Global

It all started with the winners of the first Youth Challenge! The 5 winning teams announced last year generated huge waves of excitement, inspiration, and enthusiasm well beyond the 16 countries that initially participated in the Youth Challenge. Suddenly, not only did young people all over the world want the same immersive and fun experience,…, eBionics from North Macedonia, Driven by their desire to innovate and create affordable solutions for people with disabilities, team eBionics is expanding access to user-friendly prosthetic care services with their project Venus Arm. The Venus Arm is a 3D printed bionic arm for people with upper limb deficiency. Their vision is to create a user-generated sustainable and…, Meet Femme & Stem from Mexico, Meet team FEMME&STEM who believe that STEM subjects are for everyone. Knowing that in the next 30 years, most jobs will focus on this area, they set out to help young girls prepare for this and bridge the gender gap in STEM. This team created a personalized education platform, Erandi Aprende, designed to provide resources, tools and…, Meet Muallim from Thailand, Muallim is a team from southern Thailand envisioning a more peaceful world. Unfortunately, they grew up in a place of ongoing unrest which consequently lead to bullying becoming an issue in their community. They realized that children do not seem to know what bullying is and so, they developed a board game - DAWN - to raise awareness and develop…, Meet CreaDeaf from Syria, This team, most of whom are persons with disabilities, were motivated to create a solution that will support in advocating for more integration of persons with disabilities in Syria within the education system and labor market. This would help curb the multitude of challenges persons from this community face every day and empower this group of…, Meet The Green Project from Kenya, The Green Project is a social venture established to create employment for Kenyan youth and provide their communities with clean, affordable energy in the form of organic briquettes.  The team was concerned with the rise of unemployment rates in Kenya which has led to a rise in crime, especially within informal settlements, as young people have…, Meet Hydrolution from Nicaragua, Within the Central American Dry Corridor, unemployment rates have sky-rocketed and due to climate change and the tons of oild that end up in water sources, there is a lack of water fit for human consumption. To address these issues, this team of young entrepreneurs collect and recycle used oil and transform it into artisanal soap that can be used…, Meet Team Muda from Nigeria, Team Muda are concerned with the staggering number of Nigerian youth not in school despite primary education being free and compulsory. To bridge this gap, this team developed Street2school, a blended online-offline community learning hub that empowers adolescents who are not in school to learn basic foundational and soft skills.  Their vision is…, And finally, last but certainly not least, meet Education on Air from India, This team identified a crucial problem students are facing especially since the onset of the pandemic. This problem is the lack of access to technology to facilitate online learning, especially for disadvantaged children in rural areas where poverty and connectivity hinder access to quality education.  To solve this, Education on air developed an…

A portrait of Vibhu Sharma When I think of the expanding technological innovations around the world, I am reminded of the extemporary question I was asked in middle school, “Is technology a Boon or a Curse to Humanity?” “A boon.” I had argued and grew up with that mindset. The reason for my answer was the digitalization that information and…

Generation Unlimited has reached more than 100 million young people. Check out the progress GenU has achieved since its launch in this report. November 2020

A portrait of Rafik Amrani Generation Unlimited “With life shifting to online, our impact as grassroots changemakers has decreased due to the restricted reach. For this reason, the world needs to connect every young person. Let’s reimagine a holistic system to eradicate the youth digital divide.” —Rafik Amrani,  Algeria.   “In a time of crisis and…

In 2011 the UN General Assembly’s Human Rights Council noted that access to the internet is fundamental to the enjoyment of other human rights. The Report of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression was almost a foreshadowing of the state of the world right now as a result Covid-19.…

Globally 1.5 billion students have been affected by Covid-19 due to the closure of schools.  In Ghana 9.2 million basic school students have been affected (kindergarten, primary and junior) and 0.5 million tertiary students according to UNESCO. The onset of Covid-19 also known as the global pandemic has had impeccable effects on the world. From…

Digital literacy has always been on our agenda. "The future is digital" is something we believed in. The problem lies in the fact that skills and training are not enough as the bottleneck is the affordability of tech products. A textbook being shared among at least 4 students is not an uncommon phenomenon in Africa for example. With this in mind,…

A group of young people lined up in working vests to volunteer In Jordan, youth volunteers play a key role in COVID-19 response The continued spread of the novel coronavirus across the globe has underscored the importance of engaging local actors in communities, who are critical in responding to the current emergency and to reimagining and…

How can we create more inclusive economies and societies? One place to start is by bridging the digital divide among young people. See how we’re addressing this issue in collaboration with PwC and UNICEF  in our report Stepping forward: Connecting today’s youth to the digital future.   November 2020

I am Rafik Amrani, a 20-year-old Algerian change-maker seeking a bachelor’s in business administration at the American University of Beirut with a minor in Computer Science. My vision is to modernize the Algerian educational system by changing what and how students are being taught. To understand better the challenges presented at hand in times of…

For years, young people in Nigeria and Africa at large lacked the opportunity to lend their voices towards the socio-economic and political climate of their countries leaving them unmotivated and disheartened. That is, until Adebola Williams took the initiative to change this and developed a platform that empowers young people and drives the youth…

Two teams, Team Alpha and Team Muda have emerged winners of the Generation Unlimited Youth Challenge in Nigeria after a very competitive judging process by a panel of judges drawn from the private, public and civil society sectors. Both teams will represent Nigeria in the global judging competition. They will compete with 72 other teams from 36…