Speech of Andrea Wong, President of Endeavour Volunteer Consulting for Non-Profits at the Graduation Gala of Vision Youth Leadership Programme 2010-2011 [Feb 26, 2011]

It's an honour to be a part of this celebration tonight. I want to congratulate everyone who has contributed to making Vision Youth what it is today - from the executives to the Visioneers, to the parents and supporters. VY is an incredible program and you guys have done some really amazing and fun stuff. I wish I had participated in this program when I was younger because the experiences and relationships that you've built through VY, and the contributions that you've made to the community, are so valuable. I understand many of you who are Visioneers will be entering university or college soon. You'll be embarking on a new chapter of your life that is both exciting and challenging. Looking back on my time in university and the last four years that I've been working, the most valuable lessons I've learned in life and the most rewarding experiences that I have had have come from my involvement in the community. Tonight, I want to share with you two of these experiences and what I've learned. But these next few minutes aren't about me - they're really about what you'll take away from this - and one of the things that I hope you'll take away is the importance of staying involved in the community and the positive change that you can create in your own life and in the life of others by being an active member in the community.

Let me start by sharing with you, back when I was in high school I used to get really nervous when I had to give a presentation. Even when I was about to graduate from university almost 5 years ago I said, I hope I never have to give another presentation in my life. But in the last 4 years, I've spoken before many groups in the community and now I look forward to the opportunity to share my experiences with others. And these opportunities have come to me because of the nonprofit that I started four years ago with a few friends. Let me tell you a bit about this nonprofit, Endeavour, that I started in 2007. Similar to your VY community service projects, Endeavour brings together teams of volunteers to work on projects to help nonprofits achieve a goal. Since 2007, Endeavour has engaged more than 200 volunteers to provide free management consulting to 36 nonprofits in Ontario.

Here's a photo of one of our volunteer teams. Our volunteers are diverse. They range from university students to experienced professionals from various backgrounds. We create our volunteer teams to leverage this diversity. We provide our teams with support throughout their projects, including orientation and training, and industry experts. The nonprofits we work with support diverse causes. They help communities in areas such as the arts, education, the environment, healthcare, international development, and social justice, just to name a few.

Let me give you a few examples of the nonprofits we've worked with. You might have seen this ad in the subway recently for Windfall. Windfall is a charity dedicated to alleviating poverty in the Greater Toronto Area. Windfall receives donations of new items and distributes them through social services agencies in the GTA. One of the issues that Windfall was facing was that they were receiving donations of bridal gowns that their clients didn't need. They decided to sell these gowns and use the revenues to fund their charitable programs. Windfall asked one of our volunteer teams, pictured here, to develop a strategic plan for a bridal boutique that would serve as a source of sustainable funding for Windfall's charitable programs. Windfall was very happy with the work our team did, and they recently celebrated the launch of their bridal boutique by setting the Guinness World Record for the largest group of people dressed as brides, as you can see from this photo.

We also help charities with an international reach like Food For the Poor Canada. Food For the Poor works in Haiti and Jamaica. They build schools and homes, feed the hungry and provide healthcare to the sick. Food For the Poor Canada asked one of our volunteer teams to conduct market research and develop a marketing strategy to build awareness about their organization among target donors. They have been doing well. Recently, they opened a school in Jamaica and gave five families in Haiti new homes, and are currently building five more new homes using the funds they've received. We've worked with nonprofits that run some really unique programs, and Freeing the Human Spirit is an example of one. The charity runs yoga and meditation programs in prisons to contribute to the rehabilitation of inmates. Since 2004 they've established their programs in 20 prisons in Ontario and two other provinces, and are working to expand across Canada. One of our volunteer teams, pictured here, is currently working with the charity to develop a branding strategy to raise greater awareness about their organization. These are just three examples of the 36 great nonprofits that we've worked with in the last four years.

I often get asked, what made you start Endeavour? After I graduated from university, I was looking for a way to get involved in the community during my free time while developing my skills and connecting with like-minded individuals. I had volunteered with a similar student group in my last year at the University of Toronto, and I learned a lot from that experience and met some great people. One of the things that I learned from that experience is that a lot of nonprofits and individuals can benefit from an organization like this. The fact that Endeavour has had more than 700 volunteer applications and that more than 100 nonprofits have applied for our service speaks to this. But I wasn't able to find an organization like this for people no longer in school so I thought, why not start one? I got together with a few friends who were also excited about the idea, and in 2007, we successfully launched our first set of projects.

It's been an amazing experience starting and growing Endeavour. It's been very rewarding both personally and professionally. It's also been exciting for us in the last two years, we've been contacted by people from across the country and around the world, including business professors from Japan and Stanford MBA graduates, who want to learn more about Endeavour's model so that they can replicate our successes in their own communities. We've been asked by professionals from Vancouver and as far as Turkey to help set up an Endeavour chapter in their own community. Unfortunately, we don't have the capacity to expand and help more communities. Endeavour is run entirely by volunteers on a shoestring budget. How do we continue to grow and help more communities? Right now, one of the greatest challenges for me as a leader and for us as an organization is sustaining our growth and success. We need to work as a team, but I've realized that is not enough. We need to build leaders within our organization too. The organization can't just be led by one person. We need leaders to lead their own teams so that we can do and accomplish more. We are currently doing this within Endeavour, creating leadership roles for those who have demonstrated the greatest leadership potential, the desire to lead, and their commitment and passion. By doing this, we are also helping to ensure that when a leader moves on, there will be someone to take up the leadership role and continue the work. This need extends to the larger community. It's important that today's community leaders are also investing in developing tomorrow's leaders. VY is doing just that through the Visioneers, and it's great to see that there are so many of you who are a part of this.

I want to take the last few minutes to broaden our focus to the global community. How many of you have volunteered, worked or lived in a developing country? We are very fortunate to be living in Canada, and very privileged to be able to help those who are less fortunate.

Last summer, I traveled to Mongolia for a one-month human rights internship. Let me tell you a bit about Mongolia and this experience. In the early 1990s there was a democratic revolution in Mongolia. The country introduced a constitution guaranteeing freedoms and rights, a parliamentary system, and the market economy like we have in Canada. But 20 years later, many Mongolians still live in poverty without knowledge of their rights or how to protect them.

I did my internship with the Government of Mongolia's National Legal Institute. I volunteered with a small team of volunteers from around the world on a project to raise awareness among the poor about their rights related to land ownership and civil registration. We focused on land and civil registration because owning land and having ID are important to gaining many of the rights guaranteed in the constitution, such as employment, education, healthcare, and social benefits, which are vital to lifting people out of poverty.

We focused our work in the ger districts, which are home to the poorest people in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia's capital. Over half a million people, or sixty percent of the city's population, live in these settlements without water, sanitation or basic infrastructure, often in traditional Mongolian felt tents known as gers as pictured here. We put up posters in the ger districts informing people about their rights related to land and civil registration, and also informing them about a survey that they could fill out to tell us about their problems in these areas. By the end of my internship we had about 70 cases to deal with based on the surveys filled out.

One of the most memorable cases is that of a 73-year old lady, pictured here, who was looking for new land to live on. She was living with her son, but was having problems because the daughter in law was taking her pension income. She asked us to help her work with the land office to gain ownership rights to this piece of land on a hill that she had found. Many obstacles and delays came up, but this lady was very persistent and we were also persistent in communicating with the government land office to help her. Finally, the government land office she could occupy the land on the hill. We were able to help this lady and a few others on a very small scale. There are thousands of poor in Mongolia, and millions more around the world, still living in poverty or without basic rights and freedoms. We're in the position to help make a difference, no matter how small we think our contribution is we can make an impact. Let me give you one more simple example of this from my visit to Mongolia.

This is a photo of the children I met at the SOS Children's Villages in Mongolia. SOS Children's Villages is the largest charity dedicated to raising orphaned and abandoned children, and I've been sponsoring a child and village in Africa through SOS since 2006. After this visit, I decided to sponsor another child through SOS, this time in Mongolia, because I knew from my visit with the children at the village that my sponsorship was making a difference. These are children who have been given the opportunity to develop their talents and reach their full potential in a healthy and caring environment because of the small contributions of thousands of people around the world.

Giving to others doesn't mean having to give up things we enjoy. I had an amazing time in Mongolia. I enjoyed the beautiful countryside each weekend and went on a one-week tour of the Gobi Desert. This experience has given me a greater appreciation for what I have, and also of what I'm capable of when I step outside my comfort zone.

What I've come to realize is that when we get involved in the community and when we give back to the community, we get a lot in return. In the last four years since starting Endeavour, I've met so many great people from diverse backgrounds who I've become friends with, who I've learned from, and who've helped me grow personally and professionally. I think the greatest lesson I've learned from all this is that I - and every one of us - can create positive life changes for ourselves and others by being active in the community. Whether your activity is social, environmental or political, local or international, I encourage everyone to stay involved in the community. So keep up the awesome work and congratulations again on your accomplishments.

© 2003 Vision Youth