Teens focus on rehabilitating former Ugandan child soldiers

Tyler Crouch (Canyon Crest Academy) and Reid Hollen (Torrey Pines High School) will take over the ambitious task of running Xslaves.org, a San Diego-based nonprofit organization that engages high school students in assisting former child soldiers in Uganda.

Reid Hollen, 16; Paige Hollen, 18; and Tyler Crouch, 17.

Local resident and Xslaves founder Paige Hollen, a Torrey Pines alumnus, has handed her everyday duties to the next generation. Hollen, who is a freshman at Stanford University, will keep an active advisory position in the organization.

Xslaves.org is a student-founded and student-led nonprofit organization with the immediate focus on educational, vocational training, microcredit, and other sustainable assistance programs in Africa, while engaging high school students in the management and operations of non-profit organizations. Tyler Crouch and Reid Hollen have taken the initiative and started their own Xslaves.org chapters at Canyon Crest Academy and Torrey Pines High School.

“We are living in a pretty protected environment. It was time to look beyond our horizon and try to make an impact on the welfare of kids displaced by war and disease within Africa,” said Crouch. Reid Hollen commented on the second mission of the organization, “We hope to bring awareness of the fundamentals of non-profit organizations to high school students, and we’ve set the mission of setting up the Xslaves organization in at least five to 10 new schools each year for the next five years.”

Related Links: SDNN’s The Good Squad | Nonprofit gives kids cycling and life lessons

Last year the funds raised by Xslaves.org went to support a catering and baking vocational program through its local partner Friends of Orphans in Northern Uganda. Friends of Orphans is a nonprofit organization focused on rehabilitating, reintegrating, and empowering former child soldiers, abductees, child mothers, orphans, and others who have been impacted by conflict and by HIV/AIDS in Northern Uganda. The catering and baking program provided 9 months of vocational training to 30 students as well as start-up capital for the students to create their own businesses.

Xslaves.org encourages others teens to start their own Xslaves.org chapter in their school and take ownership of a meaningful cause. For more information please contact: info@xslaves.org.

Xslaves.org was founded in 2007 by Paige Hollen, an alumnus of Torrey Pines High School, in Del Mar, Calif. The all-volunteer team is comprised of students and other individuals throughout the world who are passionate about our cause and eager to make a difference in the world. The Advisory Board is comprised of business leaders across a broad range of industries: Marlene Berne (president, Berne Advisors Ltd.), Michael Brown (ex- CEO/chairman of Quantum Corp. and current board member of five companies), Taylor J. Crouch (CEO, eStudySite), Dan Lilly (president, Two Tree International), Jim Hollen (president, RICH LTD.), Ken Hollen (president, Birch Street Partners), Scott Nyquist (director, McKinsey & Company, Inc.), and Peter Yozzo (president and CEO, ThinkHR).

Tags: Paige Hollen Xslaves, Reid Hollen Xslaves, SDNN, Tyler Crouch Xslaves, Uganda child slaves, Xslaves.org

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