Youth Bridge Trust

As the world builds back better, greener and differently importance of Internet enabled technologies is highlighted. Majority of youth in Africa are not benefitting from opportunities in the emerging technology sector due to digital divide gap. Investing in digital skills is vital to a sustainable and inclusive recovery. Our programme equips youth with new skills (soft, technical and 4IR) and the ability to use ICT technologies. Our target group is youth not in employment, education or training (NEET, 15-34 years old, 60% women) typically unable to access skills and development programmes and often excluded from the formal economy due to level of education and geographic settings. The programme provides youth with a new mind-set and skill set, enabling them to prosper and seize opportunities presented by digitisation.   Deliberate focus on digital skills fills a labour market gap as exemplar setting, noting 90% of jobs globally already have a digital component.

COVID-19 has accelerated digital transformation and enabled the continuation of work, education and communication. These trends have exposed Africa’s digital divide and underscored the vital need for inclusive connectivity and improved digital literacy. Twenty-one of least connected countries in the world are in Africa and only 22% of the population has Internet access. Africa’s limited Internet access, high levels of digital illiteracy and poor infrastructure have affected the pace of growth of these platforms. This presents challenges for youth without the necessary skills to adapt and embrace change. Increasing digital skills and unlocking innovation and gig economy entrepreneurship is an enormous opportunity for the ICT industry in Africa, where 60% of the youth are unemployed.

African youth are facing multiple shocks, including disruptions to education, training, on-the-job learning; employment, and difficulties in finding jobs. Most young people have disengaged with the labour market and are not building on their skills base. They are a potentially lost generation whose ranks will grow as gaps in infrastructure, services and digital connectivity are thrown into even sharper relief as Africa navigates post lockdown.  Provided with the necessary digital skills and opportunities youth can be a driving force for supporting development and change. 

Technology acts as a vital gateway to access information and significantly enhances one's ability to earn a decent living.  In a culture of fiscal austerity, social transfers, jobs and small business opportunities are scarce and young people need opportunities to grow their skills and take control of their economic futures. The FOW  programme is an eight week programme that equips young people with soft and digital skills, knowledge of sexual/reproductive health and rights, and real pathways to employment and entrepreneurship. Growing the youth’s personal, soft and digital skills not only empowers them to act as equal participants in the economy, but also leverages the digital, gender, and youth dividends in support of GDP growth. Targeted skills interventions ensure that young people are not left behind as Africa pivots to the post pandemic context. The digital skills upliftment strategy will result in improved labor participation, international competitiveness, inclusive and equitable access to digital economy gains. 
 YBT has existing participatory M&E systems and Salesforce (cloud-based platform), which measure progress against KPIs.  These systems are aligned with global practice and enable us to ensure that activities and targets are on track, and that risks are effectively managed and remediated.

Global discourse is talking about a COVID-19 “lost generation” of young people, who will disengage with the economy. This is especially problematic in a continent like Africa, which is an increasingly youthful society. In Africa, economic development and access to skills and the mainstream economy are skewed geographically, and stratified by categories like gender, gender orientation and socio-economic status.  As digital technology is accelerating opportunities and impact all across the world, African youth in marginalised communities are being left behind.  Our FOW programme equip at risk youth from marginalised communities, NEET (not in employment, education, or training) with a new mind-set and skill set, enabling them to thrive, prosper and seize opportunities presented by technological advances and digitisation. This is a potentially lost generation whose ankus will grow as gaps in skills, services and connectivity are amplified in the growing digital economy. 

 Digital skills will help the youth to thrive in an African economy, which is transitioning to digitisation, with production being automated and digital skills are in demand. Digital innovation also enables access to health and education services and opportunities, manifest in civic engagement and enterprise level change. Our programme is context and need-specific, and our beneficiary research underscores the importance of ICT for educating out-of-school youth and supporting learning-action processes of adult men and women who lack even basic literacy. Through the programme we overcome existing gender mindsets and gendered “technophobia” that limits female participation in ICT and related sectors. The programme ensures that young men and women are not left behind as Africa pivots to the post pandemic context and that they become agents of change in a digital economy.

The programme offers a systematic approach that facilitates systemic change among a wide range of stakeholders that can help break down the barriers that prevent at risk women and men to become digitally literate and empowered, and access related jobs and small business development pathways. The project promotes ICT use, skills and learning; empowers beneficiaries as active agents of change; changes attitudes and expectations; and contributes to preventing gender barriers.  

Over the long term, the programme will play an important role when rebooting society post COVID-19 as it has potential to increase young women’s and men’s resilience and barriers in accessing technological skills, promote gender equality in growth sectors and create a model for at risk youth to be employable and entrepreneurial in a fast-changing world. The programme will also generate lessons and engage with best practice and complementary interventions in Africa, so that outcomes can potentially be replicated in other countries, leveraging YBT’s existing partnerships and reach. 

Technological advancement is inevitable and will play a significant part in providing solutions for the challenges we face now and in the future. It also presents challenges for youth without the necessary skills to adapt and embrace change, which amplifies their vulnerability to pandemics and other external shocks. Covid-19 has also accelerated education’s digital transformation, highlighting Africa’s digital divide, and exposing the vital need for all-inclusive digital literacy. It is therefore crucial to invest in youth employment and digital skills development to accelerate and leverage Africa's digital transformation and to ensure an inclusive and sustainable long-term recovery.

The barriers that at risk young women and men face are mirrored throughout Africa, which is looking to leverage its “youth dividend” through digitisation and related sectors (e.g. ICT, digital banking, digital creative economy, green economy). The FOW programme is a programme that builds on our existing Fit for Life fit For Work programme. An independent evaluation in 2019 indicates that 2000 youth were placed in jobs, 150 started their own businesses and 1500 entered into further education and training (65 % bias towards women). The programme promotes ICT use, digital skills and learning; empowers beneficiaries as active agents of change and changes attitudes.  We believe the programme has high potential to be replicated in other countries, and at scale because it uses blended learning methodologies that are affordable and accessible to target groups; and  the deliberate decentralisation of FOW/digital skills delivery is custom built for scaling and inclusivity.

YBT is constantly innovating to find solutions for young men and women in the “new normal”. The proposed programme is unique through 1)its focus on youth at risk in NEET category, who are typically unable to access existing skills, work readiness and support programmes because of their geographic settings, level of education,  lack bare necessities to complete support programmes and lack digital literacy skills and ; 2) its decentralised delivery mechanism, which builds capacities of community level organisations in disadvantaged communities, strengthening grassroots groups; and 3) its contribution to the “future economy”, a priority for Africa. We understand the need to overcome gendered mindsets, address the lack of role models for youth and the stereotypes informing skills programmes and training materials, and the (often unconscious) personal biases of educational professionals. We overcome existing mindsets and “technophobia” that creates barriers for an inclusive  participation in ICT and related sectors. The overarching goal is to increase the number of young Africans who have access to the Internet and digital skills so they can access decent work and thrive in the digitised economy. Digital technologies are also transforming societies and labour markets, and growth in use of the Internet has the potential to create employment, solve social, economic and environmental challenges and improve human well-being.

From our impact report results it is evident that we have impacted significantly on a number of lives of young men and women. Lessons learnt from the impact informs our plan for scaling up the programme. There is a need to collaborate with other partners to ensure sustainability through regional platforms and engaging of multi-disciplinary teams and role players in both the private, public, and not for profit sectors. We will also continue to engage with academia and civil society. The need for continuous adaptation, innovation, thought leadership, advocating for change, information dissemination, sharing of lessons learnt and knowledge hubs is essential. Our target number of beneficiaries is as follows:

Current number: 1000 beneficiaries

Within one year of funding: 3000 beneficiaries

Five years : 15 000 beneficiaries

Of these 60 % will be females and 40 % males.

We define key performance indicators as: “a measurable value of how effective an organization is doing in a particular area". Examples of project outcome-level KPIs include but are not limited to: number of young women and men trained in digital skills; number of community level implementation partners that acquire new skills and capacities; and percentage of beneficiaries who exit the project into employment, further education and training or entrepreneurship. Impact monitoring (post project) will examine the extent to which the project has improved young women’s and men's livelihoods (social return on investment), and contributions to their self-confidence and civic engagement (qualitative research).  YBT has existing participatory M&E systems including Indicator Tracking Tables (Excel) and Salesforce (cloud-based platform), which measure progress against KPIs.  These systems are aligned with global practice and enable us to ensure that activities and targets are on track, and that risks are effectively managed and where necessary remediated.

The programme include the following activities 1) on-board community level partners; 2) recruit women and girl participants; 3) facilitate FOW skills development and coaching; 4) deliver ICT/digital skills training; 5) build the capacities and sustainably of implementation partners; 6) monitor and evaluate outputs and outcomes; 7) facilitate exit planning for beneficiaries;  and 8) improve relevance of the project approach in terms of sector areas, use of technology, and “new normal” training and coaching settings.

Full time staff: 6

Part time staff (implementing partners: 30)

Contractors: 4

YBT is a youth-led not for profit organisation, 100% African and 50% of our staff are African women. This enables us to remain responsive and relevant to the changing needs of young men and women from disadvantaged backgrounds, and the inequalities that women face on a daily basis. Our focus on youth empowerment and gender equality is about positioning young women and men as agents of change and job creators, rather than as passive beneficiaries of our programmes. Our youthful and dynamic team believes in and is qualified in gender mainstreaming and advocates for at least 60% women enrolment in all the programmes.

 YBT employs a team of experienced managers who together have a breadth of experience and a wealth of expertise in youth development and in particular skills development and entrepreneurship. 

At Youth Bridge Trust, we define diversity as a measure of difference in identity; things like gender, ethnicity, age, sexual orientation, ability, or religion. Inclusion is a respect for and appreciation of these differences – the deliberate act of welcoming and valuing diversity and equity

Our human resources policy advocates for  a respectful and caring community that embraces diversity and empowers everyone to learn and do their best cultivating a community focused on YBT’s shared values of excellence, community, equity, belonging, openness, integrity, and mutual respect.

YBT is an equal employment opportunity employer and does not be discriminate against on the basis of race, color, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, disability, age, or national or ethnic origin.

At YBT, we strive to uphold the principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and are committed to anti-racism in all the work we do.   

Diversity: We appreciate and leverage the many differences of our staff and YBT larger community, and we involve and reflect the various communities we serve through partnership and open innovation.

Equity: We design our policies, practices, and resources with the goal of providing people of all backgrounds a genuine opportunity to thrive. 

Inclusion: We strive to create an environment in which everyone is included and feels valued to benefit everyone.

Global discourse about post COVID-19 and building back better, greener and differently highlights the importance of Internet enabled technologies. Investing in digital skills and entrepreneurship for youth (NEET) is vital to a sustainable and inclusive recovery. Solve will enable us to scale our Future of Work (FOW) skills programme, equipping young men and women with soft/digital skills, and real pathways to employment and entrepreneurship. Deliberate focus on digital skills fills a labour market gap in South Africa as an exemplar setting,  noting that 90% of jobs globally already have a digital component. 

Digital skills will help them to thrive in an African economy, which is transitioning to digitisation, with production being automated and digital skills are in demand. Digital innovation also enables access to health and education services and opportunities, manifest in civic engagement and enterprise level change. Targeted skills interventions ensure that the youth mainly women are not left behind as Africa pivots to the post pandemic context and become agents of change. The FOW programme is an approach that is gender sensitive, relevant, inclusive, accessible and non- discriminatory. 
Solve will also assist in establishing networks, innovate, and foster collaboration and partner with different key stakeholders to create an enabling environment for sustainable digital transformation. 

A partnership with Solve will assist us to fill in some of the gaps in our organizational capacity and expertise and also share knowledge and best practices.

Technological advancement is inevitable and will play a significant role in providing solutions for the challenges we face now and in the future. However, technology presents challenges within our organisation for necessary skills and expertise. The organisation is growing and need to embrace and adapt technological changes in our operations.

Technology helps improve communication as effective communication ensures smooth operations and high level of motivation as well. Technology advancement will increase the efficiency of YBT and serves time and effort involved in employing human labor and increases productivity, which is a huge advantage. Technology will also assist us in managing our projects from different geographical areas remotely. Technology keeps on advancing and hence a need for partners to provide support and assist with the most recent technological tools for efficiency and effectiveness.

Technonology provides an endless supply of knowledge and valuable insights. Having valuable insights puts us in a better position to deal with your target groups and be well prepared to meet their demands. Apart from that, technology helps us keep a close eye on our competitors and take necessary pre-emptive measures to adopt the latest market trends. With the implementation of the latest technological equipment, YBT can explore new areas to expand operations and technology advancement gives us a competitive edge, which makes us a better organization. This improves the overall reputation of our brand and enhances perception, which is vital for expansion.

The Solve team could assist us as follows: 1) a  Software Engineer will assist in the development of our online courses for both YBT and the community level organisations that deliver our programmes; 2) a User Experience Researcher could assist with monitoring and evaluation especially with regard to our user interfaces; 3) a Marketing Analyst could help us package and market our programmes and preparing sales/fundraising campaigns; and 4) and online Advertising Strategist could help in raising brand awareness and design marketing campaigns, leveraging our existing grants status optimally.

YBT would like to grow its networks, innovate, and foster collaboration with key stakeholders to strengthen the enabling environment for sustainable digital transformation and growth. YBT would also like to partner and collaborate with any strategic organisations who are looking to leverage "youth and digital dividends" and related sectors (e.g.ICT, digital banking, digital creative economy, green economy.

Over 90 percent of jobs worldwide have a digital component. Without digital skills, women and girls face technical and also gender barriers and often lack confidence to participate in the digital workforce. World Economic Forum (2020) data shows South Africa has made some strides towards gender parity; but not in the local ICT sector, where women make up only 23% of the workforce. The gender divide compounds the digital divide, a significant problem for gender equality and female empowerment as the country addresses its digital jobs gap.

 In South Africa, economic development and access to skills and the mainstream economy are skewed geographically and stratified by categories like gender, gender orientation and socio-economic status.  As digital technology is accelerating opportunities and impact all across the world, women are being left behind.  The FOW programme will equip at risk women and girls from marginalised communities with a new mind-set and skill set, enabling them to prosper and seize opportunities presented by technological advances and digitisation.  

The programme has potential to increase women’s and girls’ resilience, address socio-cultural perceptions and biases that creates barriers for women in accessing technological skills, promote gender equality in growth sectors and create a model for at risk women and girls to be employable and entrepreneurial in a fast-changing world. The programme will also generate lessons and engage with best practice and complementary interventions  so that outcomes can potentially be replicated in other African countries, leveraging YBT’s existing partnerships and reach. 

Digital technologies hold immense potential to improve marginalised people’s economic and social outcomes, yet challenges remain regarding women’s access to and use of technologies. Investing in digital skills and entrepreneurship for youth (60% bias towards women) (NEET) is vital to a sustainable and inclusive recovery, and to building back better. The programme offers a systematic approach that facilitates systemic change among a wide range of stakeholders that can help break down the barriers that prevent women and girls to become digitally literate and empowered, and access related jobs and small business development pathways. The project promotes ICT use, skills and learning; empowers beneficiaries as active agents of change; changes attitudes and expectations; and contributes to preventing gender barriers.  

The grant will assist us to co-deliver the FOW and digital skills programme to a significant number of women and girls, which will stress test our new blended learning methodology and provide useful lessons and outcomes that will evaluate scalability and replication potential. The programme will also enable YBT to grow its networks, innovate, and foster collaboration with key stakeholders to strengthen the enabling environment for sustainable inclusive digital transformation and growth. YBT’s knowledge platform with over 2000 active organisations from 45 African countries will assist in sharing knowledge, good practices, and campaigns to promote and incentivize women and girls to participate in digital skills development activities.