Earlier this year, WildHearts achieved its goal of transforming one million lives. One of those lives was mine.
Until recently, I had a pretty cynical view of big-business. Their success seemingly came at the expense of ordinary people. It was as if they didn’t care about poverty, the climate crisis or educational inequality.
As a young person in today’s world, it’s so easy to feel cynical, overwhelmed and downright hopeless in the face of these seemingly insurmountable challenges. Myself and my peers will have to deal with the consequences of things we didn’t start and it’s unspeakably frustrating. Not only that, it’s terrifying.
Because of WildHearts, I now know that business can be a force for good.
Micro-Tyco has changed my way of thinking. Not only did it allow me to regain a sense of control over my future and a sense of hope for our planet, but it equipped me with essential entrepreneurial skills to take action. I have successfully implemented my team’s idea to end the annual sale of over 30,000 single use plastic bottles in our school, replacing them with stainless-steel reusable bottles. If you had told me a year ago that my team and I could have achieved this, I would never have believed you.
As a WildHearts Global Youth Ambassador, I have had opportunities beyond my wildest, most ambitious dreams. I was recognised at Parliament in July for my work and have earned a place at the Global Entrepreneurial Leaders’ summit at the United Nations Headquarters in Geneva, this November.
Because of WildHearts, I now know that business can be a force for good. I’ve had my eyes opened to the truly amazing potential of social business and I have met the leaders of many global companies that are using their power to champion positive change.
I’ve gone from feeling hopeless to being proactive, from despair to regaining an optimism for the future. My entrepreneurial skills are not going to go to waste. I’m going on to studying politics and sociology and I am determined – unrelentingly so – to use what I’ve learnt from Micro-Tyco to make a genuine, positive difference, today, tomorrow, 50 years from now.
So thank you. Thank you for investing in WildHearts, because in doing so you invested in me, and other young people like me. You have changed my life – our lives – for the better, so now we can change our world for the better. None of this would have been possible without WildHearts customers. None of this would have been possible without you.
* Thanks to WildHearts corporate customers, all WildHearts Schools Programmes are delivered free of charge. To date, over 45,000 young people have benefitted.