Destination Digital Design

The Guyana Animation Network Inc.’s Destination Digital Design provides a virtual solution for future innovators, entrepreneurs, creators and students of all ages by giving them the digital and design skills needed to help them navigate the present and digital future. With a small team of young women leaders and creative professionals, we have developed bite-sized curricula for several pertinent digital skills for business marketing, app design and 2D animation. Being creatively inspired may seem difficult, stressful or challenging during these unprecedented times but we have develop our bite-sized curricula for parents and adults displaced from their jobs, children and youth stuck at home, and small businesses forced to transition to online sales and marketing. The digital future is already here and we’ve tailored our training with the future of the world in mind: little to no digital skills required as we equip you to find or create digital job opportunities. 

We are trying to solve the problem of accessibility and availability of digital and creative skills training and career opportunities for children and youth in Guyana, South America and the Caribbean.  Early exposure to technology for creative skills development is not a reality in the education systems of our country and region, where hundreds of thousands of children and youth lack the digital skills, opportunities and visibility to develop digital solutions from a young age as compared to the average  middle school student in the U.S and Europe in coding, design, animation and other digital and creative subjects.

With a population of over 700,000 people, Guyana’s  education system is largely traditional: with chalk/marker and board-styled teaching; little to no usage of technology and innovative learning styles in the classroom; creative and digital skills are viewed as hobbies rather than career aspirations; and children and youth are not allowed to experiment or be inventive through technology. 

This problem is found in other parts of the world where cultures, communities and countries of 170+ million children and youth are not equipped with digital skills to contribute to the global digital economy due to transformations needed within their local education and employment systems.

Our solution is the equipping of children and youth with the digital and creative skills that they need to create their own opportunities or become employable in the digital economy. We provide training through annual digital summer camps and training platforms.  Our training comprises of a bite-sized curriculum per course for the diverse digital courses offered. Each course consists of live, virtual or pre-recorded skills training  facilitated by a trainer(s), along with resources and objectives that can be learnt, utilized and achieved, respectively, within 20 hours or over a 5-day period with 1-hour minimum time. Each course has recommended ages based on children as young as 5. 

Our solution is made possible through collaborations with local, regional and international creative professionals and freelancers who work with us to develop curricula and/or facilitate training. Our solution is backed by research and analysis of relevant digital skills, trends, impact, ease of access to required software, ease of learning, scope of further learning and development opportunities and importance of need and applicability to navigating the present and digital future.

Our target population are children and youth as young as 5, in Guyana, South America and the Caribbean. These are children and youth who have a passion for creativity and innovation but lack a community and formalized system to help them to hone their skills and find learning and employment opportunities. With the help of parents and teachers, we have been able to find children and youth who fit our target audience. With the help of local and regional bodies and organizations, we have been able to find children and youth who fit our target audience but who live in underserved communities or children’s homes/orphanages. Through online forms and direct contact, we have been able to understand the needs of our target audience and develop our solution further to include nuances. 

Our solution will address their needs by:

- shifting learning and career perceptions locally and regionally. 

- equipping them with the skills needed or enhancing skills previously learnt informally. 

- creating a community to boost their confidence in their skills through sharing their work with others and connecting them to greater opportunities based on their skills and specific interests.

Children are the future, and youth and young adults are the present of the job sector. The digital gap founded on inaccessibility and unavailability is digital and creative skills training and career opportunities by 170+ million children and youth in the world mean that 170+ million families of the world are missing present and future opportunities in the job market because they do not possess the technological and digital literacy to stay apace and ahead of the times. Our solution is provides a proactive and bite-sized approach  to technological and digital literacy.

Our innovative solution is embedded in our unique experiences as youth in education and careers within a developing country, in an advancing digital world. Due to these experiences, we were led to develop and create a customized way of gaining and sharing resources and delivering digital education and literacy to make an impact. 

Overtime, we designed curricula and systems to combat the challenges of the availability and accessibility of technological and digital resources specific to our community. Our process of translating digital information into physical spaces where there is a lack of these resources and skills can be translated to our communities, sectors and regions faced with problem. 

Our solution is different because it comprises of bite-sized curricula designed with literacy and techniques in a range of digital, creative, innovative, entrepreneurial and interpersonal skills that can be learnt by a child as young as 5, within a minimum of 1-2 hours and maximum of 4 hours over a 5 day period. We first cater to the learning needs and threshold of a child. 

This means that if a child can understand it, create a digital solution and continue their development after the training, an adult can too. Even though our solution was developed to meet the needs of a young audience, it also caters to mature audiences which include parents, teachers and business executives who may be digital immigrants. 

The aforementioned distinguish us from our competitors like STEMGuyana, Braintree, IntellectStorm, Global Technology, NexusHub and A+ Computer Training Centre.

We use new and existing technology to facilitate, improve and enable access to our training, this includes both hardware and software and digital technology. Through strategic partnerships access to technology for our team and beneficiaries has helped us to provide our solutions.

Our bite-sized curricula refers to our application of technology and processes to tailor, translate and better communicate digital lingo to be easily understood across age groups, learning abilities, communities and cultures. 

For our physical training, we utilize a computer lab of 100+ high-end computers (hardware) from one of the our local partners and country's only local university, the University of Guyana.

For software accessibility, we utilize Adobe, Google, Unity 3D, Pencil 2D Animation, Comic Art and Marvel products to facilitate training, registration, communication, design and social media content.

For digital technology, we utilize Trello, Slack, Google Drive, Dropbox, Youtube, Zoom, Google Classrooms, Calendar and Forms to track team work, deliverables, participant registration, sessions and resources.

In light of the different technologies used by our team which are based heavily on the specific area of focus, we recognized the need for simplifying our process of virtual and physical training by following tested standard operating procedures used in previous activities which made our delivery efficient and effective.

For specific software technologies used, an example of our unedited product demo of our training tutorial using Adobe Photoshop to our audience is available here:https://www.dropbox.com/s/4obz...

This demo excludes our transcript for the video, sectioning and curriculum that each participant can view or download.

For digital technologies, we create re-usable forms for participant registration and feedback through Google Forms. Upon registration, participants are emailed and given steps on payment, and accessing software or other resources to prepare for training. 

Through digital technologies, our training is marketed across social media platforms to reach our audience.

Through software partnerships, participants access free or low cost software to receive training. 

Through hardware partnerships, participants lacking access to hardware, are provided with hardware on a needs-basis, to participate in training.

Upon completion of training, participants are provided with digital or printed certificates of completion, prizes and badges for progress and participation. 

Activity: Digital Summer Camps - Digital skills classes and training, provide the perfect opportunity for young and mature to hone skills in technology and creativity. We are 4 years, 5 camps and 200 persons trained from when we first started in 2016.

Outputs: Participants and volunteers gain fundamental skills and techniques in creative applications and resources.

Short Term Outcomes: Design and create innovative solutions, network with partners to further develop these solutions.

Long Term Outcomes: Participants and volunteers further develop creative solutions established during training period, retrain other youth and adults in underserved communities with skills gained at camp.

Activity: Girls in ICT Initiatives - Train  girls in entrepreneurship and innovative digital design skills in secondary/high schools through mentorship, projects, collaborations with local tech businesses headed by women.

Outputs: Participants and volunteers explore a range of entrepreneurial and technological skills to develop innovative solutions.

Short Term Outcomes: Develop unique products and services; present and deliver product and services for peer-to-peer evaluation and feedback.

Long Term Outcomes: Participants and volunteers build confidence in their abilities to develop innovative solutions; they further develop their business solutions with the support of parents, peers and other family members before launching out into wider community; they develop a greater appreciation for developing innovative solution to tackle local and global challenges.

Activity: Creating Creative Connections

Outputs: Provide support, exposure and global opportunities to our members, team, and followers through virtual masterclasses with industry professionals.

Short Term Outcomes: Stimulate a local, regional and international sense of community among creative professional, freelancers and students in the Caribbean; create opportunities for learning and mentorship exchanges across borders; developing a greater pride and appreciation for creative work representative of the Caribbean culture 

Long Term Outcomes: Further exposure opportunities for local creators through regional and international cross-cultural and multi-cultural exchanges, competitions, work and educational opportunities for Caribbean creators in the region and diaspora; creating an opportunity for international experts with Caribbean heritage to re-invest into their culture through mentorship and other forms of advice, resources and partnerships.

Our solution currently directly serves approximately 300 camp participants and 196 girls in ICT, a total of 496 persons. The number we’ll be serving in one year are an additionally 50-100 persons. 

In 5 years, we’ll be serving a minimum of 250 persons to a maximum of 500 persons. 

Within the next year, our goals are to expand to virtual training through online and digital technologies instead of physical training to our audience; to launch of website and virtual platform design into viable and engaging space; and to train a minimum of 100 to maximum of 500 persons within and across borders without being confined to a physical training space. 

These goals will be achieved by utilizing available digital technologies to plan, communicate, develop and deliver course training, provide our participants and teams with virtual access to software and offer rewards and prizes through digital channels. 

Through possible partnerships or funds raised, we plan to invest in launching our website idea and virtual platform to enable users in our country and around the world to access our training resources and activities. 

By providing access to training online, an increased number of participants from approximately 50 persons annually to a minimum of 100 persons may be achieved as access to training will no longer be confined to physical attendance.

Within the next five years, our long term goals employ effective replication of core parts of our operations that are tested and proven solutions to the problem that we are addressing. Where applicable and necessary, our team will utilize the approach of customizing our training, curricula and deliverables to meet the needs of specific communities and countries, through collaborations, as we scale. We will retain flexibility to improving our system of operation and delivery for greater efficiency and effectiveness. 

Current barriers that exists and may limit our impact in the next year and next five years are:

Financial:

- Access to online payments through Paypal or other international payment services with restrictions to certain parts of South America and the Caribbean.

- Access to sufficient funds to effectively scale and compensate team members to work full-time; all roles are volunteer at present.

Technical:

- Limited technical capacity to manage operations full time

- Technical support to improve efficiency of team and work flow.

- Technical support and personnel with expertise in financial and management accounting for social enterprises.

Legal barriers:

- Legal and active guidance on compliance and regulations.

- Legal mentorship for scaling across borders;

Cultural barriers:

- Negative or repulsive perceptions to online learning as distinct from the physical classroom;

- Against making online payments;

Market barriers:

- Access to international payment options 

We plan to overcome our current barriers by:

Financial:

- Connecting with Paypal or other international finance services to initiate discussions and solutions for the restrictions to be lifted or partnering with an international partner to facilitate receipt of online payments through these services.

- Continue to develop ways to generate income, accumulate and re-invest wisely to develop a pool/fund where team members can eventually be paid to work full-time.

Technical:

- Continue to explore capacity building and training opportunities by registering with the local Small Business Bureau where such services are offered to entities within the local context.

- Access mentors and on-demand advice from experts and partners actively and proactively during and before projects to optimize our efficiency, operations and work flow.

- Connect with mentors and professionals in finance, banking and corporate management to garner the technical support, resources and personnel to help us improve financial and management accounting, analysis and projections.

Legal barriers:

- Access additional legal support, mentorship active guidance:

1. on local and international compliance and regulations;

2. scaling across borders;

Cultural barriers:

- Continue to provide and share information, and advocate for individual, cultural and systematic shifts, to virtual and digital education to improve preparedness for present and digital economy.

- Work to provide and share information on financial payments, online security and financial literacy to boost consumer confidence.

Market barriers:

- Lobbying for international payment services to remove restrictions placed on certain regions in receiving international payments for goods and services online.

Not applicable.

2 full-time, 4 part-time, 3 contractors, and 1 external creative professional. 

We have a small team of young, passionate women leaders with backgrounds and skills in law, medical technology, research, social and tech entrepreneurship, animation, game design and development, project and resource management, volunteerism, hospitality, communication, marketing, administration and taxation. Our team members have participated in local, regional and international programmes, awards and ambassadorships for young leaders in technology, community, business and youth development like the Adobe Design Achievement Awards Judging 2019, One Young World Summit 2019, the Caribbean Tech Entrepreneurs Programme 2019, IDB Project Management for Results Programme, Innov8 and the Ministry of the Presidency's Department of Youth National Youth Award. 

Through our combined skills, backgrounds and experiences, we have been able to collectively leverage partnerships with 86+ private and public partners locally, regionally and internationally. Our partners are aligned and community to children, youth and community development; some have specifically dedicate their resources to creative and technological skills development, which allows us to deliver our solution and solve the problem. 

Notably, our collaborations with local and global creative professionals and freelancers who serve as mentors, facilitators and observers of our activities, has significantly enabled us to ensure that beneficiaries receive quality training even though the digital language is translated for simple consumption. 

Together, and with external support, our team is uniquely positioned with access to software, information, industry professionals and a diverse partners who share a common goal of advancing our present and future leaders and innovators by training them with the skills needed to navigate the digital economy.

GAN currently has groups of partners based on resources provided:

Funding

- Unicomer Guyana Inc. (Courts Guyana), GoInvest Guyana, Spang and 21Q Caribbean (Suriname), Herdmanston Lodge, Department of Culture (Guyana), Public Utilities Commission (Guyana) for corporate sponsorship of a number of children and youth to receive training from specific communities or ages.

- Chloe Noble (US AID), Jared Jerrick and Alfred Langevine for individual sponsorship to children and youth receiving training.

Software, hardware and physical/prize/ticketing resources:

- University of Guyana (UG), UG - Philantrophy, Alumni and Civic Engagement (PACE) and Metro Computer Supplies for hardware and physical resources to enable training.

- Adobe Youth Voices and Taking It Global for software resources and accessibility.

- Concept 3D and Dynamic 3D for 3D printed prize resources to children and youth.

- Java Coffee Bar, Gizmos and Gadgets, Banks DIH Ltd, Channel 9 and Badmonkey Merch for providing physical and prize resources to enhance the training experience or facilitate payment of training fees and ticketing.

Facilitating trainers:

- Ministry of Telecommunications and the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat for funding the travel and accommodation of international trainers.

- Simi Digi (USA), Perceptive Engineering (USA), Chris Taylor, Atio Chryst, Pyroglyphics for providing trainers, facilitating, developing curricula, observing training or providing mentorship.

Exposure, conferences and competition:

- GTT, Innov8 Summit, the Masterclass Institute and the British High Commission (Guyana) for providing opportunities to technological, entrepreneurial and diplomatic forums or workshops.

- Animae Caribe Festival (Trinidad) for enabling participants to engage in cross-cultural pitching and training.

We provide value to the populations we serve through:

• our training workshops in digital and creative skills to children and youth in our community;
• access to software and resources not easily accessible, available or translated to our culture; and
• a community of connecting creative professionals and freelancers to job opportunities, and private or public entities to creative talent for work.

Our services combined are currently not provided by any other entity (public or private) in the country on as large a scale. Due to this fact, we receive new and recurring participant users every year backed by parental, academic and business support. We actively manage and track our activities' impact and user base through data and feedback. We also collaborate with our only local university, creative professionals, freelancers and executives to support execution.

We provide our services through our signature programmes of our annual digital summer camps, Girls in ICT initiatives and Creating Creative Connections. We also provide our services to other external initiatives.

Within a 3 year period, our small women-led team has serviced 300 children and youth in creative and digital skills and 196 girls in entrepreneurship and innovation. 

Through our training workshops we have raised over US$30,000 in revenue within a 3-year period at an average variable fee of $US50 per course. Our total revenue over the above period is 100% of our initial seed funding raised by friends and family of approximately $US300 in 2016. We reinvest in our process, compliance and development.

We raise funds through our programme fees, which are moderate to our market, and a combination of sustained donations and grants. Through entrepreneur support, strategic partnerships and sponsorship packages allow us to raise funds through sustained donations. 

In the long term, we also intend to raise funds through e-commerce of branded products and merch and commissions from providing a cooperative for creators.

We are applying to Solve because Solve can help us to overcome our:

- Financial barriers:

• of accessing international finance services like Paypal to link to our website and virtual platform by connecting us with international financial, business or tech experts who can recommend alternative international payment options; and 
• of raising enough funds to eventually pay our team to work full-time through mentors and experts can help us to reach to that level.

Technical barriers by connecting us with mentorship and strategic advice on:

• capacity building, interpersonal and innovative skills required for our internal team to lead international operations
• optimizing efficiency, operations and work flow.
• financial and management accounting, analysis and projections.

Legal barriers through mentorship on international compliance and regulations for scaling across borders.

Cultural barriers through mentorship on improving dissemination and presentation of information and resources to improve preparedness for present and digital economy, and financial literacy on online payments and security.

Market barriers through connecting experts who can provide strategic advice on receiving international payments for goods and services online from our country.

To help us overcome the barriers mentioned above, we seek partnerships to:

• Support and advise on technologies that we can use to simplify or improve our solution
• Advise and/or support us through funding or improving our revenue model.
• Serve as advisors or board members to provide on-demand advice, connections and resources for scaling
• Provide legal and regulatory support and guidance
• Recommend technologies or provide mentorship on systems of monitoring and evaluation that can improve our reach, operations, efficiency and impact
• Support marketing, communications, branding, media and exposure opportunities across mutual or diverse audiences to build mutual community support.

We would like to partner with technology-based, innovative, entreprenuerial and philanthropic organizations that can assist us through:

• Technical and software sponsorships and support to improve our online market readiness by developing and launching our website and virtual platform to provide training within and across borders; and stimulate cross-cultural and  multi-cultural creative and digital competitions and activities like Adobe, Microsoft, Google, Sony, Autodesk, Vodafone Americas Foundation, Apple, Unity 3D and Electronic Arts (EA). 
• Business and strategic planning for international development such as MIT faculty or initiative, Solve Members, the Richard Branson Foundation/Virgin Unite
• Educational and cross cultural learning and launching opportunities for participants or beneficiaries in technology and innovative spaces like MIT faculty and initiatives, AfroTech, Women in Tech, Girls in Tech, South by Southwest (SWXW), Davos, Electronic Arts (EA), Sony and Google.
• Establishing their local/regional headquarter in our locality to improve access to job and other opportunities: Adobe, Google

One of our signature programmes is our Girls in ICT Initiatives through which we improve the life of women and girls by educating, empowering and enhancing their lives through training on entrepreneurship and innovation and individual demonstrations of their business solutions. To date, we have trained 196 high school aged girls between the ages of 11-20. 

We would use the Innovation for Women Prize to advance our solution by funding and facilitating training of women and girls from our urban and indigenous communities in entrepreneurship and innovation. Further through collaborations with our local Small Business Bureau and regulatory systems, establishing a mechanism where women and girls can easily register their business solutions, build teams, obtain mentorship and funding to scale their initiatives to the next level. 

Most of the women and girls in our community lack the financial resources, mentorship and community to start and sustain their business ventures. Given that we have tested training in entrepreneurship and innovation for women and girls, and we've seen their commitment to development unique solutions for the market, this Prize would help us to continue this programme and sustain it over a 5-10 year period with possible support of our local Small business bureau.

Our solution is actively geared towards enabling people of all ages including working-age adults to build digital and creative skills and resources they need to access well-paying jobs in a changing marketplace. Even though our solution was designed with a young audience in mind, its content can be easily understood by adults since it was tailored to be easily understood by a child as young as 5. This, therefore, enables working-age adults who may be considered as digital immigrants to learn and apply the digital and creative skills and resources needed to help them to easily navigate the present and digital future of work. 

Through our solution, working-age adults will become technologically and digitally literate and competent without the mental blocks or barriers associated with learning digital lingo, compounded by the complexity of the language and material to be learnt.

Our solution is actively geared towards enabling people of all ages including adults to hone digital and creative skills and improve digital literacy. Through our solution, adults who may have been displaced from their jobs and opportunities in the digital economy, have the opportunity to upskill and learn digital skills in a simple and practical way. Even though our solution was designed with a young audience in mind, its content can be easily understood by adults since it was tailored to be easily understood by a child as young as 5. This, therefore, enables adults, who may be considered as digital immigrants, to learn and to apply the digital and creative skills and resources to their livelihoods as they navigate the present and digital future of work. 

Through our solution, adults will become technologically and digitally literate and competent without the mental blocks or barriers associated with learning digital lingo, compounded by the complexity of the language and material to be learnt.