramble. • January – June 2010: Our mission, vision and program concept is

hashed out, and YV gives us our first grant.• June – August 2010: Our pilot project is launched in the form of a

two week leadership development course for 28 girls. • January 2011: We secure a $10 000 Davis Projects for Peace grant. • June 2011: We officially launch Women LEAD as an organization with

3 full-time employees.• July 2011 – present: Our year-long LEAD program is launched, and

we pilot our 3 program tracks. • January 2012: We are officially incorporated in Washington DC and

form our Board of Directors.

Appendix: Measuring Impact • Our metrics for success

The key short-term predictive indicators of long-term success are:

1. 100% of participants enter a formal leadership position within one year of completing the LEAD program

2. 75% of participants remain engaged with the Women LEAD alumni network three years on (attend WLEAD events, participate in our on-line forum and opportunities, mentor other alumni etc.)

THANK YOU FOR YOUR HELP IN SPONSORING AN AMAZING YOUNG WOMAN LEADER.

When you sponsor a girl ,

she will send you a personal, handwritten letter with details on her background, career goals and interests. In the middle of the year, she will send you another letter on how the sponsorship and year-long training are impacting her life.

At the end of the year, you will be able to Skype with her to talk to her directly about how she has changed in the past year.