Amina, three years on.
In 2023 she cleaned offices. 2024: German B2, a mentor, a placement. 2025: a permanent contract on a ward. 2026: a language buddy at the speaking café. That is impact as we mean it: not teaching hours, but what people go on to do. We measure what can be measured and say plainly where we cannot.
Four years in Darmstadt
Januam grew out of a volunteer study group in 2022. What has been added since, in the order it happened.
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2022
Founded as a non-profit company
The first German courses and the speaking café start on Rheinstraße. Connect 4 Change links up local initiatives.
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2022–2023
First European project
Erasmus+ Media Mentoring trains young media mentors. STEM Mentoring pairs people with STEM degrees from abroad with professionals in the region.
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2023
Digital basic education becomes a focus
The computer basics course starts under the state WIR programme. Immune 2 Infodemic begins with CERV funding.
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2024
Accredited as an education provider
Januam is accredited under AZAV [verify: year]. Two new Erasmus+ partnerships: DigiBridge+ and DACH Discovery.
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2025
Two thousand graduates
Courses reach their 2,000th participant [verify]. Former participants now teach at the speaking café themselves.
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2026
Out into the city
A Digital Day on online safety, a team at the Merck corporate run, language meet-ups outside the classroom.
What we count
As of 2026. Updated once a year with the activity report.
What changes, for whom
A course is not the goal. It is the first link in a chain that takes years. This is how we think about impact, in three time horizons.
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0–12 months
Short term
What comes directly out of a course or a mentoring pair.
- One language level up, usually A1 to A2 or A2 to B1
- An email account of one’s own, a government portal, a completed online form
- First contacts outside one’s own community
- A checked message instead of a forwarded one
How we see it Placement tests at the start and end of every course, attendance rates, feedback forms.
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1–3 years
Medium term
What becomes possible once the foundations are there.
- A recognised qualification, or a recognition procedure under way
- A placement, an apprenticeship, a job in the profession one trained for
- Parents who understand their children’s school and take part in it
- Yesterday’s participants who are today’s mentors
How we see it Follow-up surveys six and eighteen months after a course ends [verify: in place?], feedback from mentoring pairs.
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3 years and beyond
Long term
What we work towards and can only partly evidence ourselves.
- Economic independence rather than reliance on benefits
- Taking part in clubs, parents’ councils, volunteering, elections
- A neighbourhood that spots disinformation before it spreads
- Partners who change what they offer because of what worked with us
How we see it Here we rely on third-party research and on the individual lives we were allowed to accompany. We do not have figures for this.
And what this has to do with the global goals
Our local work feeds into six of the seventeen UN Sustainable Development Goals.
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4
Quality Education
Education that does not sort people by origin or prior schooling.
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5
Gender Equality
Programmes that make re-entry possible for women.
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8
Decent Work and Economic Growth
Recognition and mentoring as the route into decent work.
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10
Reduced Inequalities
Less structural disadvantage for people with a migration background.
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16
Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions
Media literacy against disinformation.
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17
Partnerships for the Goals
Partnerships in Darmstadt and across Europe.
The numbers are in the report. The stories sit in the speaking café on Wednesdays.
Anyone who wants to check can come by. Anyone who wants to fund it: a mentoring pairing costs 500 euros for six months.