Since my childhood, I have been bothered by solvable problems around me, from an old dangerous school playground to large-scale societal injustice. Luckily, I did not just observe problems. No matter how small, I would jump on every opportunity to improve things around me, whether it was the cleanup action, fundraising, or food collection.
Throughout the years, I have created opportunities for young people to attend free education abroad, collected tons of food for those in need, and gave several hundred hours of lectures, all as a volunteer.
Thousands of times I have been asked, “Why do you bother if it does not affect you?” and “What’s in it for you?” Although I believe that smiles and gratitude resulting from my activities are more than enough reason to do good, each time I tried to explain to others why it is important to take initiative and make small positive changes around you.
As the time passed, my efforts were awarded with numerous awards, and well-paid job offers from global companies straight out of college, even though youth unemployment in Montenegro still exceeded 30%. I realized that my major skills were not obtained only through my studies, but also from spending hours and hours creating new projects, communicating with many people, and managing small amounts of donations through my extracurricular activities.
For this reason, a great passion to empower others with practical skills led me to create the Movement for Cooperation and Development of Youth. This platform provides young people with knowledge, resources, and support in their pursuit to create positive social impact on the people around them. This also helps them learn important personal and professional lessons to be better humans and achieve better employment in the future. So far, we have provided over 300 people with different types of lectures and support, and many have found jobs with above average salaries.
I have realized, through my experience, that learning which happens outside of the classroom is a way to improve the quality of education. Creating social impact gives us a chance to solve problems, improve the lives of others, and our own, through empathy, communication, and the development of professional skills. My dream is for all young people to have free and equal access to such non-formal education.*2 If we can achieve this, we, the youth, will be able to change the world much faster.