Ideology in Detail - In Canada - Overseas
“Sustained social change begins only when individuals are able to engage critically in the world around them; becoming conscious of their own capacity, and their abilities to better their own conditions and the conditions of others.”
Mission Statement
Our mission is to mobilize individuals towards the realization of their potential. We do this by investing in education, as we believe that the knowledge, social development, and cognitive tools that are developed through learning are the foundation for empowering people to positively affect their condition and the conditions of those around them.
Ideology
Students for Education, Empowerment and Development (SEED) believes that every human being has the potential to positively affect her or his conditions and those of others. We define empowerment as the realization of this potential. SEED was born from our own empowerment. We recognized that there is nothing inherent about the increasing disparity of opportunity between rich and poor, and we are motivated to mobilize others and ourselves towards the strengthening of local and global communities that allow for equal opportunity and the realization of human potential.As students, we recognize that we have developed much of our understanding of the world, our sense of belonging, and our own empowerment through education and meaningful social interactions. Thus, we focus upon education in our movement for empowerment, and our goal is to educate ourselves and those around us while facilitating access to education overseas. We believe that learning through our movement and creating the opportunity for young people to become students will deepen our sense of empowerment and similarly allow other youth to act as authors of their own development.
Methodology
SEED works to non-invasively provide individuals whit access to one of the tools that facilitates empowerment – social and formal education. We do this by:
• Establishing an intimate relationship with and providing scholarships for students in overseas communities. Relationships allow for cross-cultural communication, while scholarships facilitate student’s access to formal and social education.
• Establishing community projects locally and overseas that present opportunities for individual and community empowerment.
• Providing Canadian university students with social education through the participation in SEED university chapters, internship programs, and workshops; as well as raising awareness of their own potential to positively transform their communities.
• Critically and constantly re-evaluating our programs, and maintaining a grassroots operation methodology.
