CONTENTS: Introduction About Vision History Key Takeaways The Team -
Board of Directors The Operations Team The Counseling Team The Communications Team The Development & Marketing Team The Design Team The Finance & Partnerships Team
Your Commitment - Next Steps
Initiatives Contact Disclaimer
- End Of The Bargain
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Dear PossPak Volunteer, First thing’s first: let us clear some misconceptions. We are no Skull and Bones. We don’t offer fat pay-checks. There’s no LEGO at our headquarters that you can play with in times of stress. Sadly, we don’t give out stuffed toys as well. It sounds all too depressing. We know. What we’re offering though, is to be part of a community unlike any other. Not your usual let’s-network-and-be-off-to-work community; but one where you get to interact and help (even ask for help from) brilliant individuals from all five continents. And to that point, if you have any recruits in mind that can help the number reach seven, we’re all ears. What do an actuary, editor, engineer, game developer, lawyer, teacher, Fulbright scholar and graduate from Harvard have in common? Apart from the fact that they’re all human (we promise they are!) these wondrous humans have dedicated their time to Possibilities Pakistan, because they know that nothing can replace the feeling of doing good to bring a positive effect in student’s lives. Over the years, we’ve realized the rewards of being part of this brilliant community far outweigh the tediousness of a certain task. We’re driven to actualizing our vision: providing free, personalized college counselling to students from all over Pakistan. How?
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We’re glad you asked. This is where you come in. You, dear team member, get to be a part of the ‘solution’: a team of dedicated students and professionals alike who are committed to changing lives for the better. Remember that feeling of being lost during one point or another of your admission process? As a team, we’re here to make sure no Pakistani student feels that way again. A wise man once remarked that the greatest thing since sliced bread is Possibilities Pakistan. We like to think that’s true. And we think you do too. So welcome to the family. We hope you’re here to stay. The Possibilities Pakistan Team
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About. Possibilities Pakistan is a network of students and professionals spread across the world. With guidance counselors in 300 Universities all over the globe and professionals across a wide range of industries, we connect students, aspiring to go abroad, with these people who have been through the process of applying and studying abroad. We help students with their applications to their University choices and our services are completely free of cost. When current Pakistani high school students have questions about applying to colleges or Universities abroad, they simply e-mail our organization Their queries are forwarded to appropriate members of our team who have faced similar problems before and the students, then, receive a personalized response. To date, we have successfully guided over one hundred Pakistani students to universities like London School of Economics, McGill University, Mt. Holyoke College, Umea University, Australian National University, and Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar, to name a few. Our large network of guidance counselors ensures that a prospective university applicant can access multiple viewpoints to a question allowing him/her to reach an informed decision. We are also more efficient than traditional counseling, since we provide our guidance counselors the opportunity to contribute to the educational sector in Pakistan without demanding any large commitments. By guiding students who have no other access to counseling to well-selected
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Universities, we hope to promote educational opportunity in Pakistan, and to ensure that students are never denied their right to learn.
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Vision. Our team is nothing short of ambitious, coming up with new ways to keep students involved and ensuring they get the very best in the education guidance sector. To this end our strategy team has made a twofold action plan: 1. Create a mentorship platform to directly connect each high school student with an appropriate mentor to guide them throughout the entire college application process from start to end. Basically, our counselor will fulfill the role of a regular college counselor electronically. There will be a monthly review from anonymous college counselors on each high school student’s application to ensure progress is being made 2. Partner with high schools and provide them with solution packages for their college counseling department. The goal is to work directly with high school counselors to provide them with the relevant resources and information to allow them to provide effective college counseling to their students. We are essentially helping high schools develop their college counseling departments for free! Our long term vision is to test the mentorship model as a pilot project in major metropolitan areas in Pakistan, including but limited to Karachi, Lahore etc. If successful, scale project to other parts of Pakistan, and to other countries. Ultimately, we visualize Possibilities Pakistan as having established something of a LinkedIn for education: an effective social network for students. We intend
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on establishing a three tier model which will link a 1. High School/A or O level student to 2. University students who will in turn be linked to 3. Working Professionals. This will facilitate e-based college counseling between high school students and college students/professionals, and remove any middlemen. Here’s an example: 1. Ali is an A level student wanting to study Law at Cambridge. He will contact us on our online platform, which will put him in touch with 2. Hassan, who is a university student in his second year of Law at Cambridge. Hassan will help Ali. 3. Faraz , a working professional, is a Trainee Lawyer at a Law firm in London. When Hassan will want professional advice, our network will put him in touch with Faraz. Faraz will then help Hassan.
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History. Now in our fourth year, it astonishes us here at Possibilities Pakistan to see us progress from our conception as an idea to the 300 strong global volunteer organization we are now. Our pilot has shown us the value that free college counseling can add to students. These four years have seen us answer more than a 1000 queries for students and rack up a number of other significant achievements. - With our guidance, we have seen students being successfully placed in Universities around the world, like Cambridge , L.S.E, McGill University, Mount Holyoke college and UMEA to name just a few. - We have organized multiple college fairs at A – level schools in Pakistan to increase college counseling and have received wide coverage and tremendous student responses. - The Possibilities Pakistan Blog and Newsletter have been launched and not only act as indicators of our progress but also, with interviews of Admissions tutors and articles by current University students, serve as relevant sources of information. - And just last year, in what we like to think was in recognition of our efforts, we won the Dell Social Innovation Challenge People’s Choice Award, out of 1340 entries.
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Key Takeaways. 1. Free for everyone. 2. Leverage best counselors: those who were admitted abroad but not on the ground to provide in-person counseling. 3. Convenient; students can send us questions via e-mail, remaining anonymous if they want. 4. All counseling documented and tracked for future analysis since it’s done online. 5. Large groups of volunteers can provide multiple perspectives to a question and can answer college specific questions (e.g Why MIT? Harvard interview?) 6. More efficient than traditional counseling; tap into the network of Pakistani college students and alumni by offering them a chance to contribute without large commitments.
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The Team. Through Possibilities Pakistan, we aspire to direct students with limited educational resources, and equip them with the tools necessary to succeed in post-high school plans. To achieve this goal, we have put together a group of highly dedicated volunteers consisting of students, teachers, advisors and professionals who believe in our cause. Meet our functional core team!
Board of Directors:
The Board of Directors consists of 4 highly dedicated members of the team who have been with PossPak since its early formation. Focusing on the strategy and overseeing various initiatives of the year, they are responsible for keeping the organization up and running.
The Operations Team:
The Operations Team comprises of the team functional heads and the Executive Director. It is responsible for all administrative tasks of Possibilities Pakistan; to plan, manage and direct performance of the company improving efficiency and maintaining growth in accordance with the company’s strategic goals.
The Counseling Team:
The Counseling Team consists primarily of counseling representatives, (fondly called project managers) & curriculum developers. They are mainly responsible
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for checking and answering all emails that we receive and generate content related to various countries’ application processes tailored specifically to Pakistani students.
The Communications Team:
Consisting of Editors and Copywriters, the Communications Team is responsible for the quality and management of all written material presented on the Possibilities Pakistan Webpage and Blog.
The Development & Marketing Team:
The Marketing and PR team is responsible for developing and expanding the high school network in Pakistan. The Marketing/PR department seeks to engage these students, and develop a systematic high-school network to expand and secure our target market.
The Design Team:
The Design Team helps facilitate the branding of Possibilities Pakistan and lead various design projects including but not limited to web design, newsletters and blog layout, and other creative projects year round.
The Finance & Partnerships Team:
The Finance & Partnerships Team is responsible for soliciting sponsorship deals, and maximizing sponsorship revenue, as well as for managing the finances of Possibilities Pakistan.
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Your Commitment. The success of our initiatives is important to us. We hope that it is to you too and therefore before you agree to join our team please consider your availability carefully and make your commitment accordingly. We generally expect approximately 2 – 6 hours per week from our volunteers. You are expected to be present at any Skype meeting set by your team barring an emergency. Not informing us of potential problems with your task will cause problems or even an unfortunate revocation of our invitation - since we are committed to our organization. We ask that you regularly update your team lead. Effective communication is the key to your success and ours. Lastly, if you foresee that you are unable to give the time you have promised please inform us as soon as possible.
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Next Steps. Here are some things you need to do as soon as possible to finalize your selection 1. Attached are the guidelines of being a PossPak Volunteer. Please sign and send a copy to us for our records as soon as possible at
info@possibilitiespakistan.org
2. Fill out your details on the Core Team Contact Information Page: http://bit.ly/PossPakCoreTeamInfo
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Initiatives. Beyond our year round counseling services, PossPak also encourages its volunteers and team members to head independent projects that support our cause. To date, these have included: 1. 3 College Fairs organized by our on ground team 2. 150 page online magazine with the latest news and updates about applying abroad 3. The Editorial Board’s Blog for students 4. The PossPak Newsletter 5. The 1st Education Unconference, featuring workshop style talks by experts on best practices of applying abroad. You may find the details of these initiatives on our website www.possibilitiespakistan.org. As a volunteer we encourage you to make the most out of the time you give us. Beyond your tasks there are numerous ways you can get involved with our team. Here are a few: 1. Provide feedback. You have no idea how much we value your advice! 2. Join our strategy think-tank to help us:
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a. Design our mentorship platform, which we mentioned above in the ‘Vision’ section. b. Design our solutions package and resources for high school college counselors c. Create a strategy to engage high school students to partner with us. Remember, if you join as a core team member, you automatically opt-in to help out as a college counsellor unless of course you indicate otherwise. For more details regarding the points above, please contact us at info@possibilitiespakistan.org
Contact. If you have any questions, concerns or need assistance of any kind please contact us:
Amna Raja
Executive Director | Possibilities Pakistan M: +92-322-4-247-499 E: ceo@possibilitiespakistan.org W: www.possibilitiespakistan.org // www.facebook.com/posspak
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What you should know and agree to as a Possibilities Pakistan Volunteer. Oh, you lucky few, As Possibilities Pakistan volunteers, you have the opportunity to work towards a great cause with a diverse group of passionate individuals who are on a whole new level of insane. In fact, it just may be that they invented the thing, because you will find them working at all sorts of ungodly hours, often only surviving on cafeteria food, Fox's mints and the goodwill of their peers. They do not do this because they like to torture themselves, they do it because they believe in what they are doing, and they believe in the power of collective genius to turn things around. This is why working for Possibilities Pakistan is going to be an experience to remember. You seem to have the same kind of spirit, and this is why you have been called upon to be a part of it. So please check the ego at the door, read and agree to the following, sign over your freedom for the foreseeable future, and let’s begin.
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Your end of the bargain. By agreeing to work as an official Possibilities Pakistan volunteer, I agree to the following: 1. I will believe in the power of collective genius. I will learn and share and walk the talk with pride. 2. I am not the All-Knowing, and I don’t have the All-Seeing Eye. This is exactly why I will stay in touch with my team members at all. 3. I am going to do the assigned tasks better than expected; that’ll tell the team leads! 4. I am going to research Possibilities Pakistan like it’s going out of style, and know what I’m talking about when I open my mouth about all things PossPak. 5. I am going to exercise my right to be awesomely cool and show up for all meetings and tasks ten minutes before they are supposed to begin. 6. I will not quit, no matter what. Once I’m in, I’m in. There is no option of divorce in this relationship, unless something apocalyptic like a unicorn zombie takeover happens. Even then I will reconsider my decision to quit. 7. I will discuss any grievances in private with my team leader and try to resolve any issues with the kind of dignity that will set new standards of class. 8. If I can't be there for a meeting or a task, I will alert my team lead a day before so that the poor thing can arrange for something else. 9. I will maintain team spirit by being supportive, constructive and respectful
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of other's opinions. I will question things and give suggestions to make thing better, not to randomly rip them apart. 10. I will try my best to preserve our collective resources and make the most of what I have. 11. I will ensure that I help make the organization run as smoothly as possible. 12. If I misbehave or prove to be a bad influence on other team members, my team lead has the authority to report me to the Executive Director. 13. I will aim big, and dream bigger. I will not let pessimism take me over. I will defeat negativity with my optimism and with my genius. I'll give help and seek help without delay. 14. I will have so much fun, my friends and family members will volunteer next year just to see what I'm on. My name is ______________________________________, I'm ______ years young, and on _________________________ I have signed on to become an official Possibilities Pakistan Volunteer. I'll be working with the ___________________________ team.
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