Youth Empowerment and Development Program (YEDP) is a program that deals with youth issues: Young people must be empowered and enabled to develop their skills, create and improve opportunities and have a higher life expectancy.
This means that young people have the rights on equal access to cultural, economic and political opportunities. Equal accessibility to information and knowledge sources has a key role in developing and maintaining the situations which can create money, power and knowledge, and increase their human capabilities.
In this case ISRCD has established a worldwide platform for the youth known as YEN (Youth Empowerment Network) that work together to counteract the effects of poverty on youth development and education so that partner organizations can sustain growth from one generation to the next.
ISRCD recognizes that caring for youth and providing academic and vocational tools will allow them to be contributing members of their communities.
Consequently, ISRCD through YEDP carries out the following:
- Teaches adult and youth literacy courses focused on vocational skills development and life skills training.
- Engages youth in the creation of dance performances, theater, script writing, and choreography aimed at raising HIV/AIDS awareness and supporting HIV/AIDS-affected youth.
- Facilitates workshops with local youth on reproductive health, effective communication, self-esteem building, and positive decision-making.
- Creates sports-related clubs and activities that engage youth in confidence building experiences.
- Develops social and academic activities for local youth to reduce at-risk behavior, build self-esteem, and inspire a sense of vocational direction.
- Provides life skills and vocational training, along with credit and savings opportunities for marginalized youth.
- established a Youth Empowerment Fund (YEF) that financially support youth organizations and cooperatives to run generating income activities.
ISRCD uses a three-pronged approach that effectively engages young people in work that challenges them to develop skills, gain critical awareness, and participate in opportunities that are necessary for community change. This is achieved through three processes: Skills development and Critical awareness and creation of opportunities.
-Skills development: The process of strengthening the skills of youth so that they know how to effectively make decisions, positively interact with their peers, and act as community advocates
-Critical awareness: The process of providing youth with the information and resources necessary for analyzing issues that affect their lives and environment as well as strategize on ways to act as change agents in their communities.
-Opportunities: The process of providing youth with platforms for decision-making and encouraging their active participation in creating community change.
ISRCD established Youth Empowerment Network (YEN) and through YEN, young people are encouraged, trained, supported, mentored, challenged and mobilized to be the change they want to see in their communities- Youth led change for healthier communities. The ultimate goal of YEDF was the establishment of Youth Empowerment Fund (YEF) that financially support youth organizations and cooperatives.