Our mission at FreeConferenceCall.com is to help charities, non-profit organizations, schools, and other heroes in our community get the tools they need to communicate effectively without roadblocks. We’re able to do this thanks to the generous contributions of our community members who choose to pay what they can for our services. Thanks to their generosity, these organizations have access to the communication tools necessary to achieve their missions.
We are partnering with leaders from non-profit organizations who benefit the most from our service to shine a light on the outstanding work they’ve done in their communities at home and around the world.
Empowering Young Women Through Education
Our partner, A2Empowerment (A2E), is a non-profit organization that provides educational scholarships and support to girls and women in Cameroon. Their goal is to educate and empower women to lead healthier, more productive lives.
We sat down with Anne Cheung, co-founder and President of A2Empowerment, to learn more about A2E and why they choose FreeConferenceCall.
Co-founder, Anne Rapin, served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in a remote village in Cameroon, West Africa, where she taught high school science. While reflecting on her time in Cameroon, Rapin expressed to Cheung that only 10% of her upper-level classes were female. Lack of female representation in upper-level classes in Cameroon could be caused by arranged marriages at an early age or being kicked out of school due to pregnancy. In some cases, families facing financial hardship often must choose whose education to support; the son is almost always chosen over the daughter. It was this disheartening knowledge and experience that compelled the pair to co-create a girl’s scholarship fund in 2008. They teamed up with Peace Corps Cameroon to garner connections with active Peace Corps Volunteers and their Cameroonian counterparts, and thus, A2Empowerment was born.
Now in 2021, A2E addresses their mission by working solely with on-the-ground Cameroonian mentors and partners to coordinate monthly meetings with scholarship recipients where they cover topics like women’s health, budgeting, and career aspirations.
Reliable and Affordable Communication is Vital to Their Business Model
“Our greatest hurdle has always been communication,” Anne responded when asked about the difficulties A2Empowerment has faced over the years. As a non-profit organization that works exclusively with partners in Sub-Saharan, Africa, free international communication is vital to their business model.
A2E relies on contributions from their community and generous donors to provide scholarships to these at-risk young women. Maintaining low overhead costs allows this organization to uphold their practice of earmarking the full amount of all donations for girls’ education. With FreeConferenceCall, A2E has access to a free and seamless audio and video call service that allows them to effectively communicate with their team in Cameroon — something that was a challenge in the past.
The Future
What started with 17 scholarships in one region of Cameroon in 2008 has since grown significantly. In total, A2E has supported over 2,000 women: this year, 105 high school scholarships and 3 university scholarships. The organization hopes to expand their reach and provide an effective program that empowers women through sponsoring their education. A2E has many exciting initiatives and hopes to continue building and improving upon their work, supporting even more women and girls in the coming years.
*A2E Alumni, Olive and Grace visiting current scholarship recipients in Penka Michel, Cameroon
Anne has recently taken a break from her full-time job to focus her work on A2Empowerment exclusively.
“Although I do not get paid by A2E, this work is so important to me, ” says Anne. “I believe in the transformative power of girls’ education. I made this choice [to take a step back from my career] to keep A2E going, because it has so much impact and so much potential.”
Her hope is that this focus period will allow for a transition to have A2Empowerment Alumni lead the organization from Cameroon. This will not only improve the quality of the program domestically in Cameroon but will also allow for strategic growth.
You can check out the work and initiatives A2Empowerment is working on at https://a2empowerment.org
