Dream Catchers Academy
Seyi Oluyole grew up in the slums of Lagos, Nigeria. Despite poverty, occasional homelessness, and abuse, she developed a special love for dance and film production and began to write her own music. By the age of twelve, Seyi knew she wanted to be an artist, understanding the unique influence that those in the arts can have on their communities. Although she was unable to become a professional dancer herself, she believed she could create opportunities for other young girls struggling in poverty who dream of a life in the arts. So, in 2014, at age twenty-four, she founded the Dream Catchers Academy.
Dream Catchers Academy focuses primarily on impoverished girls living in slum environments, where they must deal not only with poverty and trauma but are targets of gender-based violence and forced child marriage. Every year, Seyi and her team go into the most hopeless and marginalized communities to select young girls and give them a chance at a sustainable and exciting future. The girls are given a safe place to live, three meals a day, psychological counseling, an academic education, and training in the performing arts. The goal of Dream Catchers Academy is to help the girls find healing, develop resilience, and gain skills to allow them to become financially independent adults.
Most of all, Seyi wants their lives to be filled with joy and confidence. This certainly comes through in every dance video Dream Catchers produces:
Dream Catchers:
- BELIEVES in the validity of the dreams of the girl child; every child deserves an opportunity to succeed irrespective of their gender or background.
- CHANGES the life of despondent/orphaned girls by bringing hope through education and the arts; thereby changing the path of their future and that of the world.
- HAS CONFIDENCE in the talents and future of girls. If you educate a girl; you educate a generation.
One of the many reasons we at Global Pearls love this partner and project is their focus on teaching the girls to pay-it-forward. They not only encourage the girls to be the change they want to see in the world, but they also give the girls opportunities to serve others. For example, the girls share clothes, food, and gifts with children in multiple slums each Christmas, they help children at other schools with their studies and teach them how to dance, and they help educate the community on environmental sanitation issues and the dangers of Female Genital Mutilation. Dream Catchers Academy is developing future changemakers!
