Youth With A Mission

We are building a platform and a network organization to support the Converge platform to connect interns from anywhere to missional organizations everywhere. Here's how:

1. We are pre-qualifying and registering internship hosts.
2. We are translating the Converge platform and online course to multiple languages, beginning with Spanish and Korean.
3. We are providing low-cost global internships for women and minority students. (We charge a one-time $25 fee. Most internships are less than $200USD/week for room and board. And 95.5% of student scholarship donations go to the student project and expenses.)
4. We are producing the Converge Stories podcast, weekly conversations with internship hosts, former interns, and mentors.
5. We are recruiting three types of network staff, all of whom serve in a particular sphere of influence, such as the arts, business, education, media, medicine, etc. We are recruiting senior staff as Managing Partners; Network Circle Staff to serve with those partners; and Converge Support Staff who work with software development, communications, and administration.
6. We are completing a thorough back-end software development and review to prepare to scale the Converge program.

To accomplish our goals, we seek donors to help sustain the development and operations of the Converge platform so young people can join Xian, an engineering student from Singapore and founder of Dlight.com, who served in East Timor in saying, “That internship left an indelible mark on me."

Please consider becoming a sustaining member of Converge through a pledged recurring contribution. With your help, the Converge platform and network organization will be able to support the mobilization hundreds of students annually.

Thank You!

Our Vision: Making a Difference in Your World.

Our Mission: Connecting Interns to Missional Organizations.

Converge helps missional organizations to quickly and easily design their own internship program. We pre-qualified interns, especially women and minorities, to these global internship opportunities.

1. A missional organization appoints a host to use our online “Create an Internship" form to quickly and easily design a customized internship program.

2. The Host shares the Internship Profile Page from the Converge platform.

3. Students search the Converge site and apply for opportunities that relate to their passions and career goals, such as pure water, poverty, and women & children at risk.

3. Donors designate their contributions to scholarship students through the interns' personal profile pages.

4. Students choose a Mentor with cross-cultural and career experience from their own community.

5. Students connect in the Converge Online Course.

6. Hosts provide orientation, set the schedule, and oversee student interns, especially with a weekly one-on-one meeting.

7. Students serve the host's organization and consider a unique project to be completed before the end of the internship session.

***The big question for Converge interns, "What can I do here, with my time, skills, and resources, to make a difference?"***

Here’s what our interns have done for projects: created curricula for schools; planted churches; started businesses; worked in medical & dental clinics in slums; set up pharmacies for community health development teams; researched childhood disabilities in tribal areas; cared for refugees in the Middle East; conducted HIV/AIDS prevention campaign in Africa; established HIV/AIDS counseling center; installed water pumps and storage tanks; established therapy routines in orphanages; conducted forgiveness education workshops for making peace in the Middle East; developed nutritional plans in hospices; and more…

8. The Student proposes a unique project and the Host and Student Intern agree on what will be the Final Converge Project assignment.

9. The Student completes the Project and submits it in writing or another appropriate form (video, blog, photo journal, etc.) which may be turned in to their college or university for academic credit. Copies of the final project report are provided to the host and the Converge office.

We released the Minimum Viable Product of ywamconverge.org. The following is a summary of the development phases and accomplished activities:

1. Created and tested the viability of the project through a prototype integrating Salesforce with a Wordpress site. Signed up 20 example host projects.

2. Redesigned curriculum and placed the five-phase course (including first phase pre-departure orientation with 10 lessons and 50 short videos) on the new Coursesites by Blackboard. Currently moving entire course and new content to a new mobile-friendly platform.

3. Performed a high-level re-examination of all system needs based on user stories. Each User has expectations, thoughts, and feelings, related to their involvement with Converge. Opportunities were programmed into the site and back-end workflow.

4. Assembled tech resources and needs, including personnel and funding. Received over $30,000 grants to hire software developers.

5. Continued Tech development. Secured office space and additional volunteers.

6. Tested Course site curriculum, including Mentor interaction, with a pilot group in South Jersey. Decided Mentors should be chosen by the student from their own community.

7. Tested name for platform (changed from IPO Connection to Converge). Hosted our first annual fundraising banquet.

8. Hired marketing consultants and worked closely in the development of a strategy. Created a distinct brand identity to maximize our impact on students, constituents, and internal stakeholders. Streamlined student profile and fundraising capabilities, built a lead-generation funnel, completed approval systems, developed follow up an email system to sustain the community. Raised an additional $7,000 through personal appeals.

9. Several software upgrades necessitated a migration to a new server and a new round of programming with a new group of volunteers. That migration is nearly complete. We deployed the new server at AWS late March 2019.

10. Introduced Converge Stories podcast to serve hosts with an additional marketing vehicle for their internship opportunity. We also interview former interns to inspire students and others with the life-changing experiences of our interns. We have published 45 episodes available on Apple iTunes, Stitcher, and Spotify. Currently preparing for Season Two.

We will refine the program and scale to a much larger audience.