Digital communities for social change
RNW Media and RNTC partnered with the Swedish Postcode Foundation to strengthen the capacity of young change makers to build inclusive digital communities for young people in the Middle East, Africa and China. The project started on August 1st 2019 and ends on July 31st 2021, and was funded by the Swedish Postcode Lottery Foundation.
Building digital communities for social change
How-to Roadmap
Together with young change makers, a toolkit in the format of a ‘roadmap’ was created which functions as a clear and visual manual, covering how to build inclusive digital communities and engage with young people in restrictive settings.
This roadmap includes various topics based on the needs of young change makers such as how to stimulate online engagement, how to moderate discussions to stimulate social cohesion and how to collect data for advocacy in an ethical way.
The roadmap to build digital communities was co-developed with teams of young change makers and ultimately served to train them in strengthening their already existing digital communities and depth of engagement.
Training of Trainers (ToT)
We implemented a Training of Trainers (ToT) approach to ensure the sustainability of the project. RNTC Media Training Centre developed a ToT curriculum, based on the same roadmap, which was also translated into Arabic and French and made available in all 3 languages.
In this ToT model we aimed to build a pool of engaged young change makers who are able to teach the steps within the roadmap. We view it is crucial to put the young changemakers in the driving seat and give them the ownership to train others.
The roadmap and ToT curriculum provide young change makers the opportunity to learn from each other’s experiences and strengthen their network.
Outcomes
A total of 120 young change makers were trained on the roadmap from 7 different countries: Libya, Yemen, Egypt, Burundi, DRC, Mali, and China. Also, learnings on monitoring & evaluation (M&E), communications, human resources and business development were shared with the young change makers.
Furthermore, the lessons learned and summary of the roadmap were made available to various CSOs who are working on human rights, including freedom of expression of young people - such as ForumCIV which is a network organisation for Swedish CSOs - so that they also can benefit from our expertise and outcomes of this project.
We at RNW Media and RNTC believe that in building alternative civic spaces for young people, we can enable them to access reliable information, form and express opinions, and engage with decision-makers. Ultimately, empowering them to shape societies which respond to their needs.