So, lately I stopped having a second job (I used to do so to cover the expenses of ourghema) and I started focusing on more of developing ourghema, and I started thinking: What is next? I am running a well positionned space in Medenine, I was able to overcome so many diffuculties and I am going to sum up my first year in numbers:
More than 30 events were organized.
More than 1000 persons were touched through those events.
+/- 20 persons come to our space daily, and what I am proud of is that more than 70% from them are women, knowing that Medenine is a “conservative region” and it is not an easy thing to gain the trust of Girls, and their parents to go to a public, “mixed” place on a daily basis! Super proud of that! if I did that myslef, but then what if ourghema gets bigger and I don’t do that only myself but with the support of a greater community?
So my plans are currently:
starting the hackerspace that I started working on already, and it is going to be through a partnership with someone from Medenine (3D Protoksi) , as he is an expert in 3D priniting, (Currently, I am thinking of reaching more people, so I believe that with this partnership, and the support / partnership with Ibtakiroo association, we will be able to reach more people and have a greater impact, more than when ourghema works by itself)
Focusing on the high school students in this year, and this is a strategic decision as I do believe that they will be the ones who will be making change in Medenine in the coming ten years, so investing in them is quite a great idea! for instance, I am going to make an Ideas Camp which is a big event and this event is funded by l’institut Français and supported by the incubator Labe’ess and, since we already have the Oci Lab incubator doing great job in Tunisia, I thought that they should be part of the Ideas Camp, through having sohayeb and Zmorda as trainers / supervisors, ( Ideas Camp is an event that will work on the tools of processing ideas and how to turn them into impactful actions, after this event, we will continue on working with the participants, whom will be divided into three groups, eachgroup will come up with a social idea after the camp, and work on it in the next three months, with the incubation of the space ! But since we already have OCI LAB, I believe it will be a great thing that they incubate these participants and include them in their program as well
so back to my question, What is next? my answer is that Ourghema will launch a fablab, and then launch an incubator, we will be incubating the young change makers of the south of Tunisia, in a continuing process, and through reaching a larger community, our first incubation experience will be in the coming months and I am excited about it!
@nadia, we have had a discussion in Washington one year ago, about linking different social spaces like ourghema in the MENA region and each space support the other, @alberto suggested something similar as well in the Hackathon, and @matthias suggested the same in this post ! can we go further with these suggestions?
Also, a great coinsidence, I met Mr. Mahmoud Mohieldin VP of the world bank for the 2030 development agenda, in the World Forum Convergences held in Paris, and both of him and his colleague were impressed by the work ourghema is doing and we are currently discussing if the IFC can help in anyway the space (I hope it will work!)
So many things are happening, and I wanted to see if Ourghema, and Edgeryders can go further together!
Yes I am interested. It depends on a few things though. The most important of which is a solid commitment of leadership on co-driving the effort which includes fundraising to cover everyone’s time and create opportunities for each individual who participates. As you see from that post and the discussions that followed, it is important that there is someone who commits to move things forward, repeatedly reaches out to people and draws focus and attention to moving something forward - basically not dropping the ball before the results are in. And this can take years. What this would mean in this context is for us to decide together, but for me this is the criteria that has to be in place. If you feel you want to do this, then yes you have my full support.
You are doing impressive work, and you are an impressive woman yourself. Hats off.
With an important caveat: you need to be super-careful not to overinvest, and at every step make sure that Ourghema stays a little profitable and (very important) debt-free, and you yourself do not burn out due to self-exploitation. I am counting on @Sohayeb , @zmorda and of course the rest of your family to keep an eye on you.
Which means you need a revenue stream…
Exactly like this. Realistically, membership payment for Ourghema is not likely to become a large revenue stream any time soon. Selling food a bit more so, but even then I suspect you will need to partner up with orgs that can access development money.
We can help you a bit here, especially @nadia. And, as I already told you and Zmorda and Sohayeb back in Tunis, you could also potentially help us. There are some clear synergies between a more global level, where we operate, and the local reality of southern Tunisia. But, as Nadia says,
Hello dear!
a year ago I didn’t feel that I am ready for such a responsibility, but now I feel I am ready and I want to proceed with this and with developing it, I am seeing a lot of potential and I don’t want to miss it, so if you and the Edgeryders team feel ready and want to proceed with this, then let’s start working on this
For the moment, Ourghema is still not making any profits, but its revenue stream is getting better, (the coffee shop, the memberships for our clubs…) so the fact that it is improving compared to last year, makes me a bit comfortable that this is working, and a year after a year is getting better…
Absolutely, it is what I am currently working on and collaborating with l’institut français is already a big achievement for the space, means that there could be more coming in the future, knowing that l’instiut français in Tunisia is considered as a valuable structure, so collaborating with me will position the space in even a better position
As I mentioned to Nadia, a year ago I didn’t feel I am ready to proceed with this idea, but now, I feel that we should proceed with it
@Yosser@matthias We have to rethink how it is possible to move Forward the digital Medenine project during the ideation camp. The high school students are the best fit to build up a core contributor team who with our support can do surprising achievements.
Well, we don’t have to do the Digital Medenine project I think for now it’s better that @yosser can focus on the new hackerspace etc. inside OurGhema. Following too many ideas at the same time is usually not a good idea itself … in my experience.
Digital Medenine seemed like a good idea, but I think right now is not the time for it. The time may come, though. For example, when doing grantwriting for OurGhema, it could be a good project proposal of something that can be organized around the OurGhema space.
Ok - so my proposal would be as follows; create a new post with some goals that you want to achieve for the next year and how much time you are willing/able to put into achieving them. Make them tangible and clear, ideally summarised in one sentence each. No more than three. Then we can take it from there.
