Author: Zorica Trajkova Strezovska

The new project of the Macedonian-American Alumni Association “Alumni encouraging community services and extracurricular activities” was initiated on October 1st, 2022. The project’s aim is to invest in the youth by raising their awareness that the relationship with the society should be reciprocal and that it is our moral obligation to give back to it.

Therefore, its main objective is to engage the youth, students from higher education institutions, in volunteering and extracurricular activities, which will enable them to expand their views and skills and cooperate with other students with whom they share similar interests. For this purpose, volunteer and extra-curricular interest clubs will be formed in four different universities in North Macedonia, mainly those with which MAAA had previously signed memorandums of cooperation, and MAAA members will be involved in different aspects: as initiators, mentors and trainers of the students’ clubs, as participants in workshops, in the community service activities organized within the project, and as applicants for small grants projects which would need to have focus on this specific area. A number of members have already shown interest to take part in the various activities which will be organized within the project and will take part in the next few months. 

In order to achieve greater visibility and success, MAAA will establish partner relations with different stakeholders such as municipalities, local NGOs, the business sector, university professors and rectors, with the creators of the online platform volontiraj.mk, and it will also design and implement a social media campaign to raise the awareness among social media users of the benefits of engaging in the activities mentioned above.

MAAA hopes that this project will improve the image of our universities and help them establish themselves as socially responsible educational institutions. Empowering young people will lead to a bigger and better engagement of the youth in the social life and in the creation of the local policies, in finding partners and funding opportunities.