Cape Town, South Africa - November 3rd - 14th, 2007

The YAP Mission

To provide a global and innovative learning experience for middle school students that foster hope, a heart of compassion, and life skills, which promotes a foundation for selfless service.

Our Vision

Samaritan's Feet's vision for the Youth Ambassador Program is to offer scholarships to middle school students that provide an opportunity to travel to impoverished areas of Africa or other continents. Our aim is to positively affect the students' perspective on life as they display selfless service through cultural, educational, sport, life-skills, and humanitarian activities; exchanging ideas and talents among diverse groups of people.

In 2007, six students from the Charlotte Mecklenburg School system participated in the program. Students had an opportunity to attend class with South African students. They visited shanty communities, the South African parliament, an AIDS orphanage, open markets, banks, and the apartheid museum. The students fed the homeless population and helped to distribute shoes to more than one thousand people.

Shoe of Hope Relief Distributions:

1. Cypress Elementary School - 400 Pairs of shoes
    

2. Crystalis Academy - 350 Pairs of shoes
    

3. Macassa Boys Home - 150 Pairs of shoes
    

4. Ottery Reformatory - 150 Pairs of shoe
    

We believe that YAP can ultimately change the course of a student's life as 21st Century learning skills are applied. With mentoring in place, the projected outcome is students who are now prepared to interact and meet the real world head-on in high school, college, and thereafter.