OUR IMPACT IN LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN: HEALTH AND EDUCATION

Turning disease into health and wellness

Dr. Antonio Eduardo Fernandes D’Aguiar (Brazil 1996) was a surgeon treating disease in the body at the time of his fellowship to the United States in 1996. He credits his fellowship for revolutionizing the way he viewed his profession and the role that he wanted to play as a doctor. When he returned to Brazil, he made a radical transition to focus on preventative health and wellness. He realized he was treating patients at the tail-end of their health concerns, and could make much more of an impact by helping individuals achieve greater levels of wellness before they even got sick. He has been working as a Healthcare Manager for a corporation, ARCADIS, where he is responsible for the health and well-being for employees. Listen below to hear his story.


 

Providing safe and alternative spaces for children in Chile

In Santiago, Chile, Fundación Ganémosle a la Calle (Let’s Win the Streets Foundation), an innovative urban nonprofit, will dramatically deepen and expand its groundbreaking after-school sports recreation programs to give thousands of disadvantaged children new opportunities to escape the dangers of street life. Eisenhower Fellow Maria Gracia Carvallo (Chile 2018), executive director of Ganémosle, plans to increase the number of children in the foundation’s programs from 500 to 3,000 over the next five years and expand the organization’s reach from the streets of Santiago to rural regions of Chile. In addition to providing structured, supervised recreational outlets for Chilean youth, the foundation will develop new nutritional and psychological programs to instill and reinforce healthy lifestyle habits. Maria Gracia is applying new ideas and approaches she learned in the United States during her Eisenhower Fellowship to craft new ways to tell Ganémosle’s story and attract long-term financial support. Her vision is to grow her organization across her country in a sustainable way and provide safe, alternative spaces after school doors close that nourish Chilean children’s full potential.


Creating opportunities for the youth of Buenos Aires

In Argentina, 50% of students don’t graduate from high school, 50% of graduates don’t reach minimum reading and math standards and youth unemployment is double the national rate. Fundación Junior Achievement, an innovative global nonprofit, will dramatically deepen its impact over the next five years from 7,500 to 120,000 students from the province and city of Buenos Aires to prepare and inspire them for the world of work and higher studies in a context of fast changing Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Eisenhower Fellow Noël Zemborain (Argentina 2019), executive director of JA, is crafting a robust scale-up strategy that includes deepening strategic partnerships with the private and public sector. She will apply new ideas and approaches learned during her Eisenhower Fellowship in order to create a comprehensive curriculum that includes project- and competency-based programs and performance assessments on entrepreneurship, financial literacy and work readiness. By 2021, she intends to launch pilot programs to foster internships, design a blended teacher training course and network and a robust measurement and evaluation framework. Ultimately, she envisions transforming JA into a strong advocate and research base for innovation in public education.

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