Community Connections Alumna Fights Poverty by Empowering Youth
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Several Georgian professionals recently visited the U.S. to learn about wine tourism. The group included local winery owners, government officials and hotel operators from Georgia's Kakheti region. They traveled to Washington State's wine regions as part of the USAID-funded Community Connections program. One of the participants, Neli Gobejishvili, owns the Megzuri Hotel in the Dedoplistskaro district of Kakheti.
The Community Connections exchange offered Neli an opportunity to network with wine educators and American businesswomen. She enjoyed hearing the womens' stories, and hopes to learn from their experiences. What struck Neli most was that many of these women made an effort to reduce poverty in their communities by providing marketable skills to those in need.
Upon her return, Neli decided to undertake her own ambitious endeavor to help foster professional success among youth. She started the Pirosmani Foundation, a business consulting center in Kakheti region. The center works with youth to improve their communication, cooperation and time management skills.
The new center is already having a positive impact in the community. Neli has already delivered 36 seminars through the center. Among seminar participants, five high school students have secured part-time jobs. Thirty others are working in their communities on various projects to improve information sharing.
Neli has also taken a lesson from the Community Connections program. She is an ardent supporter of alumni networking and partnership. She encourages trainees to continue working together to ensure success, saying that "the best way to encourage people to become more proactive in determining their own futures is to give them skills to improve socio-economic conditions in their own communities."
