by Hollie Nielsen, AWC Central Scotland
This month, Target Project 5 is highlighting Sustainable Development Goal 4, “ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all” – perfect timing for the Ed Team to highlight Awesome Blossoms and continuing education.
The Awesome Blossoms program provides the women entrepreneurs with education in the areas of financial literacy, hydroponic techniques, sustainable farming practices, environmental care and nutrition, marketing and entrepreneurship as well as sales activities, from promotion to post-sales activities. This all falls perfectly within SDG Target 4.4: “By 2030, substantially increase the number of youths and adults who have relevant skills, including technical and vocational skills, for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship.” In her April Target Bulletin, Amanda Drollinger, Chair of Target Project 5, noted the many successes in educating the entrepreneurs.
As Amanda said: “In the upcoming month, Awesome Blossoms will prioritize training sessions focused on marketing strategies and entrepreneurship development for peer educators and women micro-entrepreneurs. These sessions will equip participants with essential knowledge and skills to effectively promote their agricultural products, reach target markets and manage their businesses efficiently.”
In addition to all these successes, Awesome Blossoms has been selected as one of the possible projects for agriculture students at Wageningen University (WU) in The Netherlands. WU is one of the top universities in the world in the field of agriculture. The university has an internship program within its master’s degree program: the Academic Consultancy Training (ACT). Students work together in multidisciplinary teams of five to seven students to address specific questions coming from society (companies, municipalities, associations, etc.). Projects run for eight weeks, in which the students work part-time for three weeks and full-time for five weeks. Approximately 20 study programs are active in the ACT course, in the fields of social sciences, plant sciences, environmental sciences, animal sciences, agro-technology sciences and food sciences. The students are supervised by a coach and an academic advisor from the university.
If Awesome Blossoms is selected by a group of students in this round, it means real-time collaboration and problem solving for our Target Project. If they are not selected in this cycle, Awesome Blossoms will be on the list for the next cycle.
Awesome Blossoms is asking WU’s ACT students to evaluate and make recommendations to their farm model to increase its productivity, impact and ability for replication.
There will be many continuing education winners if Awesome Blossoms is chosen. The first are the women peer educators and micro-entrepreneurs at Awesome Blossoms. Their skills and knowledge would be significantly increased by recommendations from the WU students, leading to better opportunities for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship. Second, the WU student interns will increase their real-world skills by providing Awesome Blossoms with recommendations for their farm model. Third, because of AB’s peer educators and “Each One, Teach One” philosophy, many more women in the surrounding community will gain knowledge and skills that hopefully lead to employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship.
Well done, Awesome Blossoms, and good luck being chosen to participate in the ACT program!
