The Education Development Centre, Inc. (EDC), an international NGO based in the US, will soon introduce mobile libraries to simplify easy access to text books in Rwanda. The five-year project will be implemented in collaboration with the Peace Corps, a US volunteer service organization, and funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) at a cost of $20 million.

For two decades, Mali has enjoyed remarkable political stability characterized by four rounds of peaceful presidential and legislative elections and the proliferation of civil society organizations and private media outlets. In this sense, the country has been something of an anomaly in a sub-region where neighbors have been plagued by political repression and an absence of democratic freedoms.

Somali youth are learning from the USAID sponsored soap opera 'Dab iyo Dahab' that being good at math is not the same as knowing how to manage a household budget or run a business. In English, the title means 'Fire and Gold.'

Upon visiting two EDC projects and another project for Somalis, the United States Agency for International Development's Deputy Assistant Administrator for Africa is "thrilled to see what USAID and the Somali people have achieved together".

Young women and men in Garowe, Somalia, are acquiring the skills to get jobs and "contribute to the well-being of the community". IRIN profiles one of EDC's many local partners in Shaqodoon, the Somalia Youth Livelihood Program.

Last summer, in Hargeisa, Somaliland, Ahmed Mohamed Abdullah, 22, received a life-changing note—by way of a text message. A local government internship was available, read the young man who’d never had a job. “I went straight to the nearest Internet café and applied for the internship,” recalls Abdullah.