The mission of The AjA Project is to empower refugee and underprivileged youth through educational programs and to help them create better opportunities for their future. We fulfill our mission by fostering a sense of belonging and self-worth in refugee youth. The AjA Project provides innovative media arts and photography-based educational programs that empower youth to explore identity and develop communication and leadership skills, for the purpose of fostering self-sufficiency, both for the individual and their community.
The AjA Project has an international focus and operates three programs: Disparando Cámaras para la Paz (Shooting Cameras for Peace), involving internally displaced youth in Colombia; Record of Truth, involving refugee children on the Thailand/Burma border; and Journey, a local initiative in San Diego.
The AjA Project also administers a traveling multimedia exhibit of students’ works – “Lives in Transition: Expressions of Refugee Youth.” The AjA Project’s newest initiative is “Documentary Interchange”- in which AjA students from all three sites are paired up as pen pals and share their lives with each other through the exchange of letters and photographs.