In keeping with its commitment to empower the youth of this country through education, the Youth Excellence League (YEL), an initiative of The BEIGE Foundation, has identified and honoured 90 more students from 17 selected schools comprising Senior High, Junior High, Technical/Vocational schools, among others.

These students were selected from the Ashanti, Western, Brong Ahafo and the Northern regions of Ghana. YEL aims at extending its coverage to the rest of the country. The selection of talents began with the Southern sector of the country.

The selection of these talents was done by the management/heads of the schools using three main means: students that were brilliant but needy, students that exhibited leadership potential and proactiveness on the part of the talents/students.

The YEL project is an initiative of The BEIGE Foundation and it seeks to recognise and honour exceptional youth talents, particularly in the areas of academia: basic, secondary and tertiary levels of education. At the launch of YEL last year, Mike Nyinaku, the CEO of The BEIGE Group committed an amount of GHC2 million to support YEL for the year 2017.

Beneficiaries, apart from receiving financial rewards, will be trained and honed as part of a skills development programme run by BEIGE Academy, the talent development arm of The BEIGE Group.

Commenting on the rationale for this exercise, the Programmes Officer for the BEIGE Foundation, Ms Anne-Marie Blackmore, said, “the BEIGE Foundation through YEL, seeks to recognise and award exceptional youth talents. Again, this gesture is to train, support and promote youth excellence in the country. Our agenda is to identify and support 1,000 students by the end of 2017.”

She added, “It is our belief that persons who perform remarkably in academics or whose overall achievements are outstanding are worthy of celebration. It is for this reason that the project awards their excellence.”

Among the schools from which the students were selected are Prempeh College, St. Louis, Opoku Ware, Ghana-China Friendship School, Sekondi College, Takoradi Technical University, Techiman Senior High School, Bole Methodist Senior High School, Mpohor S.D.A Basic School, St. Dominic R/C Basic School.