Addressing challenges facing the youth

IF WE are interested - really interested - in changing the futures of youth in South Africa, particularly youth of colour, then we must start by understanding the system in which we are operating.

- HALLI MANOLAKOS.

A system that has been Systemmaticaly broken, taken apart, and never fully put back together. Too often, we focus on fixing one element - education, for example - without addressing the root causes of the problems we in the development sector care so deeply about.Dr Mzamo Masito’s book, This Country Hates Our Men/Boys, hits particularly hard in the context of supporting more than 800 young people in Cape Town to thrive, excel, and reach their dreams of extraordinary futures. I believe this is truly possible - but only if we are willing to start from the roots. When I consider the compounding challenges faced by young men and boys in the Students for a Better Future programme, Masito’s central argument - a deeply broken system - plays out clearly in our statistics, academic results, behaviours, recruitment challenges, and outcomes year after year.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if young men arrived at our doors already whole? Or at the very least, with a fighting chance - because the system they grew up in was designed to support them rather than set them up to repeat generational cycles?