By Lakhram Bhagirat
Give Another Chance Foundation (GACF) was birthed from the concept of charity begins at home. Though it has been in existence for just over eight years, GACF’s founders have been engaged in charity work for longer than that time.
Miranda Thakur-Deen founded GACF to supplement the work she has been doing throughout Guyana. The non-profit, non-governmental organization has a track record for helping to improve the lives of children across the country.
GACF is committed to providing basic education from pre-school to university, and healthcare to underprivileged children in rural and urban communities. It is the belief of the organisation whether you are addressing healthcare, poverty, population control, unemployment or human rights, there is no better place to start than in the corridors of education. According to the GACF Facebook page, the vision is to provide children and young adults with the building blocks for a better future.
With mindfulness and the courage to make a change, the Give Another Chance Foundation has accepted the responsibility to provide children and young adults with the building blocks for a better future. Their main aim is to provide them with the necessary resources and tools to ensure that every child is given the chance to evolve into a productive citizen.
The GACF has persons from various disciplines on its staff. The aim of this is to tackle issues in a number of areas to better equip communities to find long-term solutions to poverty through innovative education and livelihood projects, which empower an individual to earn a livelihood. Its goal is to increase awareness on a range of issues – from healthcare to appropriate social behaviour to understanding one’s rights, and in the process help, persons become better citizens.
The Foundation works on self-reliant projects where its education programmes focus not just on access, but on attainment – ensuring vulnerable children have the right infrastructure, resources, teaching and parental support in order to have a quality education, and go on to lead productive, happy lives. This is complemented by the Foundation’s livelihood programmes that work to create secure incomes. The organisation also helps to improve agricultural practices and market awareness for farming communities.
One of the newest areas the organization started work in is Emotional Intelligence (EQ).
According to PsychCentral, emotional intelligence or referred to as emotional quotient is the ability to understand, use, and manage your own emotions in positive ways to relieve stress, communicate effectively, empathize with others, overcome challenges and defuse conflict.
Emotional intelligence helps you build stronger relationships, succeed at school and work, and achieve your career and personal goals. It can also help you to connect with your feelings, turn intention into action, and make informed decisions about what matters most to you.
With that in mind, Miranda teamed up with several other organisations as well as experts and held the first EQ walk in Guyana last year. Along with the walk, there was a pop-up festival which attracted over 600 persons.
It was the first time emotional awareness was raised and children were allowed to truly express what they felt inside. They were connected to experts who would go on to address the issues faced by young people.
Riding on the success of the first EQ walk, Miranda and her team at GACF began outreaches to schools in collaboration with the experts and they have been able to place the spotlight on emotional intelligence.
“We felt that the spotlight needed to be placed on the emotional wellbeing of our children. We have never heard about so we knew we needed to do that. By tacking emotional intelligence we feel that we will tackle mental health because once we have emotionally intelligent children then there will be less suicide and suicidal thoughts,” Miranda said.
“We at GACF are of the opinion that Emotional Intelligence can play a part in curbing mental health and Suicide. As such implementing Social Emotional Learning in the school systems is good for our nation’s children. Pop-Up Festival is all about growing the skills for a better life and a better world. Grow Friendship, Reduce Conflict, Grow Self-Awareness, Reduce Volatility, Grow Connections and Reduce Isolation. We are excited to bring this to you for another year,” Miranda informs.
The pop-up festival runs until noon today.
The POP-UP Festival honours the United Nations “Universal Children’s Day” and “Convention on the Rights of the Child”.
People have worked toward this aim for hundreds of years – and sadly, we are still far from it. In the worst cases, children are growing up in bondage and privation. But even in the best cases, vast numbers of children are growing up with basic rights imperilled — rights to their wellbeing, social and emotional safety, and a chance to build a healthy life. While many nations are working to protect the most basic rights of physical safety, our world is far from where it needs to be for us to sit back and feel 100 per cent proud of the way our world’s children are treated.
