Medha

We are applying to The Elevate Prize to amplify the importance and impact that equal career opportunities and workforce participation have on young women's overall agency.

Accordingly, we would use the funding and support to:

• Advocate for more significant investment in and encouragement of young women to pursue careers of their choice - especially in traditionally patriarchal societies in the Global South.
• Strengthen the regional and global evidence base on the causal relationship between career opportunities, professional growth, financial independence, and overall agency of young women.
• Convene and collaborate with global peers to advance the agenda on holistic skill and career development and workforce participation for young women.
• Partner with leading companies, federal and state governments, education departments, and other civil society organizations to scale proven education to employment models.

My name is Chris, and I'm originally from the Boston area. I went to Vietnam with my dad in high school and developed a 'foreigners romanticism' for Asia. That led to a year-long study abroad program across the continent that led to years of trying to find an opportunity to live and work in India. This ultimately converted into a fellowship in 2005 that brought me to Hyderabad.

That is where I met my Co-Founder, my romanticism was slowly stripped away, and the early ideas for Medha were born.

We were working for a high-growth social enterprise that was hiring hundreds of young people every month. I saw firsthand the social and economic impact we were having by providing well-paying and secure careers to these young people. I thought to myself, I would like to play a positive role in the career journeys of similar youth one day. 

After a few years between the US and India, while pursuing my MBA and MA, I moved to Lucknow in 2011 to start Medha full-time. Byomkesh and I have been pursuing our vision of an India with equal career opportunities for youth; irrespective of gender, class, or caste, ever since

The female labor force participation (FLFP) rate in India is 20%, a 10% decrease since 1990. In the states where we work, it's closer to 10%. And it's not just India. More than 20 countries across South Asia, Africa, and the Middle East have FLFP rates less than 30%.

This systemic lack of workforce participation exacerbates existing gender-based inequality and reduces young women's financial independence and overall agency.

The COVID-19 pandemic has sadly accelerated this trend highlighted the deep-rooted patriarchy that oppresses so many women in India and around the world.

Medha addresses this issue at its root cause. We work with young women while they are still studying and arm them with the skills, experiences, and opportunities to pursue careers of their choice. We provide 21st-Century Skills training, career counseling and mentorship, and internship and workplace exposure to overcome the challenges faced by many disadvantaged youth as they navigate the school-to-work transition. 

Only then can young women build long-lasting professional journeys that provide financial security, negotiating power, and decision-making capabilities to change the power dynamics for themselves and generations to come.

In a context where young women have very little control over their education, career, and family decisions, Medha does something very novel – doesn't tell them what to do!

Instead, we play the role of a mentor, advocate, and facilitator aimed at helping young women identify and pursue personal and professional paths of their choice.

We do this through a combination of 1) young, highly motivated facilitators that come from similar backgrounds as our students, 2) an experiential learning program that fosters diverse, real-world experience, and 3) an alumni community of peers that encourage and support one another.

Last but not least, we integrate this novel approach into the historically slow to adapt public sector education system so that millions of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds can access a different kind of career guidance - one that puts their interest and passions first. 

Our vision is an India with equal career opportunities for youth, irrespective of gender, class, or caste.  Accordingly, working to advance economic empowerment for young women has always been, and will continue to be, fundamental to our mission. 

We have been tracking the employability, career progression, and overall agency of our students and alumni since Medha's inception over ten years ago. We have found our alumni go on to: 

• Earn double the minimum wage within the first three years on the job  
• Participate in the workforce 4.4x the female labor force participation rate 
• Increase confidence and employability skills by 70%

In 2018, we commenced an RCT with J-PAL-affiliated professor Lori Beaman. And while we are still in the midline stages of the research, there is encouraging evidence that supports Medha's impact on career preparation and overall confidence.  

68% of our students have a family income of less than $2 a day, and more than 50% rely on agriculture as their primary source of income. Unleashing the power of young women from these communities has an exponential effect on the most marginalized parts of the country for generations to come and provides an opposing force to India's extreme and growing inequality.

Between April 2020 and March 2021, we directly served 11,279 youth, >60% of whom were young women between the ages of 17-24.

We aim to impact over 20,000 youth in the next year. 

In the next three years, we aim to improve 21st-Century skills, career progression, and overall agency for 150,000 young people across India. Measured by: 

• >75% increase communications, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity skills 
• >60% enter quality, income-earning opportunities within 36 months after education 
• >65% income growth within the first three years in the workforce 
• >70% increase financial independence 
• >80% increase confidence and overall agency 

In addition to the direct benefits to youth, we are working to impact the system by:  

• Building a pool of quality facilitators 
• Updating curriculums 
• Enhancing meaningful industry engagement 
• Activating alumni communities 

 We plan to achieve these goals by:

• Expanding our partnerships with public-sector education departments.
• Building internal & external facilitator capacity.
• Delivering 21st-Century skills training, career counseling, and ongoing placement and alumni support to students.
• Strengthening the evidence base on the causal relationship between 21st-Century skills and career counseling on long-term career progression, financial independence, and overall agency.
• Advocating for more investment in and encouragement of young women to pursue careers of their choice - especially in patriarchal societies of the Global South.
• Convening and collaborating with global peers to advance the agenda on holistic skill and career development programs for youth, especially young women.

As we expand our work with education systems and aspire to build our leadership position within the school-to-work space globally, we need to: 

1. Strengthen our capabilities in a few key areas: 

• Project management with academia, industry, and bureaucracy to improve collaboration and outcomes.  
• Data analysis to inform program design and enhance reporting. 
• Research and dissemination to share learnings and shape policy. 
• Technology design and development to enrich the learning experience and drive adoption. 

2. Build our voice and influence with policymakers, peers, and funders: 

• Campaigns and speaking opportunities to advocate for more equal career opportunities for young women in the Global South. 
• Research and evidence to support the 'Medha approach' and the impact of holistic career services on financial independence and agency.
• Collective action with partners and youth community leaders to amplify the conversation around young people's career aspirations. 

Winning the Elevate Prize would bring unparalleled visibility and credibility to Medha, enabling us to attract diverse talent to the organization and fill many of the capability gaps outlined in 1 above. More significantly, it would give our students and alumni the platform to share experiences, learnings, and perspectives on a global stage, as outlined in 2 above.  

We have built and nurtured a powerful network of over 25,000 alumni spread across three of the largest states in India. They are young people (>60% women) between the ages of 17 and 24 who are building capabilities for the future, taking advantage of every opportunity that comes their way, doggedly pursuing career paths of their choice, and supporting one another along the way.

If we were to win the Elevate Prize, we would act as a conduit and leverage the larger platform, audience, and brand recognition to amplify the voices and experiences of our alumni community, and in turn the millions of like-minded youth across the country, who collectively have the power to change the trajectory of India's development path forever. From one of inequality and exclusion, where 10% of the population holds 80% of the wealth, to one of inclusiveness, where gender, regional, religious, and caste-based discrimination declines and paves the way for sustainable growth that levels the playing field, erods patriarchal norms, and sets an example for the rest of South Asia and the world.

To me, diversity means different perspectives, identities, values, beliefs, and ideas. All shaped by our unique set of life experiences.

Diversity is core to our vision at Medha - an India with equal career opportunities for youth; irrespective of gender, class, or caste. India's economic growth the last 20 years has been extremely unequal, with 75% of millennials' income due to parental connections, legacies, and social privilege. We believe everyone should have an opportunity to pursue a career they are passionate about, and one that gives them the financial and personal satisfaction they desire.

To deliver on this vision, we need to embody it ourselves. Meaning we actively work to build an organization that recruits, supports, and grows team members from diverse backgrounds. In Northern India where Medha is based, this isn't easy, and systemic discrimination persists along many dimensions - gender, caste, religion, race, educational background, language, and geographic origin, just to name a few.

While there is always room for improvement, we are proud of the diverse team we have built at Medha, but more importantly the culture of valuing diversity. We must hold this value deeply ourselves if we expect our key stakeholders and partners to.

The average age of our 130-member team is 28. 50% are women, and 80% come from the cities and towns where we operate. Our alumni team is 100% alumni themselves. In other words, we are an 'implementing' organization at heart deeply rooted in the community in which we serve.

We balance this DNA with the belief that to achieve our vision, we need to improve an education system that is failing the majority of India's youth. This philosophy has led us to work closely with state and federal education departments, learn how to 'nudge' the system without compromising our values, and build the capabilities required for adoption at scale.

Despite the changing nature of our work, our deep connection with the population we serve makes us well-positioned to succeed. With a community of young people behind you, the system has no choice but to evolve.

In 2016, we faced a cash crunch at Medha. Like many early-stage nonprofits, we were heavily dependent on one funder who backed out at the last minute due to external factors. At the time, we had given placement offers to 15 people who were about to finish graduate school. We had no choice but to rescind these offers.

The year ahead was the most challenging we had up until that point. Two things stand out from that experience:

• Clear communication and honesty are always the best policies with the team. Byomkesh and I had a very frank meeting with everyone telling them we were in a tight financial situation but that if we all came together, we could get through it.
• I have always been persistent (some would say stubborn :) ), a bit competitive, and willing to fight for something. I took this situation as a new challenge and fought hard to get us out of it. By the end of the year, our grant revenue had grown by 100%, we had diversified our funders from four to nine, and we were in a position to double the team size in the next year. 

https://youtu.be/hzTt_qcXQeo

The Elevate Prize's flexible financial support will enable us to invest in critical areas necessary for our next phase of growth, and typically underfunded by more 'traditional and restricted' CSR funders in India. Specifically: 

• Community engagement with alumni and past beneficiaries to amplify youth voices and advocate for the 'Medha Approach.'
  • Events, stipends for Alumni Champions, social media expertise, regional expenses.
• World-class technology systems and capabilities for improved digital learning experiences and system buy-in and adoption.
  • Designers, developers, capacity building, key tech team leaders.
• Aspirational brand value and identity for funding, recruitment, and partnership development.
  • Multimedia (video, audio, photography), storytelling expertise, digital marketing assets, advertising, press.
• Coalition building, knowledge creation and dissemination for policy and stakeholder influence.
  • Research, data analysis expertise, key partnership development resources, speaking opportunities.

The financial support from the Elevate Prize will address the barriers outlined above and complement the ways we plan to leverage the larger platform, audience, and brand recognition to achieve our long-term objectives. Without substantial financial investment in the areas above, we will not be able to fully capitalize on all the non-financial benefits of the Elevate Prize. 

Since its inception, Medha has collaborates with the following partners:

• Government – State and central education departments to co-design, build capacity for, and support large-scale projects that align with our systems change vision. We have several partnerships in place across three states and the central government.
• Industry – Over 1,500 employers across 25 sectors, from the local grocery store to the multinational conglomerate. They generate employment opportunities, but more importantly, they are setting an example and driving the labor market towards quality work, where people have fair pay, security, and growth opportunities.
• Complementary organizations – Like-minded organizations that work at different leverage points in the system. With the Harayana government, for example, we are collaborating with three organizations working on good governance, entrepreneurship, and digital learning, respectively. Combined with our strengths, we have been able to dramatically improve the delivery of employability skills to over 60,000 Industrial Training Institute (ITI) students.
• Corporate Social Responsibility – Over 20 CSR partners that fund 60% of our budget and provide valuable pro-bono support. India is home to the largest CSR spending law in the world.