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By Callie Maidhof

Agroup of students from Sadat Academy for Management Sciences (SAMS) gathers to teach a small class in Manshiet Nasser, a district of Cairo better known for its population of trash collectors than its standard of education. A set of desks, pencils and notebooks greets their pupils, none of whom has never learned to read.

A charity project? Think again.

“The question was,” says Doaa Mohamed Samy, a graduating senior at Sadat Academy, “how do we make a business from this?”

Answering her own question, Samy continues, “We got machines that make copybooks — that punch all the holes and bind them. So [the students] made the copybooks first for themselves, and then sold the rest for a profit.”

Samy, who has since graduated, and her fellow students are members of Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE), an international non-profit organization that took root in Egypt in 2003-04. Promoting community service through the encouragement of free enterprise, SIFE now boasts student teams on more than 1,500 campuses worldwide.

The Manshiet Nasser literacy project is only one of several carried out by the Sadat Academy team, many based on proposals submitted to the SIFE team by would-be entrepreneurs. “We actually have many projects,” Samy explains. “Four national and three international. What we’re doing is tackling small business plans without funding, and we go to companies to see if we can help get them started. We’re always making sure, though, that in the end, they can be financially self-sufficient.

“We give them the push,” she says, “so that the owner can start his own life and make a living.”

Sound like your average 20-year-old?

The Sadat Academy students are not alone in their efforts. Last month, they were one of nine teams to participate in the third annual SIFE Egypt competition, which has quickly won broad support from the corporate world from sponsors including Mansour & Co., PricewaterhouseCoopers, HSBC, Americana Group, Radio Shack, the Canadian International Development Agency and the United States Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

SAMS tied for third place with the now-dethroned AUC team, which had won the previous two competitions.

First-time winner Misr International University (MIU) took home more than just a trophy: This September, MIU’s team will travel to Paris to take part in the mother of all SIFE events, the SIFE World Cup. The team’s bill will be footed by Coca-Cola.

With teams from nearly 50 countries, the SIFE World Cup marks the culmination of the students’ efforts.

“I went to the first SIFE World Cup in 2004, which was in Germany, and I was really surprised and amazed — it was a huge ceremony!” says Fatma Sirry, who is now SIFE Egypt’s country coordinator. “I thought it was a small organization, but it was really huge. And when I saw the projects, I was amazed by the students.”

Every year, the best of the best convene to compete and share ideas. At both the national and international competitions, judges from a range of fields are selected from the business and academic communities. The judges rank team projects according to SIFE’s six objectives: understanding of a market-based economy; “success skills” — building the skills necessary for success “in a dynamic, competitive global economy;” entrepreneurship; financial literacy; business ethics; and, finally, the sustainability of the project.

The application of these principles and the project’s impact in the community or communities determines a team’s score.

Successful teams present the judges with a range of projects playing to different aspects of SIFE’s objectives. MIU worked on six different projects this year, impacting more than 3,300 individuals in the Greater Cairo Area.

It hasn’t been an easy process: It has taken the MIU team three years to build their projects to this level. This year alone, the 50 students spent around 4,200 hours fundraising, teaching and otherwise running their projects. Even as the organization becomes well established on campus, misconceptions about the group still linger.

“People never understand that SIFE is not charity,” says SIFE MIU founding member and President Ibrahim Shawket, who graduated this past term. “People don’t understand how to help people without giving them money.”

It is this sentiment — that you can help people by teaching them how to survive in today’s free-market economy, rather than simply handing them what they need — that is one of the pillars of SIFE.

The lessons go both ways: Not only are these students making a difference in the community, but as they teach these principles, they are gaining skills that will help them to someday become effective leaders in their fields.

“The main objective of SIFE,” says Sirry, “is not community service, but to create a new generation of youth empowered with the skills needed in the global market.”

This is more than just a slogan. Members of the student teams speak effusively of how their participation with the organization has affected them personally.

“It taught me where exactly I stand and what I do,” says Raghda Mohsen, a first-year participant in the MIU program. “I never thought I could do a presentation like this one. It taught me my potential, it taught me my limitations.”

Marwa El-Kady, also of the MIU team, chimes in, “It shows us the real world we’re standing in, and how someone like me can work for the benefit of my country. It gave me success skills and gave me something to be proud of myself.”

The empowerment of these young leaders must start with the structure of the team itself, says Dr. Abdel Moneim El-Saied, the new faculty advisor for the Ain Shams University’s SIFE team, which placed second in the national competition. “Transformation of leadership is the way to go,” he says.

El-Saied learned of SIFE when he was living in the United States. Midway through the 2005-06 academic year, he returned to Egypt, hoping to start a team.

“To my surprise, it was already here, but they were in need of a new faculty advisor, so I took over the position, which meant I wasn’t able to start from scratch. I came on board with the existing board, the existing structure, and I completely restructured the whole thing. I wanted to give the students lots of flexibility. I capitalized on their strengths, killed the bureaucracy — I want to facilitate and break the red tape as much as I can.”

After making these changes, El-Saied stood back and watched the group work.

“The real success I feel now,” says Ain Shams Team President Nehal Gaber Omar, “is that we have leaders, that we are growing. I feel I have done something. I work all night, I work all day — 24 hours a day — but it helps me personally, too. It’s business, after all, and that’s what I study, business.”

Although she graduates this term, Omar hopes to continue to help her school’s team. With a diploma in hand and the lessons of SIFE under her belt, she has already developed a comprehensive business plan that builds on her experience with the start-up businesses she has helped to promote.

With the growing competition in the nation’s business community, it’s exactly the sort of experience that will make a difference.  bt