Dreaming with The Sanneh Foundation

Written by Dr. Jerry Stein

Learning Dreams is pleased to announce an innovative new partnership with The Sanneh Foundation, a St. Paul-based organization that empowers at-risk youth using individualized mentorship and life skills programs.

Established last fall, this exciting new partnership aims to leverage the power of dream making to improve the overall success of youth workers and young people in The Sanneh Foundation’s Dreamline program.

Tony Sanneh of The Sanneh Foundation

Established in 2003 by international soccer star Tony Sanneh, the Foundation has worked extensively with young people across the globe, using the game of soccer as a venue for fostering overall life success in their participants.

The Sanneh Foundation has expanded their mission to help struggling youth plan and engage in their future success — a mission that resonates closely with Learning Dreams own work.

Our partnership, split into two phases, focuses on strengthening The Sanneh Foundation’s Dreamline program, whose 25 school-based mentor-coaches support students in schools across the St. Paul and east metro area.

The first phase that began last fall involves supporting the dreams of Dreamline youth workers using Learning Dreams’ unique resource mapping and community-connection practices. With dreams ranging from writing to building a public music studio to opening a spiritual retreat center, the Dreamline youth workers have illustrated the power of Learning Dreams’ approach.

The second phase, now underway, will provide an opportunity for these same youth workers to support the learning dreams of their youth at their school sites – drawing from the flexible, supportive and engaging dream-making methods created by Learning Dreams.

Both The Sanneh Foundation and Learning Dreams hopes our partnership will help youth workers connect more meaningfully to young people while expanding their engagement to the wider learning ecosystem and thus to overall success in their lives.

“The partnership with Learning Dreams has been eye opening,” said Sanneh Foundation President and Executive Director Tony Sanneh. “For our staff to be able to empower youth, they must have their own goals. Together we are setting goals and taking steps toward (them), so we are doing what excites us most.

Support for the effort comes from Youthprise and The Pat & Shirley Campbell Foundation.