NCI/Metro Change Your Life Fund Winner Announced
Sep 08 2009
NCI and Metro have announced that Karl Kilmartin is the winner of the Change Your Life Education Fund. Entrants were asked to submit their personal stories and answer the question: Why do you want to change your life, and how could education help?
Karl was chosen from 7 finalists and will receive a life-changing prize that includes an educational fund worth €20,000 and €15,000 in other supports, such as mentoring, computer equipment and even a style package worth €1,000.
Karl’s personal journey is a real-life story of survival and success against the odds. Karl is a former drug addict who had his first drink at the tender age of 12, cannabis at 13 and heroin at 16. This led to trouble with the law and time behind bars. Determined to change his path in life, Karl applied to become part was of the first Trasna Programme set up by Paul Mooney, founder of Jobcare. Trasna is a programme designed for ex-offenders to provide them with the meaningful work experience, training and individualized coaching needed to forge a new path for themselves and their families within their communities. Karl is passionate about getting ahead and he believes that an education is the only thing now missing from his life. His goal is to use his education to work with children as young as he was when he started getting into trouble, to show them that there is another way to live and to help them to find a better path in life.
Paul Mooney came up with the idea for the Trasna Programme through his work with Jobcare, an organisation that helps the long-term unemployed find their way back to the workforce. He was awarded a Social Entrepreneurs Ireland Level 2 Award in 2007 to help set up and run the Trasna Programme. As well as providing training, mentoring and employment, in its first year, the programme saved the state over €990,000 in prison costs alone. For more information on Paul’s Social Entrepreneurs Ireland Award click here. For information on Jobcare, click here.
