CALL TO ACTION: Thanks to donors like you, Istanbul&I survived the COVID-19 pandemic and continues to make an enormous impact on the lives of young people, refugees, and migrants. Now, we are launching the Youth4Youth Mentorship Program. This program will provide services to refugees between the ages of 18-25 and help them build their academic and professional careers, as well as English and Turkish language skills. We need your help!

Istanbul&I

Istanbul&I is the only NGO of its kind in Istanbul, Turkey. Made up of volunteers from over 50 countries, Istanbul&I is an international, youth-led NGO that dedicates itself to volunteer work and social inclusion.

Since 2016, hundreds of volunteers from diverse identities have walked through our doors. In 2021, we welcomed 134 new volunteers. Our organization is open to everyone and is a safe space for people from marginalized identities.

Our youth volunteers take on leadership roles that allow them to enhance their skills while bettering their community. 

Youth4Youth Mentorship Program

In March, we will launch the Youth4Youth Mentorship Program. Working with refugees between the ages of 18-25, our volunteers will create a safe, inclusive community for them to ease integration into Turkish society.

Our volunteers will serve as mentors that provide them with services designed to build their academic and professional careers. 

The program will offer the following services:

• Turkish and English Language Sessions: language teaching sessions thematically organized based on real-life necessities such as taking a bus or shopping for food, as well as one-to-one tutoring sessions.
• Resumed Education Assistance and Collaborative Help (REACH): workshops designed to help mentees access higher education in Turkey, covering the topics of university applications, financial aid, scholarships, and academic tools and assistance.
• Women’s Entrepreneurship Education: workshops that teach women about entrepreneurship in stages and build skills needed to launch small-scale business ventures, with small grants available to allow women turn their ideas into reality.
• Skill-Based Mentorship: mentor-mentee matches will be made between Istanbul&I volunteers and program beneficiaries to help them build skills and learn about topics from coding to research to photography.

We will provide the materials needed to participate in the program, including school supplies, books, and metro cards.

Volunteer Projects

Our volunteers design social impact projects to help disadvantaged and displaced people. Every month, our volunteers:

• Help around 30 refugee children with their homework in Turkish, their non-native language
• Teach English and Turkish to around 140 language learners
• Collect second-hand donations and redistribute them to people in need

We also collaborate with other NGOs and send our volunteers to assist them. Every week, our volunteers:

• Clean up an animal shelter’s facilities and take care of the animals
• Prepare meals for homeless people in Istanbul’s low-income districts

Every year, we run our Iftar&Community project during the month of Ramadan and provide iftar meals for disadvantaged people. In 2021, we supported 264 individuals from 52 displaced families. We provided each family with a night of freshly prepared iftar meals, a 200 TL gift card to a local supermarket, and a 100 TL gift card to a clothing store for Eid gifts. 

Social Inclusion Events

We host social inclusion events designed to educate and inspire, bringing locals and foreigners together in our social impact space to learn and grow side-by-side.

Every month, our volunteers regularly plan and host our four flagship events:

• Culture Nights - celebratory nights where we share knowledge and food from our cultures
• ÇayTalks - cross-cultural, philosophical discussions over tea moderated by our volunteers
• TALKs - public lectures on inspiring topics given by professionals from various sectors
• Workshops - skill-building workshops designed to empower the youth

Please Donate

Your donation will allow us to make a difference in the lives of vulnerable youth.

To lift this program off its feet, we need your help. As an NGO that is funded solely by donations, we will first launch a pilot version of the program for 30 beneficiaries. After that, we will find sponsors, allowing us to support more beneficiaries. 

Please take a look at our budget: