We have some exciting news to share! Shamiri Institute, with its mission to enable young people worldwide to realize their life potential, has received a €1.5m funding boost from the Fund in Innovation for Development (FID). Since our inception in 2018, we have been committed to providing youth with access to affordable and suitable mental health and wellness services.
This generous funding from FID means we can now put our scale-up strategies to the test and conduct a comprehensive impact evaluation of our work with 25,000 young people in Kenya.
The Challenge We're Addressing
Mental health issues pose a significant barrier to young people globally in fulfilling their potential. In Kenya, where our work is primarily based, 50% of the population is aged 19 or younger. Alarmingly, almost half of Kenyan youths report elevated symptoms of depression and anxiety. These mental health issues can lead to medical, educational, economic, legal, and interpersonal problems.
Unfortunately, systemic and structural barriers often make help inaccessible for young people grappling with mental health problems.
Our Solution: Anansi
In response to these challenges, we've developed Anansi, an effective mental health solution that contains two key components:
- An evidence-based mental health intervention.
- A tiered caregiving model that connects lay-providers, trained clinical supervisors, and clinical psychologists and psychiatrists.
The Anansi solution has undergone rigorous testing, including an RCT published in JAMA Psychiatry, showing significant reductions in mental health problems and improvements in social relationships and academic performance.
Our Journey Towards Scaling Up
Over the next five years, our goal at Shamiri is to scale up our reach to 1 million youths. With this new funding, we will be able to test two different models of scaling up our work and conduct an extensive impact assessment. This funding complements financing from other organizations like the Templeton World Charity Foundation, Wellspring Philanthropic Fund, and Agency Fund.
About FID
FID is committed to supporting innovation in the fight against poverty and inequality. They enable innovators across various organizations to test new ideas, experiment with proven scientific evaluation approaches, and scale up the most effective solutions for lasting impact.
About Us: Shamiri Institute
At Shamiri Institute, we're dedicated to developing and implementing scalable solutions that empower young people to thrive and realize their life potential. We combine rigorous social science research with in-depth understanding of the educational and mental healthcare systems of the communities we work in, to develop and scale effective and holistic interventions that allow young people, and communities, to flourish.
