Muhamad Iman Usman

Muhamad Iman Usman (Iman) was born on 21st of December 1991 in Padang, Indonesia. His interest and passion to empower and struggle for children brought him to join and develop numerous activism led by kids. He has been an active volunteer and community member since he was ten years old. At that time, he established a free course and library for children in his neighborhood. When he was 14, he founded and developed an online shop for Harry Potter marchandise and led numerous events in various subjects in his town. His involvement in child rights area became more intensive as he elected as General Secretary for West Sumatera Children Forum – a children led organization that struggling and promoting for child rights in West Sumatera, Indonesia –, and founded a youth led community, Komunitas Anak Kritis Indonesia in 2007. In 2009, he founded Indonesian Future Leaders, a youth led non profit organization that aims to empower young people to be able to bring constructive changes and be solution for social problems. In Indonesian Future Leaders, he led numerous programs in community service, capacity building, as well advocacy to government for issues related to young people. Today, Indonesian Future Leaders already have more than 400 active volunteers that spread around the country (by September 2010). He has been experienced to represent Indonesia in various international conferences, symposiums, training, and forum, including joining G20 Summit 2010 in Toronto, Canada; Mondialogo World School Contest – a largest world collaborative project competition for students – in China as he elected as world finalist among 2200 projects entries worldwide; AFS-JENESYS Exchange Student Program to Japan in 2007, and more. These experiences led his passion to promote intercultural dialogue and collaboration in Indonesia and the world. For his activism and efforts to uphold children’s rights and promote intercultural dialogue both in Indonesia and overseas, he has achieved numerous honours. In 2008, he was named an Indonesian Young Leader 2008 by the President of the Republic of Indonesia and a Mondialogo Junior Ambassador for intercultural dialogue by Daimler and UNESCO. In 2009, he was one of ten youth worldwide to receive a Youth Achiever Recognition Award and was elected by the UN Population Fund Indonesia as one of the youngest participants on its Youth Advisory Panel. In last August, he was chosen to receive Be The Change Scholarship with other four volunteers worldwide