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Young citizens are at the forefront of change

Article update: Last year, World Learning supported youth through a series of “Ideas into Action” design sprints, which are one piece of World Learning’s Technical Approaches on Civic Engagement and Advocacy. These citizen-centered sprints provided a streamlined framework through which youth analyzed local issues, devised potential solutions, and created action plans — all during fast, two-day workshops. In follow-up, three participants shared the impact of the design sprints on themselves and their community. Scroll down to hear what they had to say!

Throughout the world, it is often youth who are driving democratic reform, economic growth, and social change in their communities and countries. Using a combination of traditional civic tools such as protests and campaigns and more innovative approaches like social media memes, passionate youth are activating their networks to tackle climate change, foster equity in education and health systems, and create new employment opportunities. Through this, they are harnessing their energy to promote a new set of norms and policies to include more diverse voices and populations.

While social media has allowed more inclusive mobilization by reaching youth from farther areas, many movements are still concentrated in capital cities. Youth in more remote areas are often excluded from national campaigns, funded trainings and activities, and other government services. They lack access to the essential information and tools, cannot afford expensive travel, and are unable to leave home responsibilities for the extended time it takes to reach the capital.

Group in Dundgovi, Mongolia, present their concept poster on creating an easy e-commerce platform for local small businesses.

This discrepancy in access to programs can be seen in Mongolia. In April, hundreds of youth gathered outside the government palace in Mongolia’s capital, Ulaanbaatar, to protest high levels of inflation, political corruption, inefficient government spending, food shortages, and unemployment. Protests heavily relied on youth already in the capital, while a large number of youth outside the capital were unable to participate due to the prohibitive amount of time and cost to reach Ulaanbaatar from their respective aimags.

World Learning began tackling this challenge in 2016 through its Leaders Advancing Democracy-Mongolia Program (LEAD). Participants worked with communities to design and implement projects that addressed key areas in need of support and change, such as the environment, poverty, and anti-corruption. These projects benefitted more than 9,000 people directly, and more than 4 million people indirectly. According to an external evaluation, the program “contributed to greater social inclusion of traditionally excluded communities,” and also “encouraged those communities to make their voices heard in decision-making.”

Following the success of LEAD, alumni called for more localized, shorter trainings while maintaining a focus on socially excluded communities. This led to the creation of the “Ideas into Action” design sprints.

This citizen-centered model provides a streamlined framework through which youth analyze local issues, devise potential solutions, and then bring these solutions to action all during fast, two-day workshops. In the process, youth use human-centered design principles to rapidly learn local decision-making processes, identify key networks, and complete the project cycle. Ultimately, the goal is to give participants the tools and platform to freely learn and create their own innovative, implementable solutions.

In Mongolia, LEAD alumni throughout the country were trained as facilitators and oversaw the sprint methodology in their communities. The combination of the streamlined structure of the sprints, with the guidance from local facilitators, allowed World Learning to reach youth in even the most rural and often excluded aimags, such as Bayan Ulgii, Mongolia’s only Muslim- and Kazakh-majority aimag.

Mongolian youth in Orkhon brainstorming, clustering, and prioritizing local challenges.

Over time, it became clear that many of these complex and multifaceted challenges could not be solved through a two-day workshop. The program goals therefore shifted from being results-based to process-focused. As a result, the design sprints provided a much-needed opportunity for youth to explore issues in-depth, learn new perspectives, and discover how to collectively mobilize citizens, government networks, and private-sector resources to create positive change.

Feedback from participants in the design sprints showed this was the first time many had full control — and the critical skills needed — to solve problems in their local communities. The mix of participants from public and private sectors helped groups see issues from different angles and perspectives. The flexible nature of the sprints also allowed participants to think critically about issues important to them and have autonomy over how to solve them.

“I learned that when we dig deep into the root causes of the issue, it is easier to understand the issue thoroughly and find its solution,” one participant said.

World Learning’s “Ideas into Action” design sprints are one piece of World Learning’s Technical Approaches — Civic Engagement and Advocacy. This work ensures that youth from all areas of the country learn effective tools for activism and support their efforts to create sustainable change in their own lives and communities.

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Six LEAD Mongolia Alumni Share Their Presidential Election Experiences

By Meghan Burland, Chief of Party, Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia

Mongolia’s June 9 presidential elections marked the country’s third round of voting in 13 months. While voter turnout was historically low, likely due to an increase in COVID-19 cases in the days preceding the election, 59 percent of eligible voters came out to elect former Prime Minister U. Khurelsukh from the Mongolian People’s Party to a six-year term as president.

As with the previous parliamentary and local elections, alumni from the USAID-funded Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) program used their training to support the election process by serving as civil society observers, volunteering at polling stations, and recording voter turnout in real-time.

Observing Elections

As civil society election observers, LEAD alumni helped safeguard the integrity of the presidential vote. Ganzorig Tsedenbal, a 2018 U.S. Exchange Program Fellow, observed the election in Ulaanbaatar as part of a civil society monitoring effort organized by Youth Policy Watch, a local NGO. At his polling station, the process went smoothly, with observers from the three political parties joining the civil society effort, sharing information and ideas. By volunteering as a civil society observer, Ganzorig says he wanted to play a role in ensuring a fair election and felt confident and useful in helping to “prevent any possible violations or fraud.”

Another 2018 U.S. Exchange Program Fellow, Altanchimeg Purevsuren, also observed the election as part of Youth Policy Watch’s effort. However, her observation came with a twist — currently living in Seoul, she observed Mongolians residing in South Korea voting at the embassy in the capital. Having previously worked at Mongolia’s General Election Commission (GEC) for more than seven years, Altanchimeg has substantial experience in elections work, but this was her first time participating on behalf of civil society.

Altanchimeg observed voting at the embassy in Seoul over two days and says there was an exciting atmosphere at the embassy, with voters wearing traditional clothes, bringing their families, and taking photos in front of the embassy and the Mongolian flag.

A woman stands behind two ballot boxes at the Mongolian Embassy in Seoul. — LEAD Mongolia U.S. Exchange Program Fellow Altanchimeg Purevsuren at the Mongolian Embassy in Seoul.

“When voters are coming to the embassy polling station, it is so meaningful for them,” she says. “They were proud of their participation in the election.”

Shirnen Zorigt, a 2020 In-Country Program Fellow, took a different approach by joining a volunteer team to monitor the election for accessibility for people with disabilities and develop recommendations to make voting more accessible in the future. This effort was organized by the Parent Teacher Association of Mongolia (PTAM) and included nongovernmental organizations supporting disability rights, people with disabilities, and other citizens.

As a visually impaired voter, Shirnen went into the observation process well aware of the challenges people with disabilities may face when voting. His goal in participating was to shine a light on these issues and provide realistic proposals for ways government agencies could address these barriers to participation. Shirnen, Ganzorig, and Altanchimeg all note that their LEAD training helped them take a human rights approach in the observation process and focus on inclusion in the elections, especially for women, people with disabilities, and youth.

“If we strive for a democratic and equal society, its most valuable thing must be people,” Shirnen says. “The right to vote and to be elected is the most important thing in the society we are aiming to build right now.”

A man wearing glasses and a lanyard around his neck stands outside. — LEAD Mongolia In-Country Program Fellow Shirnen Zorigt on election day.

For this election, the GEC improved voter education efforts for deaf and visually impaired voters, providing information on voter rights and the election process in accessible formats. In cooperation with the GEC, PTAM also organized trainings on the rights of voters with disabilities for polling station staff nationwide. However, some shortcomings remained, including that political parties did not provide enough accessible information for voters with disabilities and many polling stations were not fully accessible.

Overall, Shirnen says it was a “great step forward” to have a team of voters with disabilities involved in election observation and providing recommendations, as well as having accessibility trainings for polling station staff.

Tracking Voter Turnout

Other alumni contributed to the election by working directly with the GEC to improve the effectiveness and transparency of voter turnout data. Ganchimeg Namsrai, a 2017 In-Country Program Fellow, and Sanjaasuren Munkhbat, a 2018 U.S. Exchange Program Fellow, were part of a team from the LEAD Alumni Association that received support from World Learning and the GEC to implement the “Making Elections Effective and Transparent” (MEET) project.

A woman stands in front of a sign for the Mongolian 2021 election — LEAD Mongolia In-Country Program Fellow Ganchimeg Namsrai on election day.

The project aimed to develop and utilize a comprehensive online platform to track voter turnout and share that information transparently with the public. In previous elections, the GEC released voter turnout four times during the day, with a two-to-three-hour lag. This information was collected via telephone from every polling station nationwide and announced at a press conference. Citizens were not able to access voter turnout data on their own.

To address these issues, the team created a mobile application that integrated data from every election station with internet access; those stations without internet access would provide their data by calling in at set times during the day. The integrated data was displayed on a web platform, where citizens could access the information on any device with internet access. The voter data was disaggregated by location, gender, and age, in contrast to previous elections. As a result of the MEET project, this year the GEC released election turnout data to the public on an hourly basis, with 90–95% accuracy. The LEAD Alumni Association has turned over the platform to the GEC to use in future elections, which will allow for additional analysis of voter turnout and trends.

The data from this year’s election revealed that young people, particularly those between 20 and 30 years old, had the lowest turnout (43.72% for voters aged 20–24 and 46.32% for those aged 25–29). As a young country, the low turnout of youth voters on June 9 indicates that young people need to be more actively involved in future elections to drive change. Ganchimeg believes the government and civil society should work together to develop research-based policies and plans specifically to improve youth participation.

“The active participation of young people in elections is an indisputable basis for their input into public policy and, in turn, for accountability of the elected officials,” she says.

Ganchimeg, as team leader, also notes how important it was to have support from government agencies like the GEC and the General Authority for State Registration to successfully implement the project.

“Working with government agencies as a representative of civil society has been a new experience and success for me,” she says. “I also understood the importance of cooperation and understanding between stakeholders.”

A man points at a large touch screen showing a map of Mongolia's voting districts. — LEAD Mongolia U.S. Exchange Program Fellow Sanjaasuren Munkhbat reviewing voting data.

Sanjaasuren, a data specialist and IT engineer, oversaw and managed the development of the software and technology. While there were some challenges installing the mobile application due to cybersecurity and timing concerns, he says the project was worth it because it offered transparent access to turnout data, which can now be analyzed and used to improve voter participation during elections.

“I think there is no way to solve a problem without revealing it,” Sanjaasuren says, later adding, “Now we have a wide range of data, and we should find reasons and solutions.”

Volunteering at Polling Stations

On the government side, 2017 In-Country Program Fellow Munkhzul Tsend served as the chairperson of a polling station commission in Bayankhongor aimag (province). In Mongolia, polling station commissions are volunteer groups composed of civil servants that have to pass an examination to work in this capacity. Munkhzul had previously volunteered for this commission seven times, in presidential, parliamentary, and local elections. As the chairperson at her station, Munkhzul was responsible for turning over the election documents properly and ensuring preparations are made within the framework of the law. From her perspective as a polling station volunteer, the election proceeded smoothly, with officials following a pre-approved schedule.

There were additional measures taken this year, including regular disinfection of all polling stations, manual counting of all ballots at every polling station nationwide, and using the new MEET application to submit voter turnout data. Munkzhul was also able to use the MEET application to present voter turnout data at the polling station and noted that it enabled them to record voter turnout data in a timely manner, an improvement from previous elections. She also cites her LEAD program experience in providing her with the tools and techniques to manage and lead her team working in the polling station.

The LEAD program emphasizes the strength of the LEAD network and the importance of working together to achieve a common goal, and this was in evidence during the June 9 election. For example, one of the leaders at Youth Policy Watch is also a LEAD Mongolia alumna, and LEAD alumni have observed in their effort for both the 2020 parliamentary and 2021 presidential elections. Altanchimeg learned of her observation opportunity through the LEAD Mongolia Facebook group. The LEAD Alumni Association had previously worked with the GEC on last year’s elections, setting up a fruitful collaboration that continued this year.

Although LEAD alumni participated in the election in different capacities, all emphasized the importance of voting in a democratic society. Sanjaasuren credited learning the fundamentals of democracy during his LEAD experience as one of the reasons he worked to implement the MEET project despite implementation challenges.

Shirnen summarizes it best—voting “may seem like a right, but…it is a civic duty that everyone must fulfill.”

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LEAD Mongolia is a five-year leadership development program — funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by World Learning — that brings together young professionals representing different sectors and experiences to take part in civic advocacy and leadership training, exchanges, and community action planning, all aimed at fostering a strong network of young democracy advocates across the country.

This article was made possible through the translation assistance of World Learning Program Officer Munkhkhishig Dashtseren.

The contents of this article are the responsibility of World Learning and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.

What 100 Days in Office Taught Eight LEAD Mongolia Alumni

By Meghan Burland, Chief of Party, Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia

In many places, local elected officials are often the people taking care of a citizen’s daily needs — from determining local community development projects to maintaining roads and infrastructure. Additionally, national-level politicians usually get their start at the state or local levels, learning the ropes of government and how to ensure their policy goals and ideas are prioritized. Although local elections often do not receive the same level of attention as national elections, they are equally as important in determining the trajectory of a city, district, or state.

On October 15, 2020, Mongolia held its most recent election for representatives of local councils across the country. These local councils, known as Citizens’ Representatives Khurals (CRKs), are responsible for making and enacting local policies. More than 17,000 candidates from nine political parties and coalitions competed for 8,169 seats in the capital of Ulaanbaatar, nine districts within the capital, 21 aimags (provinces), and 330 soums (sub-provinces).

Eighteen alumni from World Learning’s Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program ran in the election, with eight winning seats in either their provincial, sub-provincial, or district council. Below, all eight reflect on their experience running for office and the first 100 days of their term in office.

Several of the alumni noted that expanding youth engagement played an important role in their decision to run for office. Soronzonbold Alexandr, a 2019 In-Country Program Fellow, was elected to the CRK for the 17th district in Darkhan soum. His motivation for entering politics was to increase youth participation and to improve the living and working conditions of young people in his community. Munkhbat Nergui, a 2017 In-Country Program Fellow and CRK member from Sukhbaatar soum in Selenge aimag, expressed a similar motivation — to increase youth political participation in order to build a “just, open, democratic, and inclusive society.”

Erdenetugs Oroolon, another 2019 In-Country Program Fellow, also highlighted that his experience as an educator further motivated him to run and be a voice for young people at decision-making levels.

“The driving force of society is the youth,” Erdenetugs says. “It is clear that we have to participate today to build the society we will live in the future.”

Erdenetugs Oroolon (left) and Jigmeddorj Batbayar (right) — From left to right: LEAD Mongolia In-Country Program Fellows Erdenetugs Oroolon and Jigmeddorj Batbayar

Youth participation across Mongolia is often low. Ganbayar Monkhor, a 2019 alumnus in a CRK in Sukhbaatar aimag, believes this is likely due to a lack of employment opportunities. One of his goals is to increase employment opportunities for young people in rural areas, to empower them and support them in being productive and active members of their communities.

“We also need to seed a dream for youth that together we can create a brighter future,” Ganbayar says.

Another challenge is the need to increase innovative, new methods for resolving community issues instead of solely relying on traditional ones, says Tudevvaanchig Battulga, a 2019 U.S. Exchange Program Fellow from Zavkhan aimag. As a member of his local CRK, Tudevvaanchig wants to introduce new ideas and solutions to his community, such as training local households on waste management to improve environmental protection in public spaces and ger areas.

According to 2020 In-Country Program Fellow Jigmeddorj Batbayar, a CRK representative in Tuv aimag, young people are needed in government because they often develop daring and innovative ideas.

“Democracy is all about civic participation,” he says, adding, “I think that Mongolian youth should be more active and present as creative members of society.”

In regard to why youth often have low voter turnout, Jigmeddorj surmises it is due to a lack of civic education as well as a negative perception of being active in the community. He says, “We need to equip our young generation with knowledge about society and civic participation in various forms, such as programs like LEAD Mongolia.”

In addition, Batzaya Erdenebat, a 2017 alumnus, says corruption can also play a role in keeping young people out of government. He decided to run for office in Bayankhongor aimag because he believes that problems such as bribery and nepotism are worsening and even beginning to be accepted in society. One of his goals is to improve the integrity of the electoral process by eliminating unethical practices such as promising jobs and distributing gifts and cash. Batzaya says these practices make it harder for young people to get elected despite their knowledge and achievements.

Batzaya Erdenebat (left), Yadamjav Delegpuntsag (center), Munkhbat Nergui (right) — From left to right: LEAD Mongolia alumni Batzaya Erdenebat, Yadamjav Delegpuntsag, and Munkhbat Nergui

Relatedly, he stresses that public trust in the government is declining, which he calls the “biggest challenge to democracy.” To counter this, Batzaya says elected representatives need to act transparently, solicit feedback and suggestions from constituents, and be accountable.

2019 alumnus Yadamjav Delegpuntsag was running for a CRK position for the third time, having been elected to the Chingeltei district CRK in Ulaanbaatar in 2012 and 2016, so he was already familiar with his constituents and they with him and his work. Even so, he worked hard to meet as many voters as possible to present his results from his first two terms and share his goals for his third term. He emphasized the importance of working closely with constituents to drive forward policies and projects, and highlighted his success on road, infrastructure, and construction projects in his district during his third campaign. As an elected official, he acknowledged the importance of his constituents putting faith in him to improve their district, and how it is critical to take responsibility and put that trust to good use.

“A lot of people have trusted me with the task of doing a better job, so I thought I shall try harder to bear the trust of these people,” he says.

Of course, these 100 days have been made even more complex by the COVID-19 pandemic. Several alumni noted the challenge of governing during a pandemic, from having online meetings to not being able to go out and meet directly with constituents. Additionally, members of local government are often involved in efforts to combat the virus. Munkhbat notes the hard work that went into the testing and quarantine process for citizens in Selenge, and how it took the efforts of many people working together to successfully contain the spread of COVID-19 in their aimag.

Many are also working to support constituents who are struggling because of the economic impacts of the pandemic. According to Jigmeddorj, “…the number of people facing financial vulnerability [due to COVID-19] is increasing day by day…we have provided assistance to about 200 families in need of food in our ward.”

From left to right: LEAD Mongolia alumni Tudevvaanchig Battulga and Ganbayar Monkhor

LEAD’s focus on civic action planning provides participants with the tools and training to advance both advocacy campaigns and community-driven projects, as well as how to work with diverse groups and ensure inclusive processes for change. The LEAD experience helped motivate alumni in their choice to run, and in bolstering their confidence to be transparent, hard-working, and driven elected officials.

Munkhbat explains that the LEAD program influenced his decision to run for office and still plays a role in how he approaches his work.

“I am incorporating what I learned from the program training, meetings, and other participants into everything we do now, and focus on how to bring positive change in my community,” Munkhbat says.

According to Ganbayar, his experience with LEAD helped him “improve in many ways.” He became more confident and was able look at issues from different perspectives.

Similarly, Soronzonbold says taking part in LEAD helped him build key skills needed to succeed as an elected official.

“I learned how to communicate effectively with people, how to solve problems [by] identifying root causes, and how to achieve good results with participatory projects,” he says, adding, “I am trying to apply what I have learned to my work and everyday life, to set an example for others, and to spread the values of democracy.”

This article was made possible through the translation assistance of World Learning Program Officer Munkhkhishig Dashtseren.

The contents of this article are the responsibility of World Learning and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.

How LEAD Mongolia Alumni Helped Support Free and Fair National Elections This Summer

LEAD Mongolia alumna Enkhbayar Tumurbaatar works as an election observer in June 2020.

By Meghan Burland, Chief of Party, Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia

Free and fair elections are often considered a hallmark of democracy. Mongolia was no exception to this on June 24, 2020, when 73 percent of registered voters turned out to vote for the 76 members of the State Great Khural, Mongolia’s unicameral parliament, demonstrating their steadfast commitment to citizen participation in spite of COVID-19 social distancing restrictions and severe weather across the country.

Youth played a significant role in the election, with youth voter turnout at 62 percent for voters aged 18 to 25, an increase from the 2016 youth voter turnout of 50.8 percent. This year’s election also featured an unprecedented number of young candidates running for office as well as youth-led nonpartisan citizen election monitoring efforts.

Alumni from World Learning’s Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program were front and center in election-related activities across the country. As Mongolia prepares for local elections in October 2020, as well as a presidential election next year, LEAD Mongolia and its alumni continue to prioritize increasing young Mongolians’ civic participation and highlighting the work of youth in the country.

Below, four LEAD Mongolia Fellows share their experiences of participating in this year’s important parliamentary election and how their LEAD Mongolia training helped to prepare them.

Erdenetugs Oroolon

LEAD 2019 In-Country Program Fellow Erdenetugs Oroolon, an elementary school teacher, ran for a parliamentary seat as a candidate from the New Party under the New Coalition in the 6th District, which comprises Dundgovi and Govisumber aimags (provinces). Erdenetugs decided to run in February 2020, after changes to the electoral law increased the number of seats in his district from one to two, creating new opportunities for first-time and independent candidates. The December 2019 amendments returned Mongolia to a multi-member plurality system.

“As a young professional, I thought I could use this election period as an opportunity to engage with the public and create [a] base of supporters,” says Erdenetugs.

However, he notes, this year’s election was not without its challenges, including the constraints of Mongolia’s traditional two-party system, allegations of vote-buying, a need for strengthened voter education and awareness, and COVID-19 restrictions. Due to the pandemic, candidates were not able to engage in traditional voter outreach during the three-week campaign period, making it difficult for newer parties and first-time, lesser-known candidates to gain the necessary support to win a seat. Erdenetugs also highlighted local difficulties, such as a drought in Dundgovi aimag, that required many herders to migrate to more remote areas for better land, making it more difficult to reach these voters ahead of Election Day.

Erdenetugs focused his policy platform on three major issues: decreasing allegiance to the two-party system and creating room for new, independent candidates; implementing equal distribution of wealth in compliance with citizens’ constitutional rights; and creating a corruption-free society. Although he did not win a seat, Erdenetugs had a fulfilling experience, having learned more about his own strengths and weaknesses, as well as gaining new perspectives from his fellow citizens on how to improve governance systems. He plans to run again in the next election.

On how his LEAD Mongolia experience helped prepare him for his parliamentary run, Erdenetugs explains he leveraged the civic action planning and grassroots-level advocacy skills learned during his time with the program to better connect with voters. Most importantly, his LEAD experience provided him with the power to “shift [my] perspective and challenge myself.”

Delgerzul Lodoisamba and Orgil Dugersuren

LEAD 2016 U.S. Exchange Program Fellow Delgerzul Lodoisamba and 2019 U.S. Exchange Program Fellow Orgil Dugersuren participated in domestic election observation efforts, organized by local civil society organizations Women for Change, Youth Policy Watch, and the CSO Network for Fair and Just Elections. Prior to this year, both had observed elections through the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (OSCE/ODIHR) election observation missions, including for the 2013 and 2017 presidential elections and 2016 parliamentary elections. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic this year, OSCE/ODIHR was unable to deploy a mission, making local civil society observation efforts all the more important.

On June 24, civil society election observers joined observers from political parties and independent candidates at polling stations around Ulaanbaatar. Delgerzul observed during the morning shift, from 6:30 am until 3 pm, while Orgil observed from 3 pm until 1 am, after votes were counted. Both noted how well COVID-19 safety measures were implemented in order not to disrupt the election or discourage voters from showing up to the polls.

As citizens, Delgerzul and Orgil both emphasized the importance of independent election observation efforts to promote transparency and confidence in election results. It is a “great honor,” says Delgerzul, to represent citizens on Election Day and help ensure reliable and fair elections, noting how other LEAD Mongolia Fellows encouraged her to observe this year. For Orgil, he believes citizen participation exemplifies the spirit of democracy and contributes to the further strengthening of Mongolia’s democratic system. However, challenges remain in Mongolia, such as the ability of young, independent candidates to gain equal opportunities; a fluctuating legal environment surrounding elections; and a narrow 21-day window for election campaigns.

Enkhbayar Tumurbaatar

Enkhbayar in her election observer t-shirt.

LEAD 2019 In-Country Program Fellow Enkhbayar Tumurbaatar served as an election observer for the first time, joining the election observation organized by local civil society organizations Women for Change, Youth Policy Watch, and the CSO Network for Fair and Just Elections. Of the overall experience, Enkhbayar says, “it was [a] very interesting and new experience for me to watch the entire election process, how the election law and rules were executed on the ground, the actions of the organizers and other observers that were present.”

In deciding to observe for the first time, Enkhbayar explains that she wanted to understand the electoral system from a new perspective. She adds that, as young person, she wanted to engage and have a meaningful role in the democratic process of her country.

“As a first-time observer, the most rewarding…take-away from me was the fact that I was able to witness and see the reality of the election through my own eyes, rather than hearing about it from someone else or from a media outlet,” she says. “I was humbled and happy to have contributed to the great effort CSOs are making to keep elections fair and right in Mongolia.”

From Enkhbayar’s perspective, the biggest obstacle to running for office in an election is the adversarial element of politics, such as negative campaigning that some parties or candidates may use to bring down the opposition. Running as an independent candidate requires courage, both to campaign without the support of a party and to prepare oneself for political attacks from both opponents and voters. For someone running in a specific political party, the challenge is to demonstrate your capacity to party leadership and prove that you can make substantial contributions to the party. Both of these scenarios can be particularly challenging, sometimes prohibitively, even for LEAD Mongolia alumni, who are “emerging leaders who have the capacity and genuine will to contribute effectively to the development of Mongolia.”

Enkhbayar cites her LEAD Mongolia experience in showing her the importance of civic participation in a democracy, which inspired her to participate as an election observer. Additionally, the strong LEAD alumni network involved in the elections further encouraged her to participate and to gain new knowledge on the electoral process.

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Overall, all four LEAD Fellows emphasize the importance of youth participation in strengthening Mongolia’s democratic trajectory. As Enkhbayar says, “there is a great need for programs, campaigns, and activities that help demonstrate and have youth feel the real impact and power their participation can bring. A great example of this is the LEAD Mongolia program…if I had not been to LEAD, I would not have understood the importance of my participation.”

As Mongolia prepares for local elections on October 15, Delgerzul highlights how much the younger generation cares about democracy, and how young people are using Facebook and other social media platforms to raise their voices and call for change. Moving forward, Mongolian youth will continue to play a critical role, particularly in civil society efforts to advocate for election reforms, transparency, and increased voter education. As MP candidate Erdenetugs puts it, “people need to be empowered to work hard for their dreams…and fight for the society they want to live in.”

In Virginia, an International Exchange Program Leaves a Legacy

It’s no surprise that in its short lifespan, the Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program has driven remarkable change in Mongolia. LEAD fellows, who are the country’s most promising future leaders, are helping children access quality education in remote areas, fighting corruption in their government, and standing up to sexual harassment and domestic abuse.

But the program has also left its mark on communities across Virginia.

It has done so through the power of international exchanges. LEAD Mongolia, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by World Learning, provides emerging democratic champions with leadership training and civic engagement skills. As part of their training, LEAD fellows visit Virginia and Washington, DC, through exchanges organized in partnership with the University of Virginia (UVA) Center for Politics.

These cross-cultural exchanges provide LEAD fellows and U.S. citizens alike the opportunity to share knowledge and cultivate relationships. Those experiences have lasting results — in many different forms.

Promoting Global Alliances and Stability

LEAD Mongolia fellows observing a Staunton City Council Meeting.

At first glance, it was a city council meeting like any other: Council members discussed local ordinances, recognized a retiring city employee, and listened to constituents’ concerns. But this particular meeting, held last fall in Staunton, Virginia, was more than an exercise in civics — it was an opportunity to shore up democracy in the U.S. and abroad.

LEAD Mongolia participants lined the seats in the back of the meeting room, having come to experience local government and citizen participation in action. “It was an opportunity to witness with my own eyes how the public hearing and city council meeting happens,” says LEAD fellow Enkhbayar Batsukh. “[Mongolia hasn’t] yet developed this culture of civic engagement.”

LEAD Mongolia fellow Dorjgotov Ganbold presenting a gift to the Mayor of Staunton.

Mongolian democracy is young, having emerged in 1990 after a peaceful revolution. LEAD Mongolia fellows are committed to ensuring the longevity of their hard-earned democratic system — and this international exchange helps them do so. They visit places like Montpelier, home President James Madison, father of the U.S. Constitution, to learn how democracy here was founded, and they see how it is sustained today by attending city council meetings and expert talks.

These visits have exponential benefits for the global community, according to Daman Irby, director of global initiatives at the UVA Center for Politics. Democratic countries are among the strongest U.S. allies — and LEAD fellows return home better equipped to advocate for their country’s democratic system. “Our nation benefits when other countries have peace and freedom,” he says. “They’re better trading partners and better friends.”

Staunton Mayor Carolyn Dull, who met with the LEAD Mongolia fellows after the city council meeting, says these exchanges help strengthen U.S. democracy as well by reinforcing the ideals upon which the country was founded and which are enshrined in its Constitution. “To hope for a more perfect union, you’ve got to know each other,” she says. “You can’t stay strangers.”

Building Cross-Cultural Relationships

While global alliances are critical for security and stability, Mayor Dull says there’s great value in building cultural bridges at the individual level as well. “People tend to hate things they don’t know or are afraid of,” she says, noting that LEAD provided a rare and valuable occasion for Staunton residents to meet people from Mongolia and learn about its culture.

LEAD Mongolia fellows during their visit to the University of Virginia.

That is by design. Throughout all its international exchange programming — which includes several other programs in partnership with World Learning — the UVA Center for Politics creates ample opportunities for Charlottesville-area residents to connect with visitors, who attend bluegrass festivals, football games, rodeos. Irby even recalls taking a group of South Asian visitors to a fiddlers’ convention, where they immediately bonded with locals who were camping out on the convention grounds.

“Inevitably when you get people together, it’s impossible not to develop a greater understanding of the other people,” Irby says. “If nothing else, just seeing that they are, in fact, people.” When people meet LEAD fellows, he adds, they come to understand Mongolia beyond Genghis Khan and nomadic farmers.

And, sometimes, they even develop lasting connections. Irby recalls a recent dinner at the Barbeque Exchange in Gordonsville, Virginia. He was surprised that night when chef Craig Hartman came out of the kitchen to thank him for bringing a group of 30 LEAD fellows to the restaurant months before. Hartman told Irby that he was still in touch with some of the Mongolian visitors on Twitter and Facebook. “They really are conn

The Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind.

ecting with the community,” Irby says.

For others, hosting international visitors may be their first exposure to a larger world. Patricia Trice, superintendent of the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind (VSDB), says visits from LEAD fellows are good for her students, most in grades K-12, , who often face exclusion and thus are behind socially and in world knowledge. VSDB teachers point out Mongolia on the map and talk a little about the country before LEAD fellows come to visit. “Some [students] still may not understand that concept,” Trice says. “But it’s still giving them a sense that this is someone who doesn’t live here. It just broadens their horizons.”

Sharing Best Practices

Exchange programs also provide a platform for people in both the nonprofit and the business community to share best practices, build their networks, and advance their interests globally.

The LEAD Mongolia fellows pose for a group shot at the Virginia School for the Deaf and the Blind.

VSDB, for example, often receives requests from people around the world wishing to tour its facilities such as the independent living apartments, where students learn life skills like paying bills and preparing meals. Trice says it’s only natural to accommodate these requests as information-sharing is critical to improvement. In fact, she also sends her administrative team to schools in other states to learn about how they’re implementing new practices.

“We’re all about giving back to the field and we feel like we have a lot to share,” Trice says. “For countries where their services for disabilities are minimal, if none, we want to be able to try to help increase their services and see what we can share with them.”

Six guests from the deaf and hard-of-hearing community participate in a live debate on Mongol TV titled “Silent Discussion.”

In Mongolia, that has already made a difference. LEAD fellows have become outspoken advocates for deaf education in a country that has only one school for deaf and hard-of-hearing children. In 2017, Mongolian students erupted in protest over their teachers’ refusal to use sign language in class. Lkhagva Erdene, a LEAD fellow and executive news producer at Mongol TV, moderated a live panel debate about the issue. It was the country’s first public debate on sign language. Then, last year, Tuul Batsuren, a LEAD fellow and teacher at the school, helped her students rally yet again to replace their useless emergency system — a ringing bell — with a system of lights.

Stories like that are rewarding for Trice. “It makes you feel like all the work you put into your school helped somebody else,” she says. “That’s what it’s all about. Everybody’s got the same goal. So, I’m like, gosh, don’t keep anything secret. What do I have that you could use and what do you have that I could use?”

These exchanges help Trice and her staff improve services for VSDB’s international student population by giving them insight into the resources (or lack thereof) their students may have had prior to enrolling. “It’s hard for us to understand a student not having access to education,” she says. “Not just being able to go to school, but having a program that’s fully accessible for people with disabilities.” That insight can help them better meet those students’ needs.

Economic Benefits and Beyond

Virginia reaps even more benefits from international exchange programs. Tourism is a major industry in the state, which houses some of the nation’s most treasured historic sites including the homes of several of Founding Fathers. According to the Virginia Tourism Corporation, in 2017, the state’s tourism revenues reached $25 billion, which supported 232,000 jobs, $5.9 billion in salaries and wages, and $1.73 billion in state and local taxes.

Though LEAD Mongolia may account for only a small fraction of that revenue, Irby maintains that the program has a real impact on local businesses. It supports local restaurants like the Barbeque Exchange as well as hotels in Charlottesville, Virginia Beach, and beyond. LEAD fellows also get plenty of time to shop for souvenirs, clothing, and other items.

People and organizations across Virginia seem to appreciate their engagement. Irby says groups rarely turn him down when he asks if he can bring a sizable group of Mongolian professionals to visit with them. Not only is the UVA Center for Politics well known and respected across the state, but he says people are also fascinated by the opportunity to meet visitors from Mongolia.

That, ultimately, is why World Learning and the UVA Center for Politics plan to continue to cultivate international exchanges: People everywhere have so much to learn about one another and the world. When people get to know each other, good things happen.

World Learning Launches Virtual Tours Exploring Careers Around the Globe

Bayarmaa Lkhagvador (right), a renewable energy engineer walks through a solar farm in Mongolia.

Imagine stepping into the shoes of a teacher at Mongolia’s only school for deaf students, or an engineer working to find a solution to air pollution — without leaving your home.

Now’s your chance to do just that. Working with a team at Google, World Learning is launching a series of virtual reality tours designed to help young people explore the careers and daily lives of professionals all over the world. On these self-guided tours, you’ll learn how professionals built their careers, the challenges they face, and what skills they need to do their jobs well.

Virtual career tours make it possible for many more young people to gain exposure to real-world work environments. These tours show students the many ways they can apply their skills professionally and offer them insight into what working life is like. “Virtual reality is just beginning to open up new possibilities for learning and experiencing the world,” says Dr. Catherine Honeyman, Senior Youth Workforce Specialist at World Learning. “What I love about these virtual career tours is how they help us get beyond the limitations of our social relationships — you don’t have to personally know an energy engineer to visit her workplace. She has already invited you to come have a look just by using your phone!”

First up, we’re headed to Mongolia to shadow the careers of a few of our fellows from the Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program. LEAD Mongolia is a USAID-funded program administered by World Learning that works to build the next generation of democracy champions through leadership, international exchange, and civic education activities. LEAD Mongolia fellows also work on civic action projects addressing critical issues like unemployment.

These tours can be viewed on any ordinary smartphone or laptop — no special equipment is required. For a fully immersive experience, drop your phone into an inexpensive VR viewer (like the Google Cardboard viewer) and explore the scene just by turning your head!

Career Expedition: Renewable Energy Engineer
Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Action, Ministry of Construction and Urban Development
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Click to explore a career as a renewable energey engineer in Mongolia!

Bayarmaa Lkhagvadorj is an engineer from Mongolia who believes renewable energies are the way of the future. Travel with her through Mongolia to see the effects of the air pollution caused by burning coal. Go with her to a massive solar field to learn how solar panels work, and find out how Lkhagvadorj works with a local research center to provide evidence-based recommendations for stronger environmental policies.

Career Expedition: Training Manager
Wagner Asia Equipment LLC
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Click to explore a career as a training manager in Mongolia!

Follow a day in the life of Khunshagai Baldorj, a training manager at Wagner Asia, a company that provides products and services to the mining, construction, infrastructure, and energy sectors. Find out how she helps employees build their skills through training opportunities, and how she’s provided job training to unemployed Mongolians through her work as chair of the company’s Corporate Social Responsibility Committee.

Career Expedition: Teaching at a School for Deaf Children
School #29
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

Click to explore a career as a teacher at a School for Deaf Children in Mongolia!

Meet Tuul Batsuren, a history teacher at School #29 — the only school in Mongolia for deaf and hard-of-hearing students. Join Batsuren, who is deaf, in her classroom as she plans lessons and teaches class in the capital city of Ulaanbaatar. Then visit her office at the nongovernmental organization that she founded to advocate for her students’ rights to a quality education.

A Day in the Life of a LEAD Mongolia Exchange

Democracy is best understood when you see it in action. Last fall, the Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia Program brought a group of up-and-coming democracy advocates to the United States for a three-week exchange program in which they explored the country’s democratic values and discovered how they can work together to address critical issues such as poverty and unemployment, the environment and urbanization, and transparency and anti-corruption.

LEAD Mongolia, which is funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and implemented by World Learning, aims to support Mongolia’s young democracy by providing its next generation of champions with opportunities to make a difference. LEAD fellows design civic action projects in their communities, encourage civic engagement among high school students, and share their insight into the workings of democracy with other leaders in Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, and Myanmar.

The U.S. exchange is one important component of the LEAD Mongolia program, offering fellows firsthand experience with U.S. democracy. During their three weeks in the country, fellows take part in lectures and workshops, explore U.S. culture, and begin work on their civic action projects. A portion of the program is hosted by the University of Virginia Center for Politics in Charlottesville, Virginia.

LEAD Mongolia fellows Enkhbayar Batsukh (left), a local government employee who specializes in private sector development and Nyamdemberel Dorj (right), a civil society activist.

World Learning accompanied this year’s group in Charlottesville to find out what a day in the life of a LEAD Mongolia exchange is like. Two of the fellows — Enkhbayar Batsukh, a local government employee who specializes in private sector development, and Nyamdemberel Dorj, a civil society activist — checked in with us throughout the day to share their thoughts on everything from teambuilding to making education and employment accessible to people with disabilities.

8 a.m. Teambuilding and Leadership Training
Poplar Ridge Challenge Course at the University of Virginia

A LEAD Mongolia fellow navigates the ropes course at the Poplar Ridge Challenge Course.

LEAD Mongolia participants started the day with teamwork. At the Poplar Ridge Challenge Course, they helped one another cross a shaky high wire by using ropes to hold it taut and shouting encouragement. In another exercise, they worked together to balance nearly a dozen people on a small wooden plank without tipping over. Ultimately, the fellows learned how to solve problems through trust, communication, and leadership. These skills will be essential for when they return to Mongolia to work on projects together addressing some of the country’s most pressing issues.

Batsukh said she’s participated in teambuilding activities before, but none quite like this one: “I was very nervous, to be honest. When I was climbing the stairs, I wanted to give up. It was totally out of my comfort zone. But I pushed myself and started walking to the rope, and then I felt a little relieved and confident like I conquered my internal fear. I noticed that my friends who were pulling the rope [taut] to help me were really doing an active job. I felt a lot safer with them. I’m not doing it alone.”

1 p.m. Employing People with Disabilities
Vector Industries in Waynesboro, Virginia

LEAD Mongolia fellows visit Vector Industries to learn about how they help create employment opportunities for people with disabilities.

After lunch, the LEAD fellows drove about 30 miles west to Waynesboro, Virginia, where they learned how Vector Industries has created employment opportunities for people with disabilities. Vector Industries is a nonprofit that works with manufacturers across the region to provide assembly, packaging, fulfillment, and other logistical support. It employs people with disabilities, even providing them with transportation to get to and from work.

In Mongolia, unemployment is a serious challenge, particularly among people with disabilities. One LEAD Mongolia team will be tasked with finding a solution to alleviate this unemployment crisis as part of their civic action projects, but all of the fellows were excited to learn about the Vector Industries model. “I was amazed by how [Vector Industries] started by just going out door to door and trying to find a job for people,” Dorj said. “That was an amazing story to hear.”

Batsukh agreed, adding that there’s no such nonprofit in her community even though it includes more than 5,000 citizens with disabilities. “I feel that the factory is working in very smart ways,” she said. “We don’t have any working conditions for the disabled community at all. I looked at them and I had the great idea: In the coming years, if our overall development is going well, why couldn’t we organize a factory in our community like this one?”

2:30 p.m. Public Education Option for the Deaf and Blind
Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind in Staunton, Virginia

Next, the LEAD fellows headed further west to the city of Staunton, where they discovered how the state provides public education to students with disabilities at the Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind. During a tour of the campus, LEAD fellows learned about how the school is technically also a state agency. It provides comprehensive services and support to students with disabilities, offering transportation to young people across the state, employing staff and faculty members with disabilities, creating equal bilingual classrooms using both American Sign Language and English, and offering worksite experience programs.

Students can shop for household goods as part of the school’s independent living program.

LEAD fellows were particularly amazed by the school’s independent living program, in which students live in on-campus apartments for nine-week periods to help them learn how to pay their bills, shop for groceries, prepare meals, and more. “When we think of training disabled people, we always think of how to help them read and write but never how they will live independently,” Batsukh said.

Dorj was inspired by his visit to the school, which gave him a new vision for the future of education in Mongolia. “The independent living dorm was very inspiring,” he said. “I think we can apply it not only for visually impaired people but in other places and for people with other disabilities.”

7:30 p.m. Civic Engagement: Staunton City Council Meeting
Staunton, Virginia

LEAD fellows ended the day by attending a Staunton City Council meeting to witness U.S. local government and citizen engagement in action. Mayor Carolyn W. Dull led the meeting, which included discussion of public ordinances and the council’s vision for 2035 as well as opportunities for citizens to weigh in on various issues such as the petition to change the name of a local high school. Two of the LEAD participants spoke as well, thanking the council members and American citizens alike for allowing them to attend the meeting.

Batsukh was grateful for the opportunity to witness local democracy at work and was impressed with what she saw: “The lady beside me, she was a regular citizen from Staunton. I asked her if she always comes to these meetings and she said, ‘Yes, I do come because I want to know what’s going on in the city from different points of view. Not only from the city council members but from the other citizens that are concerned.’ It’s making all people informed and that’s very, very important.”

9 p.m. Head back to Charlottesville!

The LEAD Mongolia fellows on the University of Virginia campus.

LEAD Mongolia fellows returned to the University of Virginia campus to rest up for the remainder of their three-week exchange, which included lectures on civil liberties and contemporary American politics, workshops on civic action planning, and much more. While Dorj was looking forward to all the activities to follow in the coming weeks, he said he already had gained so much from the international exchange — and his team had already begun sharing ideas for their civic action project tackling poverty and unemployment. “We’re inspired by what we are learning here.”

In Mongolia, Project Citizen Empowers High Schoolers to Change Their Communities

In democracies the world over, civic education in schools is seen as a critical rite of passage to citizenship. We prepare young people to get involved in their communities, hold leaders accountable, vote, emerge as leaders themselves, and someday assume the helm of democracy. But this only works when we provide them opportunities to put these democratic norms into practice.

In Mongolia’s capitol of Ulaanbaatar, a team of students at School #29 — the country’s one-and-only school for deaf and hard of hearing students — is showing us what democracy is made of: engagement, dialogue, and an insistence that better things are possible. Working together, these students persuaded their school and the Mongolian government to install a lighting system to alert students to emergencies.

School 29 student and Batsuren (in red) pose with President of Mongolia Khaltmaagiin Battulga following his opening remarks at the Project Citizen National Competition.

The students were involved in Project Citizen — an interactive methodology used in 60 countries worldwide. The premise for Project Citizen is simple: identify an issue that’s important to your school or community, research the issue, suggest a solution, and carry out a project that will address this issue. In other words, it makes civic engagement real and achievable for students.

The initiative was introduced as part of World Learning’s USAID-funded Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia Program, which is cultivating the country’s next generation of democracy advocates. World Learning partnered with Center for Citizenship Education (CCE) — one of country’s oldest NGOs established during Mongolia’s transition to democracy — to introduce Project Citizen at high schools across the country.

Students at School 29 say: nothing about us without us

School 29 is one of 70 schools that participated in Project Citizen this past year.

Tuul Batsuren, a history teacher at School 29 who introduced the initiative, says these skills are especially important for her students because the deaf and hard of community is rarely given a voice in Mongolia. Deaf students are not integrated into Mongolia’s general education scheme and struggle to secure the resources they need.

Batsuren, who is deaf and also a LEAD Mongolia fellow, hopes Project Citizen can change all of this and give her students the voice they need to be active citizens and equal contributors.

About 20 students came together to form the Project Citizen team. Their work began with a school-wide survey to determine the top concerns of students at School 29. One of those concerns was the fact that the school and student dormitories used a traditional bell system to alert students to emergencies or the end of class. But students at School 29 can’t hear the bell, forcing teachers to tell students one by one when to attend class, where to go, or if there was an emergency.

The Project Citizen team quickly went to work to research their rights and the resources they would need to fix the problem. They gained community support and met with government officials and international organizations to demand a change.

Their efforts were rewarded. Tuul and her students convinced the Ministry of Education, Culture, Science and Sports to commit 10 million Mongolian Tughrik (3,880 USD) to fund a new lighting system to replace the bell system. National television stations also featured the students, allowing them to raise awareness among thousands of Mongolians about the barriers faced by students with disabilities.

It has already made a difference.

“We are so happy to have this light signal in our dorm now,” says Nandin-Erdene, a ninth grader at School 29 who has lived in the dormitories for eight years and participated in Project Citizen. “Everything became much easier for us.”

If we want to change the world, start with high schoolers

Tuul Batsuren teaches a history class at School 29. She has been teaching here for 11 years and was a student of School 29 herself.

Mongolia, as one of the youngest countries in the world, with young people ages 14 to 34 comprising 35 percent of the population, is an especially important place to teach youth about civic engagement. Faced with rising unemployment, corruption and fast-growing discontent with their country’s political climate, Mongolia’s young people are increasingly less optimistic about democracy and less likely to engage in civic or community work to combat these challenges.

For Dr. Narangerel Rinchin — executive director of CCE and a long-standing democracy advocate — the remedy to this is placing the practices of civic engagement directly into the hands of those young people. “If we want to make a positive change in Mongolia, we start with the young people,” she says.

She argues that the most effective way to compel younger people into civic life is to not simply teach civic responsibility but give them to space to act on it. Allowing students to carry out civic action projects based around their own interests offers those young people an opportunity to understand the democracy in which they live — and instills confidence that democracy works. It also provides a constructive approach to understanding the much more complex issues they hear about every day in the news.

This is exactly what Project Citizen achieves.

Rinchin, who has been involved in Mongolian civic life for three decades since the country’s peaceful transition from authoritarian rule to democracy, first introduced Project Citizen at 25 schools in Ulaanbaatar in 1997. Under the LEAD program in 2018, Project Citizen involved 70 schools from 11 different provinces, and will involve up to 100 schools this upcoming year with support from USAID.

“Project Citizen is a program which adds to students’ knowledge, enhances their skills, and deepens their understanding of how ‘the people’ — all of us — can work together to make our communities better,” Rinchin says. “For young people to carry forward the traditions of democracy, teaching civic education at all levels of primary and second education is vitally important.”

Democracy is more than a set of ideals, it’s about action

Were it not for Project Citizen, School #29 would still have in place a bell system that was at best impractical and, at worst, dangerous. Now, though, students feel empowered to create a positive change in their school and community.

Students applaud in sign language at Project Citizen competition in Ulaanbaatar. As part of Project Citizen, participating schools from across Mongolia compete for prizes to support their project ideas.

“I am so proud to see that the students learned how to identify a problem and how to act on it after being part of Project Citizen,” Batsuren says, adding that the experience was about so much more than building practical project skills. For Batsuren, it was about allowing the students to see first-hand how they can take charge in their community and make a difference.

Sarantuya, the principal of School #29, says she has seen a change in the students. “Ever since [they participated in Project Citizen], the students have become more vocal, active and empowered to do more,” she says.

Their work has received national recognition. The team won second place in the Project Citizen National Competition in April among the 12 teams that qualified. At the competition, President of Mongolia Kh.Battulga praised initiatives such as this one. “The main purpose of this project is for students to bring up issues and challenges they face at their schools and in their communities through extensive research, develop plans based on relevant laws and regulations, and then propose it to decision-makers to solve it together,” he said. “This is what we want to see happen.”

The project also taught students at School #29 that democracy works — especially when you get involved in civic life. As one participant, Nandin-Erdene, says, “We were so happy that our idea could became reality.”

Watch Project Citizen in action at School 29 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia:

LEAD Mongolia is a World Learning program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which is working with some of Mongolia’s best and brightest emerging democracy advocates. World Learning and CCE partnered under the LEAD Mongolia activity beginning in late 2016 and will continue to offer Project Citizen through 2021 thanks to the support of USAID. CCE first introduced the methodology in 1997 in collaboration with the California Center for Civic Education which developed Project Citizen to promote competent and responsible participation in local and state government. It was funded by the U.S. Department of Education.

Across Asia, Young Changemakers look to Mongolia to Lead

This fall, young leaders in Mongolia will join together with some of the most inspired up-and-coming changemakers in Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, and Myanmar to make change in their communities and the wider region.

The Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program is seeking applicants to join LEAD Alliance, which brings together Mongolian democracy advocates with their peers from Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, and Myanmar — three countries which are eager to learn from the Mongolian experience.

Why Mongolia?

People across Asia look to the country as a realistic model of how to achieve a peaceful transition to democracy.

Mongolia’s peaceful democratic revolution began in the winter of 1989 with young people demonstrating in Ulaanbaatar’s famous Sukhbaatar Square. And while Mongolia still has many challenges of its own to overcome — rising poverty and unemployment, environmental degradation, corruption — Mongolia’s young people continue to carry forward the legacy that began nearly three decades ago.

In short, Mongolia and its new generation of leaders have a lot to offer.

LEAD Mongolia, funded by USAID and implemented by World Learning, is cultivating the country’s next generation of democracy advocates. Participants, known as LEAD Mongolia Fellows, are a diverse contingent of the country’s most promising up-and-coming changemakers. Together, they work on projects to address Mongolia’s most critical challenges.

“The experience has [taught] me to see the bigger picture of the current political and social situations,” says LEAD Mongolia fellow Lkh.Khandsuren. “I realized that we should guard our democracy as a super precious treasure, because it comes with so much sacrifice.”

Since early 2017, they’ve also gone on to share their experiences as changemakers with their peers across the region as part of the LEAD Alliance. LEAD Mongolia partnered with the International Republic Institute (IRI) to introduce the LEAD Alliance, in which LEAD Mongolia Fellows serve as mentors to other young emerging leaders in Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, and Myanmar. LEAD Mongolia fellows help LEAD Alliance fellows implement projects in their countries. Fellows from both programs also gather for collaboration and networking at an annual summit in Ulaanbaatar.

“For me, the LEAD Alliance has been a really great platform to be able to meet and learn, collaborate and be inspired by so many different individuals from so many different backgrounds,” says Rabsel Dorj, a LEAD Alliance fellow from Bhutan. “We all share a very common passion for community development and promoting democratic ideals in their own country.”

World Learning and IRI are recruiting for emerging leaders ages 25 to 40 from Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, or Myanmar to apply through October 27, 2018. Check out LEAD Alliance and apply today.

Want to read more about the LEAD Alliance projects that have taken place in Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, and Myanmar? Check out these stories:

For One Group of Young Kyrgyz Leaders, Leadership Starts with Inclusion

A New Generation of Active Citizens in Rural Myanmar

In the Kingdom of Bhutan, Learning to Value the Environment

Mongolia

World Learning and USAID Launch New Program to Support Democratic Development in Mongolia

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) has awarded World Learning a new $2.5 million Mongolian Young Leaders Program. Secretary of State John Kerry announced the program during his June 5 visit to Ulaanbaatar. It supports U.S. Ambassador to Mongolia Jennifer Zimdahl Galt’s initiative to help build the country’s next generation of democratic leaders.

World Learning will lead the two-year program in partnership with non-profit organizations from both Mongolia and the United States —the Center for Citizenship Education and the International Republican Institute. The Mongolian Young Leaders Program will support promising young leaders from the public, civil society, media, and private sectors to work collaboratively on key policy issues related to environment and urbanization, unemployment and poverty alleviation, and anti-corruption and transparency. Through leadership programs and international exchanges, participants will interact with colleagues within Mongolia and counterparts from the United States and selected Asian countries. The program will also encourage public engagement among high school students by providing new civic education materials to teachers and sponsoring Project Citizen competitions in which students take action to improve their schools and communities.

“Mongolia’s nearly 25 years of peaceful democracy provide hope for countries struggling with authoritarian pasts,” said Carol Jenkins, president for Global Development and Exchange at World Learning. “World Learning and our partners are proud to support a new generation of democratic champions to continue this legacy.”

World Learning is an international non-profit organization working to promote leadership, empower people and strengthen institutions in over 75 countries through education, development and exchange programs. It has been active in Mongolia since 2000 through its Experiment in International Living, SIT Study Abroad programs, and international exchanges.

LEAD Mongolia

In Mongolia, Women’s Rights Advocates Say ‘Time’s Up’ on Harassment and Abuse

Gerelee Odonchimed watched the 2018 Golden Globes with awe as actors wore all-black outfits in solidarity with victims of sexual harassment and abuse. For Odonchimed, a lawyer and gender equality advocate who watched the awards ceremony from her home in Mongolia, the sea of black gowns truly meant “Time’s Up.”

“This is important,” she says of Hollywood’s new movement to fight sexual assault, harassment, and inequality in the workplace. “Discussions on workplace harassment are finally being brought up.”

In 2012, well before #MeToo and #TimesUp took over the social media stratosphere, Odonchimed started working as vice director for education and advocacy at Women for Change — a prominent women’s empowerment organizations in Mongolia — to combat the victim blaming and shaming that allows sexual harassment and abuse to go on unchallenged.

About one in five women in Mongolia are victims of violence or assault and one in three women are victims of domestic violence. Odonchimed explains this abuse is often excused as a “regular thing” in Mongolian culture.

Ganchimeg Namsrai, women’s empowerment advocate and senior researcher at the Press Institute of Mongolia.

But time for excuses is running out. The #MeToo and #TimesUp movements have been silently surging in Mongolia for some time, according to Ganchimeg Namsrai, another women’s empowerment advocate and senior researcher at the Press Institute of Mongolia. Namsrai and Odonchimed — both participants in World Learning’s Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program — are among Mongolia’s best-and-brightest emerging leaders. And they’re fighting for change.

Challenges women face in Mongolia

Justice has long been elusive for women in Mongolian society, where there’s a serious lack of information about sexual assault and domestic abuse — compounded by prevailing public misconceptions.

Domestic violence in particular has been a taboo subject across most of the country, where centuries of nomadic tradition tell families to handle their affairs without government interference. Government itself hasn’t always taken violence against women seriously: Mongolia’s penal code didn’t recognize domestic violence as a crime until 2016. And still, to this day, many law enforcement officials are not properly trained to enforce those regulations, nor does Mongolia consider domestic violence a human rights issue.

Ganchimeg Namsrai (left) presenting at a LEAD Mongolia event.

Even in the media, there’s little discussion of the legal consequences of gender-based violence. In fact, according to Namsrai, media coverage often reinforces negative stigmas against women who are victims of abuse. In 2017, she spent the year researching Mongolian media coverage of domestic violence, harassment, and gender equity.

So far, the results have not been assuring. “We found that at large, issues of gender equality are not covered fairly or in an informed, unbiased way in the media,” she says. “Gender bias and stigma bleed through.”

Namsrai’s research looks at articles and other media coverage of gender-based violence. She found that 70 percent of the article sources are male, and 70 percent of the photos are of men even though 91 percent of victims are women. Men are portrayed as businessmen or political figures, whereas women are portrayed as “instigators” or simply as housewives undeserving of sympathy. It’s highly sensationalized and meant to grab headlines. The same is true of media coverage of sexual assault and harassment, she says.

“Victim blaming is everywhere,” agrees Odonchimed. It’s never about the crime, but it’s instead about what the women said, what she wore, or that she might have done something wrong.

Gerelee Odonchimed speaking at a Women for Change event in Mongolia.

Through her own educational outreach and advocacy work, Odonchimed has discovered there is too little public understanding of gender-based violence and harassment as human rights issues. That misinformation leads to shaming and silence, which perpetuates the harassment and abuse as it keeps women from speaking up. As Namsrai explains, “They’re afraid of the stigma and what people will say, how they will be shamed.”

The good news is there is finally a conversation emerging, say Odonchimed and Namsrai. Women are becoming braver and beginning to speak out publicly.

Changing the narrative

Gerelee Odonchimed at a Women for Change event in Mongolia.

The movement toward change is becoming more and more visible in Mongolia. Namsrai and Odonchimed are up-and-coming custodians of this emerging movement in Mongolia, ready to move forward as more women speak out and demand answers.

Indeed, Odonchimed and Women for Change have spent years working to address sexual harassment on the streets, at universities, and in the workplace, namely through educational initiatives and leadership programs with young women.

“We really want to raise awareness about sexual harassment,” says Odonchimed. She explains that women often don’t realize when and how they’re being harassed — too often she hears, “Oh, I didn’t know that was sexual harassment.” For Odonchimed, her work is about getting people to think about these issues as human rights issues by educating them at a very early age about human rights, human dignity and respect.

In 2017, Women for Change launched the “Behind Closed Doors” project, which set out to personalize domestic violence by setting up booths where people listened to real incidents of domestic violence. Those recordings — which included the sound of mother being struck while a child cried in the background — elicited a powerful emotional response.

Later that year, another national campaign launched to combat violence against women and children. In early November, the “Open Your Eyes” campaign was introduced to demand that the government galvanize its efforts and strengthen legal protections for women and children who are victims of violence and sexual assault. Though the government had adopted the Law to Combat Domestic Violence in 2016, the activists and demonstrators of Open Your Eyes are arguing that too many cases of abuse go unreported because of poor implementation of the law as well as societal resistance to acknowledge abuse as an issue.

Odonchimed cautions that addressing this issue is not simply about changing male behavior. It runs deeper than that. “This is a societal problem,” she says. “It’s a problem that affects everyone, men and women, and we as a society have to figure out how to fix it.”

Gerelee Odonchimed, LEAD Mongolia participant

As they watch these movements take root in Mongolian society, both Odonchimed and Namsrai are becoming more hopeful about their own work. Through their LEAD Mongolia experience, too — which brought them together with other young, emerging leaders from all sectors to learn, network and work on projects together — they have become much better connected with the larger advocacy community.

“I am optimistic [after my LEAD experience] because I now know that if strong and passionate people come together, we can really do a lot,” Namsrai says. For her, this group signifies the promise of transformation throughout Mongolian society.

“Change is possible in Mongolia,” says Odonchimed. “When I look at other young people and I see how their attitudes are changing for the better, I am proud to be with them. I feel like change is coming.”

LEAD Mongolia is a World Learning program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which is working with some of Mongolia’s best and brightest emerging democracy advocates. LEAD Fellows represent all different sectors of society, but they have a common ambition to spur positive change on the issues they care about most.

Written by LEAD Mongolia Project Director Adam LeClair

Learn Why This Mongolian Kindergarten Principal Is Teaching Kids How to Recycle

Lundeejantsan Tsoodol believes you’re never too young to learn about keeping the environment clean — even if you’re in kindergarten.

As a kindergarten principal, Tsoodol is working to instill community values in his own students at Kindergarten #5 in the small Mongolian city of Arvaikheer. These children are learning how to sort trash for recycling, make toys and household items from used bottles or paper, and decorate their classrooms with pencil holders and flower pots made of recyclable materials.

Arvaikheer is the pilot site for Eco-Friendly Kindergartens, a project that Tsoodol launched alongside a team of participants from World Learning’s Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program. Eco-Friendly Kindergartens is working with three kindergartens in different provinces to introduce the 3R principles: reuse, reduce, and recycle.

But the project is also about so much more: Tsoodol argues that just the mere act of recycling shows children that small actions can benefit their entire community. It will encourage them to become responsible citizens who engage in even bigger ways as they get older. “This work is important,” he says. “We want to build up kids who have the right attitude to achieve because they are our future.”

Tsoodol joined the LEAD Mongolia Program in late July as part of the In-Country Thematic Program along with 29 other emerging leaders from 15 different provinces of Mongolia. “When I applied to LEAD I only thought, ‘OK, I’m going to get some skills.’ I wasn’t sure what skills I would get or even what skills I wanted,” he said. “But I knew I wanted to improve myself.” LEAD brought him into a community he never realized existed.

LEAD Fellows are quickly becoming the country’s most promising change-makers. LEAD Mongolia is a leadership development program for up-and-coming democracy advocates run in partnership with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Those who take part vary in profession and background: some are young civil society activists, others are in local government or the private sector. The point is to bring them together to solve challenges and bring about change through group projects like Eco-Friendly Kindergartens.

From day one of LEAD, surrounded by other leaders with diverse experiences, Tsoodol says he quickly realized how much there was to learn. “Because of LEAD, I figured out what I didn’t know. And because of that, I figured out what I needed to learn and how I wanted to improve.”

Tsoodol realized he could find ways to ensure a solid start for his students despite serious challenges. Schools across the country are coping with overcrowding, including Kindergarten #5, which has enrolled 295 students despite being built to accommodate 140. Funding for public education has also stirred controversy in recent months. Teachers are one of the lowest paid groups of civil servants in Mongolia, paid between 535,000 to 608,500 Tughriks (around U.S. $250) a month. This has led to mass protests and threats of strikes. Many fear poor salaries are prompting skilled teachers to seek work in private schools, which offer higher pay, or seek work elsewhere altogether.

Tsoodool believes projects like Eco-Friendly Kindergartens spurs hope for kids and their communities.

Still, Tsoodol remains undaunted. He doesn’t mind the extra students, especially during a period of high unemployment. “If we help one child, we help their family. If we can care for their child during the day, then they can find work and life can get better,” he explains.

Through projects like Eco-Friendly Kindergartens, too, he can help children build the foundations of their own lives. It sets an example for them of community involvement and it spurs hope — both for the kids and for the people around them. “The best part of this job is when you ask a kid, ‘What did you learn today?’ and you see their eyes widen,” he says. “When they learn something new, you can really see it in their confidence and you know there is hope for the future.”

Tsoodol offers an optimistic vision of that future. His school is alive with vibrant paintings on the wall and children’s art projects hanging in every room. Teachers greet visitors proudly as they show off classroom recycling projects. Parents and many others see this as not just a school, he says, but also a community hub that models what good community engagement looks like. “Schools are the heart of communities and we need to get them involved — students, teachers, parents,” he says.

It is clear that Tsoodol is doing exactly that. At Kindergarten #5, he is serving as a role model and demonstrating the democracy comes in all forms. As he learned through LEAD Mongolia, democracy is not forged by politicians in Ulaanbaatar but by the emerging leaders who create hope and allow for change to unfold in the most unexpected places and in unexpected ways.

New Film Spurs Change in Mongolian Employment Practices

Unemployment is one of the most critical issues facing Mongolia today. Though it was once considered one of the world’s fastest growing economies, the country’s employment rate has risen steeply in recent years. Last year, nearly 12 percent of Mongolians were out of work.

But the situation is even more dire for certain segments of the population: according to Mongolia’s National Statistical Office, 30 percent of people aged 20 to 24 are unemployed, a figure that soars to more than 70 percent for people with disabilities.

A new documentary argues that Mongolia’s unemployment crisis cannot be tackled without acknowledging this disparity and the social inequalities that make it possible. On July 28, a team of emerging civic leaders premiered the film Journey to Job, which aims to raise awareness of these social and institutional barriers facing young people seeking employment. The film was the culmination of their participation in World Learning’s Leaders Advancing Democracy (LEAD) Mongolia program, which works with democracy advocates to spur change in their communities.

“Social inequalities are largely unknown and ignored in Mongolia,” says Ariunsanaa Batsaikhan, CEO of Maral Angel Foundation for Children with Spina Bifida. She contends that this lack of awareness only stigmatizes disadvantaged populations and ultimately impedes the country’s chances of economic recovery.

Journey to Job focuses on the stories of three people: Otgonjargal, a young deaf man and skilled carpenter who has been actively but unsuccessfully looking for a job for three years; Munkhzaya, a single mother who hasn’t been able to find employment since her daughter was born with a disability six years ago; and Otgontsetseg, a 16-year-old woman who recently migrated from rural Mongolia to Ulaanbaatar, where she works as a bricklayer to support her family. Their distinct experiences underline the ramifications of social inequality.

“Our society has so much stigma against these groups. They can’t find jobs and Mongolia’s employers are losing important talent,” Batsaikhan says. As the documentary illustrates, stigmatized groups — such as persons with disabilities or internal migrants — are quickly labeled “lazy,” “uneducated,” or “incapable” and may be barred from decent work. But that’s the wrong approach.

Instead, the film argues for social inclusion, which is the practice of including all people in public life. The team of activists learned about social inclusion through their LEAD Mongolia fellowship exercises like the Privilege Walk, which physically demonstrates how privilege works by asking participants to take steps forward and backward for each social advantage or disadvantage to see how they rank among their peers. “After taking these workshops, we wanted to speak for as many identities as possible in a really big way,” adds Ganzorig Dolingor, another LEAD Fellow and co-founder and chief editor of the popular news site Unread Today.

And in addition to that moral imperative, there is an economic argument for embracing inclusion: Citizens who are excluded from society cannot contribute to it. “There’s the threat of what we lose economically when we don’t include all groups,” Dolingor says.

Dolgion Aldar, executive director of the Independent Research Institute of Mongolia (IRIM), provided data and research for the documentary project. Aldar commends the group and argues that issues of poverty and unemployment should be topics of interest not only to academics and politicians, but to everyone in society. “Young leaders [like LEAD Fellows] are drivers of change,” she says. “It’s important for them to understand and acknowledge deeper social and structural constraints that prevent people from improving their lives.”

LEAD Mongolia Fellows participating in the Privilege Walk.

Working on the documentary did give the team greater insight into inclusion. “The LEAD program made me see the broader picture,” Dolinger says. They’re from rural areas as well as urban. Dolingor says that diversity made Journey to Job better: “When we include more groups [in our projects] we can have more impact. We can make more change.”

Now that the documentary is complete, the group will circulate Journey to Job widely to raise as much awareness as possible. “We want to show it to many target groups, especially corporate businesses,” says Enkhjin Selenge, one of the team leaders. Ultimately, the aim is to convince employers to hire talent from disadvantaged groups. “We want to make an impact on hiring practices,” Selenge says. “If companies start hiring disadvantaged groups, then we succeeded.”

There is already a glimmer of hope. Several LEAD Fellows are initiating conversations with their own employers about inclusive hiring: Selenge’s employer, Toyota Mongolia, plans to revise the company’s hiring policy and will soon hire its first-ever person with a disability, while the construction company where Batsaikhan works when not involved in civil society just hired a former convict and a deaf welder. The team also shared Journey to Job with department heads from Ulaanbaatar’s Municipal Employment Office as well as with Oyu Tolgoi, one of the largest private sector employers in Mongolia.

But their advocacy journey is just beginning. “We need to do more to raise awareness,” Selenge says. “This documentary is just one step.”

LEAD Mongolia is a World Learning program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which is working with some of Mongolia’s best and brightest emerging democracy advocates. LEAD Fellows represent all different sectors of society, but they have a common ambition to spur positive change on the issues they care about most.

Written by LEAD Mongolia Project Director Adam LeClair

Mongolia Grapples With Deaf Education in Not-So-Silent Debate

Earlier this year, a group of protesters gathered outside of Ulaanbaatar’s School 29 — the only school for deaf and hard-of-hearing students in all of Mongolia. They held up signs declaring, “We can’t understand our lessons. You’re violating our right to an education. Carry out all classes in sign language.” These student protesters argued they only wanted the same rights as any other student in Mongolia: equal access to quality education and the ability to be taught in their own language.

Mongolia approved sign language as the native language for deaf and hard of hearing citizens in February 2016, when it adopted its Law on the Rights of Disabled People. But students say their right to be taught in sign language is not being upheld at School 29, where almost half their teachers do not know the language well enough.

That student protest has since sparked a wider public debate. In May, Mongol TV’s primetime Nuudel Shiidel program aired a live panel debate titled “Silent Discussion,” featuring six guests from the deaf and hard-of-hearing community, including one of the student protesters. It was Mongolia’s first-ever public discussion hosted in sign language. “Mongol TV has been following the story since students protested for better quality education,” says Lkhagya Erdene, executive news producer at Mongol TV and moderator of the panel. “We wanted to hear from the deaf community.”

As a LEAD Mongolia Fellow, Erdene is committed to using his role in the media to amplify the voices of Mongolia’s diverse populations. LEAD (Leaders Advancing Democracy) is a World Learning program funded by USAID, which is working with some of Mongolia’s best and brightest emerging democracy advocates. LEAD Fellows represent all different sectors of society, but they have a common ambition to spur positive change on the issues they care about most.

The idea for a sign language debate was born in May at the regional LEAD Alliance Summit, which connects LEAD Mongolia Fellows with like-minded peers from Bhutan, Kyrgyzstan, and Myanmar. During a coffee break, Erdene struck up a conversation with program mentor Oyungerel Tsedevdamba, a Mongolian author and human rights activist. “She pitched me [the idea to host the first-ever] deaf panel on prime-time television,” Erdene says. “I had to do it. Our audiences and society need to hear what the marginalized groups have to say if we want to build a humane, democratic society.”

LEAD Mongolia Fellow Nemekhbayar Batnasan participating in Mongolia’s first-ever public discussion hosted in sign language.

Silent Discussion’s six panelists had much to say through their interpreters. Nemekhbayar Batnasan — another LEAD Fellow who is also a project manager at the Deaf Information Center in Ulaanbaatar — argued that the community’s biggest challenge is poor access to sign language interpreters. “There are 65 television channels [in Mongolia] but only Mongolian National Broadcast sign interprets its 45-minute news program,” Batnasan explained in a later interview. None of the country’s public service institutions provide interpreters either.

Batnasan further argues that little progress has been made toward ensuring equal rights to education, employment, and health services for the deaf and hard-of-hearing community. The student protests at School 29 highlight that lack of progress: When students are not taught in their native sign language, they may not gain sufficient literacy skills to enroll in institutions of higher education — which in turn limits their future job prospects. They are left behind.

It is uncertain how long it will take for the deaf community to fully access their rights to basic services, but the community maintains hope. Silent Discussion caught the attention of the Mongolian public, leading to further debate on social media. Erdene, who promises to continue covering disability issues, hopes the panel will inspire many others to stand up in support of the deaf community. Meanwhile, Batnasan encourages young people with hearing impairment to create their own opportunities. “You are young and there are many things to do for our future,” he says. “Continue your fight for equal access to education. Be consistent and results will come.”

World Learning’s LEAD Mongolia program strives to forge meaningful connections whereby emerging leaders like Erdene and Batnasan can meet, exchange views, and push forward important dialogue. Further, the LEAD Alliance Summit implemented by IRI provided a critical networking opportunity to initiate new ideas, such as Silent Discussion. The program is made possible with funding the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Written by: Munguntuya Otgonjargal, World Learning Mongolia’s Training Program Officer and Adam LeClair, World Learning Project Director for LEAD Mongolia.

Fighting Corruption in Mongolia

As part of a series on the Leaders Advancing Democracy Mongolia (LEAD Mongolia) program, World Learning sat down with program participants to learn more about who they are, what they learned from LEAD Mongolia and how they plan to use their experience back home.

LEAD Mongolia is a two year initiative run by World Learning with funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which aims to bring together aspiring leaders from Mongolia to the United States to learn about democracy, and how they can work together to tackle Mongolia’s most pressing issues, including corruption, poverty, discrimination, urbanization and the environment.

Civil society leaders in Mongolia are working hard to address persistent government corruption, a problem they say undercuts economic and social progress for citizens across the country.

It’s a decades old problem for the young democracy. A 2005 report by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) highlighted that the country suffered from a lack of transparency and access to information, an inadequate civil service system, limited political will and weak government institutions.

Seven years later, in 2012, Mongolia’s former leader Nambaryn Enkhbayar was arrested on live television and charged with five counts of corruption. He was jailed for four years after being found guilty of taking television equipment intended as a donation to a monastery, and charges relating to the illegal privatization of a hotel and publishing house.

Despite his arrest, Enkhbayar’s activities are just the tip of the iceberg, according to Battulga Chambu, a LEAD Mongolia Fellow and government employee who is committed to fighting corruption.

“Corruption has become one of Mongolia’s biggest issues,” Chambu says.

Chambu is a supervisor at the Government Procurement Agency of Mongolia in Dornod, a province in East Mongolia. His agency was created in 2012 to foster transparency in the 21 provinces across the country, and to provide support for public and private sectors working to reign in official corruption. But Chambu says despite the recognition of the agency, corruption remains prevalent, and prevents citizens from accessing independent information, financial statistics or news.

“In my opinion, corruption is the root of all problems in Mongolia. If you defeat this problem, then other problems we face will become better,” says Chambu. He argues that one of the best tools is education, and he wants to start a program that gives high school students information about laws and teaches them how to avoid corruption.

Chambu participated in the LEAD Mongolia program to learn how he can help tackle corruption and transparency issues. He says the program taught him how to organize civic action plans, and exposed him to the American experience and culture — the kind of cross-cultural collaboration that will help leaders like him to find the answers to Mongolia’s thorniest problems.

Engaging in Peaceful Civil Society in Mongolia

The fatal riots in Ulaanbaatar in 2008, in which five people were killed and over 300 injured, were a wake-up call for Mongolians to educate citizens about how to engage peacefully in civil society.

Sparked by allegations of voter fraud, the riots, according to The Guardian, were among of the worst on record, resulting in a four day state of emergency issued by the government. It was a setback in what had been a smooth democratic transition for Mongolia, a place that some Mongolian educators and leaders call the only democracy between the Sea of Japan and Eastern Europe.

Among Mongolia’s next generation of pro-democracy leaders is Bolorsaikhan Badamsambu, who works with Mongolia’s youth on civic education. Badamsambu is the vice coordinator of the “All for Education!” campaign, which is part of the National Civil Society Coalition of Mongolia. The global campaign works to influence civil society participation, implement non-discriminatory services, and advocate for education across all sectors of society.

Badamsambu says discrimination and marginalization are rampant, which discourages many from becoming politically active. “After the parliamentary election in 2008, many Mongolian youth expressed their opinion, but in a violent way,” he recalls. “That alone already shows that we need to work and empower youth before they turn to violence. Youth engagement is really low because of the lack of quality education, including civic education. In addition, Mongolian youth are always marginalized and discriminated [against] because of their age or their experience or even their gender.”

He says to overcome this situation, youth need to be more aware that they have the power to make a positive change, and can do so in a peaceful way. While on World Learning’s LEAD exchange program in the U.S., Badamsambu says he was impressed at the level of inclusivity across both public and private sectors. “Whether we are working in the private sector or civil society, we are contributing to a much more democratic and open, free civil society within our country. So from this trip, I realized that every person needs to contribute to the wellbeing of people in this country.”

Badamsambu intends to implement a project that focuses on increasing civic engagement by educating students and their parents. He says he would like to work on providing information that will help the public make informed decisions about local and national politics.

Improving Freedom of the Press in Mongolia

Freedom of the press is central for Mongolian journalists like Tanan Myagmar, who works as a foreign relations officer for the official state-owned news agency. She recently returned to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia’s capital, after three weeks in the U.S. as a participant in the Leaders Advancing Democracy — Mongolia (LEAD Mongolia) program.

The program is a two year initiative run by World Learning, and funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), designed to support Mongolia’s next generation of democracy advocates. Myagmar took part in the program to get first-hand exposure to media in the U.S. with the aim of creating more open and transparent press in Mongolia.

Media organizations have flourished following the 1990 peaceful revolution ending communist rule in Mongolia, and there are now more than 400 print and broadcast media outlets. However, Myagmar says corruption within the political system and media is still rampant. “Mongolian journalism has a long way to go,” she says. “From publishing paid news plagiarism to bias reporting, journalism in Mongolia is still awash with unethical conduct and we urgently need to raise our professional standards,” she says.

A 2016 UNESCO report states that paid media content remains prevalent and points to anecdotal evidence that journalists are bribed. Myagmar says there’s also an unofficial agreement between many news organizations and prominent government officials to keep controversial issues out of the news. She fears that the country could backslide if this kind of practice continues. “I experienced during my coverage of the elections back in 2008 and 2012 how politicians exploited the loopholes of the campaign law that allowed them to buy the media and get illegally elected. The same nightmare scenario repeated itself during the 2016 election,” she says.

She adds that while journalists are aware of the situation, few are willing to take the personal risks necessary to challenge the status quo. “This has to be tamed, if not fully stopped. Otherwise if people keep being denied their rights for access to unbiased information and quality journalism, everything we have achieved in the [past] 27 years as a democratic country could vanish in a day.”

Myagmar says journalists are not protected by any laws, and many investigative journalists fear they may be heavily penalized for publishing independent reports. A 2014 report by MediaShift, an organization that offers insight and analysis of media around the world, including corruption within media, says Mongolia’s defamation laws criminalize defamation and slander, and fines run steep: journalists accused of defamation can be charged $6000 to $17,000.

Despite the difficulties, Myagmar is optimistic about the future. A new generation of journalists is emerging, and Myagmar says she believes they will change the state of the media, with a little support: “We need to equip these journalists with world-class education and an unshakable belief that what they do will make a difference.”

Expanding Disability Services in Mongolia

For people with disabilities in Mongolia, there are many obstacles to overcome. Nemkekhbayar Batnasan, a deaf professional living in the capital Ulaanbaatar, says there’s a common misperception that people born with disabilities are being punished for their sins in a past life, which leads to discrimination, and a lack of awareness and information about their needs.

Batnasan, an information officer for the Mongolian National Federation of the Deaf, says there are not enough sign language interpreters in the country, and there are very few programs that offer closed captioning, despite a new law that requires public TV channels to do so.

“Interpreters or written publications make information much more accessible for the deaf,” he says. “However, Mongolian National Broadcasting is the only station that has sign language interpreters, and that’s only during their 40-minute news. That means there’s 68 other TV channels that don’t have subtitles for their programs.”

The opportunities to learn sign language are limited, he says, noting that state universities don’t offer training for interpreters, so the only way to learn is by attending classes at the Mongolian Association of Sign Language Interpreters.

Education for the deaf is also inadequate, Batnasan says, especially in the rural communities, where life can be much harder. He says the majority of students drop out of school. To change that trend, Batnasan says he would like to see sign language used more in public, and wants to make Video Relay Services (VRS) available across the country. VRS is a form of telecommunication available in many developed countries that enables people who are deaf or hard of hearing to communicate through video instead of text.

Batnasan thinks VRS can help in myriad ways, including in emergencies. “Today emergency contact centers [police, medical, fire] only receive voice calls and deaf people cannot call emergency services. If video relaying services are introduced to emergency call centers there would be a huge possibility to connect all district-level agencies such as district hospitals, police, and social service centers.”

Batnasan spent three weeks in the United States as part of the LEAD Mongolia program, run by World Learning and funded by USAID. He says his time in the U.S. allowed him to see how open and inclusive the country is toward people with disabilities.

During a visit to Capitol Hill, he had the opportunity to meet with lawmakers and an association for the deaf, which he said deeply impacted him. “I was so proud to see that those people have knowledge, skills and responsibility.”

A team of sign language interpreters worked with Batnasan during the three-week U.S. exchange program in Washington, D.C. and at the University of Virginia. “The sign language interpreters assigned to me were extremely helpful,” he said. “I realized that we need to improve our sign language and deaf children’s education. We should invite experienced volunteers and experts from foreign countries and collaborate with them, and learn from them to improve ourselves.”

Valery Nadjibe, an associate program officer at World Learning, says a Mongolian interpreter was initially going to join, but he had to back out at the last minute due to visa issues. “We searched and searched and we could not find anyone in the U.S. that knew Mongolian Sign Language. So with the help of World Learning program associate, Rebecca Berman, who is also deaf, we managed to get four interpreters.”

Two teams of two interpreters, e with a hearing ASL interpreter and a Certified Deaf Interpreter (CDI), interpreted for Batnasan taking breaks every 20 minutes. With each team, the hearing interpreter signed American Sign Language to the Certified Deaf interpreter, who interpreted in International Sign. Before the program started, the interpreters skyped with Batnasan to get to know him. “They met him at the airport, and were there from that moment on, working with him and supporting him every step of the way,” Nadjibe says.

“World Learning’s mission is to be inclusive for everyone,” Berman says, adding that it’s important to make sure the needs of all participants are met during the planning process. “For this particular program, we helped connect the LEAD organizers with interpreting agencies and we connected them with the DC Deaf Community resources in order to make sure this program was 100% accessible.”

Batnasan was very impressed with the support he received and recommends the LEAD program to people of all abilities. “I have learned many new things and heard interesting stories about democracy and freedom with the help of the sign language interpreters provided by World Learning. I think if deaf youths participate in this program, they will be equipped to implement projects and work with other young people, and they will have the support to do so.”

Program Areas

Our Approach

Regions

Country: Mongolia

Young citizens are at the forefront of change

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What 100 Days in Office Taught Eight LEAD Mongolia Alumni

How LEAD Mongolia Alumni Helped Support Free and Fair National Elections This Summer

Erdenetugs Oroolon

Delgerzul Lodoisamba and Orgil Dugersuren

Enkhbayar Tumurbaatar

In Virginia, an International Exchange Program Leaves a Legacy

Promoting Global Alliances and Stability

Building Cross-Cultural Relationships

Sharing Best Practices

Economic Benefits and Beyond

World Learning Launches Virtual Tours Exploring Careers Around the Globe

A Day in the Life of a LEAD Mongolia Exchange

LEAD Mongolia fellows Enkhbayar Batsukh (left), a local government employee who specializes in private sector development and Nyamdemberel Dorj (right), a civil society activist.

8 a.m. Teambuilding and Leadership Training
Poplar Ridge Challenge Course at the University of Virginia

1 p.m. Employing People with Disabilities
Vector Industries in Waynesboro, Virginia

2:30 p.m. Public Education Option for the Deaf and Blind
Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind in Staunton, Virginia

7:30 p.m. Civic Engagement: Staunton City Council Meeting
Staunton, Virginia

9 p.m. Head back to Charlottesville!

In Mongolia, Project Citizen Empowers High Schoolers to Change Their Communities

Students at School 29 say: nothing about us without us

If we want to change the world, start with high schoolers

Democracy is more than a set of ideals, it’s about action

Across Asia, Young Changemakers look to Mongolia to Lead

Mongolia

World Learning and USAID Launch New Program to Support Democratic Development in Mongolia

LEAD Mongolia

In Mongolia, Women’s Rights Advocates Say ‘Time’s Up’ on Harassment and Abuse

Learn Why This Mongolian Kindergarten Principal Is Teaching Kids How to Recycle

New Film Spurs Change in Mongolian Employment Practices

Mongolia Grapples With Deaf Education in Not-So-Silent Debate

Fighting Corruption in Mongolia

Engaging in Peaceful Civil Society in Mongolia

Improving Freedom of the Press in Mongolia

Expanding Disability Services in Mongolia

Program Areas

Our Approach

Erdenetugs Oroolon

Delgerzul Lodoisamba and Orgil Dugersuren

Enkhbayar Tumurbaatar

Promoting Global Alliances and Stability

Building Cross-Cultural Relationships

Sharing Best Practices

Economic Benefits and Beyond

LEAD Mongolia fellows Enkhbayar Batsukh (left), a local government employee who specializes in private sector development and Nyamdemberel Dorj (right), a civil society activist.

8 a.m. Teambuilding and Leadership Training Poplar Ridge Challenge Course at the University of Virginia

1 p.m. Employing People with Disabilities Vector Industries in Waynesboro, Virginia

2:30 p.m. Public Education Option for the Deaf and Blind Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind in Staunton, Virginia

7:30 p.m. Civic Engagement: Staunton City Council Meeting Staunton, Virginia

9 p.m. Head back to Charlottesville!

Students at School 29 say: nothing about us without us

If we want to change the world, start with high schoolers

Democracy is more than a set of ideals, it’s about action

8 a.m. Teambuilding and Leadership Training
Poplar Ridge Challenge Course at the University of Virginia

1 p.m. Employing People with Disabilities
Vector Industries in Waynesboro, Virginia

2:30 p.m. Public Education Option for the Deaf and Blind
Virginia School for the Deaf and Blind in Staunton, Virginia

7:30 p.m. Civic Engagement: Staunton City Council Meeting
Staunton, Virginia