RECODE: Empowering through technology

In 1995, Rodrigo Baggio founded and became president of CDI Global and Recode, an NGO that transformed the lives of 1,7 million of the underprivileged population through digital empowerment. In 2020, he co-founded Tendrel, a global association for social entrepreneurs for peer exchange, achieving more than 400 members from 34 countries. From 2016-2017, Rodrigo led a pioneer reality show on digital upskilling, broadcasted to more than 3 million people (each episode) in Brazil. In 2020, he became the co-founder of Catalyst 2030; a global association of entrepreneurs cooperating to accelerate the implementation of the UN´s Sustainable Development Goals. His performance led him to be named Ashoka Fellow, Skoll Awardee, and Schwab Entrepreneur. Baggio was one of the 10 "Principal Voices" of 2007 selected by CNN, Time, and Fortune Magazines, winner of the 2014 Entrepreneur for the World Award by the World Entrepreneurship Forum, and 2020 YPO Global Impact Award. 

Recode is dedicated to amplifying horizons for professional and personal development of individuals in social vulnerability- we have achieved directly 1.7 million individuals, for the past 25 years, recoding their lives through technology and helping them facing main socio-economic problems of the last decades.

Our methodology for digital inclusion expands the array of self-development, education and employability opportunities for individuals, and democratize access to qualified training in behavioral and tech skills, empowering people who can leapfrog from being mere users to program new solutions to the world´s main social gaps and inequalities.

To achieve success, Recode invests in capacitating changing agents, who multiply our methodology locally and increase impact in their communities through the offer of behavioral and digital skills, working to have digital empowerment as central for upskilling and re-skilling of population. This way, we bring ethics and values to the center of the 4th Industrial Revolution

According to the United Nations, three billion people in the world have no access to the internet due to education, income levels, geographical restrictions, and digital literacy. Combined with this, more than two-thirds of the world's population live in countries where inequality has increased.

Moving into the second quarter of 2020, global internet users might increase following the restrictions imposed by the coronavirus pandemic. However, the UN´s first report on the digital economy affirms that the digital disruption threatens to leave less developed countries behind. They are at risk of becoming mere suppliers of raw data while having to pay for the digital intelligence generated using their data.

Brazil is the 89th most unequal out of 93 countries in a 3-year average of the Gini Index. World Bank points out that 25 million young people are in economic disengagement in Brazil, neither studying nor working. A study by Google and Mckinsey highlights that the country's GDP could increase up to 70 billion dollars if the right investment was made for building capacity in technology. However, due to Covid19, vulnerable youth faces the rise of unemployment rates and the inability to keep on studying due to the lack of digital access.

Recode aims for humanizing for the 4th Industrial Revolution, through an innovative self-created methodology comprised of 04 steps: Motivation to read the world, Understanding to act, Experiment to evaluate, and Plan to impact. This approach is based in three dimensions: Me, We, and All of Us, i.e., individuals going through our programs will be able not only to find solutions for their problems but also, transform the reality around them.

Recode has been a pioneer in bringing the discussion on re-skilling and upskilling, ensuring ethics and values in the use of exponential technologies and delivering innovative projects using Virtual Reality, gamification, distance education, access to the internet, youth employability and social entrepreneurship programs to inspire agents of social transformation. With Recode, they create their own stories on resilience and perseverance.

Currently, we are scaling up results by expanding our scope to impact 1,000,000 people over the next five years through the enhancement of our educational on-line platform and employability programs (entrepreneurship, full-stack development, soft skills, emotional resilience, among other essential topics for empowerment), coalitions with corporations, and the development of systemic change campaigns to impact public policies and provide fair and equal digital access for digitally excluded youth

Recode serves individuals in social vulnerability, in conditions of material and moral fragility in risk due to their socio-economic context. Participants of our projects range from 14 to 39 years old. In Brazil, 57,2% are women, 24% recognize themselves as afro descendants. More than 38% of the participants in our project have income below the minimum wage.

Digital empowerment requires the coordination of multiple actors (governments, educators, communities, and employers) to create a digital ecosystem connected with youth. We have been working directly with local agents creating solutions for our key audiences, leading surveys, and research to understand their main gaps and “pains”. Through innovative processes, we also invite the community representatives to co-create solutions, so we guarantee individuals will take responsibility and lead their projects according to their context and needs.

Moreover, we train educators and multipliers on our methodologies, so they replicate it within their communities, engaging more people locally in our digital trails, combining online and offline experiences for the participants of our projects. We focus on disseminating the capacity for problem-solving, collaboration, empathic communication, and creativity. The educators are not only attended by our projects but also responsible for making it successful.

Our project is geared towards a systemic change for the inclusion of people in social vulnerability, prioritizing low income, female, disabled, black, and LGBTQ+ individuals digitally and economically disengaged. 

By joining our programs, people can go through a process of understanding and reprogramming their reality, becoming change agents.

We amplify their voices by telling their stories, raising awareness on social inequality, and using digital empowerment to inspire new attitudes and behaviors to reach social impact. An example of our engagement potential was the Digital Mission Show, exhibited for two years in open TV, reaching 3 million Brazilian viewers (each episode).

When I first started, in the '90s, the focus was to get low-income people to access computers. Finally, we came up with the Committee for Democratization of Information Technology- CDI, the first Latin America NGO focused on digital inclusion.  CDI created the methodology that put together a solid personal empowering, IT training, and the ethic and fair use of new technologies. After establishing CDI in Brazil and 08 countries, in 2018, CDI became Recode in Brazil.

In the rise of the 4th Industrial Revolution, we were pioneers in exploring the ethic and humanized use of exponential technology and kept on developing and adapting activities to put humanity in the center of technological updates, by making people able to read and transform their realities, delivering systemic change and social impact.

Since I became the co-leader of  the global project Catalyst 2030, leading the first  initiative in a country (Brazil), I am again re-thinking how to work collaborative impact for systemic changes, by promoting upskilling and reskilling aiming to reduce inequality through employability, such as we did with our social venture Recode Pro, in which we build capacity for low income youth and connect them with tech companies recruiters. 

At the age of 12, I had two passions in life: computers and my volunteer work in Rio's slums, with homeless kids.  By the age of 23, I was already a tech entrepreneur, but I did not perceive a bigger purpose in life. That was when I had a dream in which I saw young poor people using computers and the internet. When I woke up, I realized that this was my purpose: to use technology to transform realities for low-income communities excluded from the digital revolution.

The technology could empower people to know better about themselves, develop their self-esteem, make it possible for them to change their reality and the communities around them. I believe in the power of technology for upskilling people to find their solutions and help them making their own choices to become whatever they want to be in their lives. To be part of this process, to feel their emotions during this journey, either by providing them conditions to empower themselves or telling their stories, this is what motivates me to keep on adapting and fighting for digital empowerment. I don't believe in any technological revolution without ethics, values, and human development.

As a tech social entrepreneur, I see myself as a visionary leader, able to deliver innovative projects with social impact and capable of quickly respond to adversities and change contexts. I was a pioneer in digital empowerment projects when no one used to talk about technology. In 1995, I launched the first Center for Digital Empowerment in a low-income community in Rio de Janeiro. Since then, I am proud to say that my team´s work achieved over 1,7 million individuals in Brazil and other 08 countries.

Since then, we have scaled up our results and accepted the challenges of the 4th Industrial Revolution. I adapted my work to keep on delivering, for the past three decades, high impact projects that tackle some of the main social problems faced by developing countries. My favorite example is our project Recode Pro, which is focused on delivering full stack and programming capacitation for low-income youth to ensure their inclusion in the job market, promoting employability for hundreds of economically disengaged people in Brazil.

We work and co-create with a respectable global network to deliver concrete impacts, such as Facebook, Microsoft, Accenture, Ashoka, Skoll, Schwab, Avina Foundation, and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

CDI Global, Recode and I have been granted 60 prizes from national and international institutions who have recognized our project as an innovative initiative of high impact for social development in Brazil. We highlight the recognition of our impact by the YPO Global Impact Award.

Recode's foundation, in 1995, is a strong example of my ability to create innovative solutions. By then, the focus of NGOs was entirely on welfare. Nevertheless, I was able to put together many volunteers that aimed to bring technology to low-income communities. The first challenge was creating a campaign for computer donation called "Computers for All" which would become a huge disappointment when a promising truck full of computers, donated by a company, was a pure electronic waste. Quickly, I had the idea to call young people from Rio's slums to learn how to refurbish computers, so they could use them for upskilling and transforming their lives. This was the first time I saw the eyes of poor young people shining in front of a computer. It redefined our mission. A year later, we created the Information Technology and Civil Rights School, in one of the most violent slums in Rio. We succeeded to be active for 25 years

Throughout my career, I have faced many challenges in implementing my project, such as two quick political kidnaps. Nonetheless, my purpose is clear: to change lives through technology, and I am committed to continuously reinvent myself and carry on.

I strongly believe in my ability to transform dreams into concrete actions and business plans. That's what happened when I was 23 years old and realized my purpose in life: combine my work for society and the youth with my passion for technology. Thus, I founded CDI, the first Latin-American NGO to promote digital inclusion.

Social entrepreneurship requires resilience, innovation, curiosity, determination, flexibility, and enthusiasm. All these are present since I first founded CDI. Mobilizing people, gathering resources, giving people opportunities to be heard, and creating movements are part of my routine.

I am prouder of the fact that I believe in people's power. I trust that anyone, with the right tools and support, can overcome adversity and change their life. I like to tell Wanderson's story, who used to be a drug dealer in Rio's biggest slum, and after joining CDI Program, while in prison, he completely changed his life, becoming a change agent and training more than 100,000 young people in our technology courses. His story is part of my story, showed me not only that he was capable of more, but also that I was capable of more. My connection with people is my main leadership skill.  

Recode innovates by the ethical use of technology, having developed a human-centered methodology focused on the most important 21st-century social and emotional skills: problem-solving, collaboration, creativity, and communication. We promote experiences, connections, and mobilization of individuals, offering creative solutions and collaborative processes that enable young people to explore opportunities and use digital tools for solving social problems.

This holistic approach allows us to be at the forefront of the 4th industrial revolution, which demands upskilling and reskilling capacities from society. We have developed solutions that range from innovative programs to stimulating the social and digital transformation of communities. Good examples are the partnership with Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, empowering libraries through a national coalition for collaborative impact (including ministries, secretaries, community leaders), known as the hugest movement in supporting public libraries in Brazil, and the use of exponential technologies to engage with youth, through virtual reality and gamification.

We also innovate in business models. Our newest project, Recode Pro, delivered a social venture in which companies pay for the professional training of low-income youth in full-stack programming. After the program´s first edition, 83% of the trainees were hired by some of the biggest companies in Brazil, earning, on average, 5 times a minimum wage.

Our diverse network, flexibility, and global reach also allow us to innovate in the ways our solutions are funded, attracting more and more important players in society. We work either with companies or governments to mobilize public policies for the benefit of society.

Our solution for tackling social vulnerability caused by the digital exclusion and technology substitution is to bring human needs to the center of the 4th Industrial Revolution. We do that by leading coalitions for the promotion of digital inclusion in public policies, building capacity in behavior and tech skills for youth, educators, community leaders, and establishing Digital Empowerment Centers for low-income communities in 09 countries.

In the short term, we aim for the individual impact of young people by increasing self-esteem and self-assertion, supporting social and civic entrepreneurship, and enabling possibilities for them to achieve financial autonomy. We, as well, work with low-income communities having educators and local organizations as key to reaching youth. We see in them an essential role in solving local problems by managing and engaging communities in our Digital Empowerment Centers, increasing the access to technology to vulnerable communities, and having them as local leaders, able to connect Recode to our target audience. For scaling up impacts, we lead coalitions that aim to create public policies to ensure digital access to low-income families, engaging governments, and companies to deliver digital empowerment for the population.

 With both individual and collective approaches, the impact we aim is the ethical use of technology, ensuring social inclusion and reinforcing citizen rights (through active social and transformative actions), the creation of collaborative networks, and the ideation of digital solutions for economic growth. Recode's long term outcome is to overcome individuals' and communities’ social vulnerability through technology.

For the past 25 years, Recode has reached more than 1,7 million individuals worldwide. In 2019, we have achieved 1,152 Digital Empowerment Centers worldwide and 53 thousand people only in Brazil. In 2020, due to the need for adaptation that Covid19 brought us, our goal is to reach out to directly 50 thousand people, and in the next five years, one million individuals.

To grow scale, Recode has different tools and strategies to amplify educational programs and technology-based projects. By next year, we will make all the content of the technical programs available to skill young people for the technology market (content on data analysis and full-stack developer). In five years, we expect to have diverse content available for all Recode's interventions: gaming, digital marketing/SEO, social and exponential entrepreneurship mindset, virtual reality, startup management, and leadership.

In addition to our technological solutions, we are working to strengthen our partnership with Education and Culture Secretaries, increasing the number of Digital Empowerment Centers and delivering communication campaigns for engaging youngsters with our content.

We also run awareness campaigns on digital empowerment and the ethical use of technology, like Digital Mission, a reality show broadcasted to 3 million people each episode. In social media, besides our 30 thousand followers, we gather with digital influencers who have more than 2 million followers each and are promoting our projects.

With our advocacy initiatives, we aim to impact over 10 million Brazilians to have access to the internet and tech equipment in the next five years

Our first-year impact will be the creation of a digital empowerment ecosystem for Brazil. We will deliver the enhancement of the Recode Platform, adding new content for upskilling digital and entrepreneurship competencies. The Platform will become an online engagement tool that puts together different stakeholders (Secretaries, community leaders, NGOs, educators, youth, and their families), who will help us to raise awareness and impact on our projects.

Recode will lead Communitarian Forums to co-create solutions based on stakeholders ‘context and territory. The online community will also bring a sense of belonging for those impacted by our Programs, increasing engagement, and building relations between decision-makers and our target audiences.

To succeed, we must deliver offline and online mobilization strategy within influencers and decision-makers, raising awareness about the role of the digital empowerment for changing the Brazilian social scenario. Hence, Recode is getting together with new partners in media, digital influencers, and delivering high impact communication products to achieve millions of viewers. We wish to carry out surveys with people to compare their perception of digital empowerment before and after our interventions.

At the end of 05 years, we aim to achieve a global impact with the replication of Brazil´s example impacting public policies that will ensure digital empowerment in the curriculum of institutions. Our systemic change is the international recognition of digital empowerment skills as fundamental for the qualified training of our youth. We will reach 1 million people directly impacted by our projects.

The pandemic and social isolation context brought us the need to adapt our original hybrid methodology (online and offline) to a completely online way of mobilizing people. The new scenario can be an opportunity, but it also highlights the problems that low-income individuals have for access to the internet and proper equipment for distance education and digital empowerment. Thus, we see ourselves in front of a systemic change dilemma: we need to strengthen our projects reach, engage with powerful influencers and partners, and build a strong coalition able to influence public policies that will deliver, through a huge alliance of institutions, governments and civil society organization, a political structure that ensures the digital access for all.

To put this project in place, Recode will need to increase qualified staff and to deliver more projects and manage the implementation of all the working fronts required to achieve our goals. At the same time, the world is expecting an economic crisis, which highlights our financing vulnerabilities.  For the next five years, we will need to build a stronger and more diverse revenue strategy for funding our projects.

With the predominance of the social, climate and economic crisis we are facing, we will need to increase efforts to engage the society, and especially the vulnerable communities, in understanding the fundamental role that digital empowerment plays to achieve a fair and equal society.

To create an excellent intersectoral articulation is possible through our efficient mobilization strategies with strategic stakeholders, but also non-profit local-based organizations, schools, local and national governments, libraries, corporate social responsibility sectors, and international private initiative.

Our goal is to lead the mobilization of strategic allies in the pursuit of a public policy for digital empowerment in Brazil that includes not only access to the Internet and equipment but also access to free technical training content. Our advocacy strategy will support and provoke improvements in primary and secondary public education, articulating for the successful inclusion and offer of technology courses worldwide.

Most importantly, we plan to improve and enhance our methodologies and educational content and communication. It is also demanded that we strengthen our relationship with the different communities we want to impact, using co-creation and active listening to get low-income youngsters involved in our projects, from designing and implementation to evaluation. For that, we will make use of mobilization strategies that include audience segmentation, partnerships with influencers related to our target audience, and new channels to expand our communication.

Finally, Recode is building new strategies for funding its activities, and finding more partners to support our projects, bringing us autonomy and sustainability for our operations.

Our key allies are Facebook and Microsoft, which support us to maintain our staff working and running our Online Platforms, making it possible for Recode to continuously increase the number of people connected to our content about tech skills and personal development. With have been partners with Microsoft for 21 years. 

With the support of Accenture and Itau Bank, we have been successful in the implementation of a new social venture, Recode Pro, a training for full-stack developers, which prepares young people to apply for technology positions in Brazilian job markets. The training is financed by the companies that hire the trainees, making it self-sustainable.

We are also part of Brasscom, the biggest association of international technology companies in Brazil, which are interested not only in funding our activities but also in being part of our initiatives, for instance, engaging in corporative voluntary work. With them, we developed the project called Recoders Challenge, in which we invited low-income youngsters to create local solutions for their communities, through a gamification 100% online process. In this initiative, some of our main partners are UNESCO, Skoll Foundation, Linx, e-core, Prudential, and C6 Bank.

We have also been partners with Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for the implementation of a collaborative project, which was done through a national coalition (connecting ministries, librarian leaders, and governments) that supported the creation of a public libraries ecosystem in Brazil.    

Our portfolio is based on four fundamental activities: 

• Training in technology, and the promotion of innovative experiences, such as ideations, hackathons, and events that inspire the co-creation of solutions to community problems
• Engagement and communication campaigns for systemic change, related to the use of digital empowerment as a solution for social and inequality problems
• Customized projects for digital empowerment, developed with partners and focused on specific target groups
• Social ventures, Recode Pro, in which we partner with recruiters so they pay for the professional capacitation of low-income youth. 

Our business model offers free content on tech and behavioral skills, based on our unique methodology, which uses proper language to connect with our target audiences. We use social media and our website to engage with our target audiences: people from vulnerable communities and supporters of our cause. 

An essential channel is the Recode Online Platform, in which we make our content available for educators, teachers, multipliers, and students. Recode relies on satisfaction surveys and active listening to incorporate the participants' feedback, to keep continuous improvement. 

Our structural costs are staff salaries and project operations, and our revenue and main fundings come from companies’ donations and service contracts, which can be done for specific projects or operational activities.

Our vision is to promote digital empowerment on a great scale. Working for this goal, within the process, we identify highly skilled and educated professionals to the job market and connect them with our main financiers and partners, such as Facebook and Microsoft. 

Recode is a mix of entrepreneur support and low-income client. Our focus is to provide, for those who would be commonly excluded from the 4th Industrial Revolution, behavioral and tech tools to be digitally empowered. For that, we fundraise with companies and foundations, nationally and international. Recode acts as an expert to put in place relevant projects for society. 

We are diversifying funding by highlighting opportunities for major donors and individual givers to engage with our projects and finance impact.

One of our innovative financial pathways is to develop social ventures. The best example is the diversified possibilities of funding for Recode Pro- a program that builds capacity for full-stack programming, in which companies pay a fee for the capacitation of youngsters that they will hire as qualified staff in their business.

Recode is a nonprofit organization that does not generate revenues and all of our funding goes to the benefit of executing our projects and generating social impact. Usually, we can fundraise to ensure the operations for at least six months, and all of our projects rely on successful fundraising strategies.

Throughout our history, we have worked with several organizations and companies. We have been working in close partnership with Microsoft for 21 years in developing diverse activities and events in Brazil and other countries. We were the largest institutional partner of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Latin America, with an innovative project that took place in 25 Brazilian states. Together with Facebook, Accenture, B2W, BNDES- National Bank of Economic and Social Development, and some other organizations, we have developed customized experiences based on a social counterpart model, taking technology to teachers and students all over Brazilian territory

In the last 12 months raised USD 787.722

BRAZILIAN ANONYMOUS FOUNDATION (Due to the confidentiality agreement we are not allowed to share the donor's information) USD 200.000
FACEBOOK BRASIL USD 179.600
FUNDACION CRISÁLIDA USD 97.957
MICROSOFT USD 75.879
ITAÚ UNIBANCO USD 70.000
ACCENTURE BRASIL USD 60.000
SKOLL FOUDATION USD 38.717
FUNDAÇÃO GUAIRÁ USD 20.000
ADYEN BRASIL USD 13.921
INSTITUTO PHI  USD 8.600
EIDOS GLOBAL USD 7.904
IBM BRASIL USD 4.046
UBER BRASIL USD 4.000
AMMO VAREJO USD 3.404
GFT BRASIL USD 3.194
RP BRASIL USD 200
MGIC COMUNICAÇÃO  USD 200
SITAWI USD 100

Our goal is to raise donations around US$4.5 million in grants over the next three years to increase the impact of our digital empowerment project at schools, social organizations, and public libraries, providing them the tools to become Digital Empowerment Centers.

The resources will strengthen the multidisciplinary team responsible for operations, as well as developing new content and technological resources for our distance education environment (Recode Platform) that will enable the creation of an online learning and engagement community, and the improvement of the training program to promote employability.

The expenses planned for 2020 are related to the execution of training projects, together with Facebook and Microsoft. Recode also have expenses related to the second edition of Recode Pro, besides the cost for maintaining our regular work.

Estimated expenses: USD 1.106.516

Staff USD 621.618
Administration USD 69.580
Monitoring and trips USD 19.289
Services USD 106.043
Communication, Marketing and Events USD 104.352
Technology and Pedagogy Innovation USD 53.366
Recode Platform USD 4.400
Infrastructure USD 127.868

The Elevate Prize will support us to grow towards our long-term goal, furthering our access to other innovative hubs and ecosystems. It will certainly be a catalyzer in our activities. Currently, Recode is allying in Brazil to advance our solutions for the economic inclusion of low-income individuals, we have been carefully designing solutions with partners and other innovation organizations. Through mentorships, new contacts with investors, and the enhancement of our social media and public exposure, we would benefit from a priceless communication strategy and improve our relationship with international partners with whom we are not yet connected.

This prestige prize will increase our network and fellowship, allowing us to deepen the development of new training contents in line with the current challenges the world is facing, offering upskilling and reskilling to the end-users of our projects. This will ensure that our solutions are at the highest level of quality and innovation, increasing our impact.

With the prize, we will have access to support from fundamental actors in entrepreneurship, such as MIT Solve, and accelerate our projects and activities which will be essential for scaling up impact and achieving the goal of one million more participants engaged with CDI Global and Recode. We are aware of our potential to impact millions of lives through digital empowerment. Our assessment and evaluation reports have proven that our educational track is efficient and transformative. Nonetheless, we are aware of our need for institutional development and improving our business strategies.

We believe that for reaching our goals we need to ensure financial sustainability. That´s why growing our network to connect with new potential funders and also develop new business models that will increase our financial safety will be fundamental for our next years operation.

We are also committed to scaling up our impact and raising awareness through the use of digital and traditional media. Innovative solutions on storytelling, branded content, marketing and influencers would be useful and also make us able to raise awareness of our work globally since we will be connecting with global heroes around the globe.

We understand that social impact activities are being demanded to reinvent and increase impact, the moment in the world demands bold, courageous, and rapid response. For that, we'd benefit from mentorships from social entrepreneurs who can support us to grow our global network and co-create new solutions emerging from Recode.

Our goal is to achieve partnerships with major technology companies like Apple, Amazon, Google, Xiaomi, TSMC, among others, which can contribute not only with funds to extend the reach of our project worldwide but also supporting us in the development of content and new tools as well as opening employment opportunities for our target audience.

We have also mapped more than four hundred global foundations, based in the USA, who are supporting projects that share our vision and goals, supporting technology and social entrepreneurship. It would be amazing that we could connect and develop projects and partnerships together, considering that we are a 5O1C3 organization in the United States.

We also see celebrities and influencers, such as Elon Musk, as important personalities to relate to, learning from them, and having their support to raise awareness on digital empowerment. Within this context, we also aim to develop a closer relationship with tier 01 vehicles on global media, besides Brazil.