Innovation Challenge 2022: Generasi Terampil – Young people find new ways to tackle community problems

Jakarta, 22 October 2022 – Close to 60 young people from various cities in Indonesia today demonstrated their innovative solutions for a range of issues affecting their communities at the Innovation Challenge 2022: Generasi Terampil Demo Day.

The young participants, ages 10 to 19 years, showcased innovations they developed in the form of digital (web-based apps, games and mobile applications) and non-digital solutions to address issues they care about, including education, reproductive health, mental health, the environment and tourism.  

The Demo Day is the final activity of the Innovation Challenge 2022: Generasi Terampil programme, initiated by UNICEF and Yayasan Daya Kreasi Anak Bangsa (Markoding) with support from the Provincial Governments of DKI Jakarta and East Java.

The Innovation Challenge was designed in response to research by UNICEF Indonesia and other partners that found major gaps in adolescents’ problem solving, critical thinking and communication skills. These gaps have been exacerbated due to large scale learning losses experienced by many millions of children and adolescents due to the pandemic.

The programme provides training and mentorship to help equip adolescents from formal secondary schools, vocational schools, religious schools and community-based learning centers with 21st century skills that are critical for the workforce. They also engage in a series of career preparation workshops.

Through a series of challenges and intensive mentorship, participants discuss a range of social issues and work together to think of innovative solutions through digital and non-digital means. The best teams advance to an intensive bootcamp where they turn their ideas into real prototypes, and then go on to demonstrate their solutions at Demo Day.

Since 2019, the programme has reached 12,693 adolescent girls and boys aged 10-19 years old from 296 schools across DKI Jakarta, Kota Semarang, and East Java. The programme has also engaged 1,214 teachers who assisted the adolescent participants to develop their skills.

“Every era comes with its challenges that we must be ready to tackle if we want the best possible outcomes for communities and countries,” said Katheryn Bennett, UNICEF Indonesia’s Chief of Education. “Equipping children and young people with digital skills helps them to solve problems with cutting-edge technology, while providing interactive and fun learning experiences. These are essential skills they can use to help enable positive change.”

“From the skills training, we learned that more than 70 per cent of participants who participated from the beginning and successfully joined the bootcamp are female. Contrary to the stigma, this has proven that when given access and opportunity to develop themselves, girls have the same potential as boys to learn and develop skills related to innovation and technology,” said Markoding founder, Amanda Simandjuntak.

The Demo Day is livestreamed through UNICEF’s YouTube channel (https://youtu.be/kbBUklRVLXM).

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For more voices from programme participating adolescents and mentors, go to: 

https://www.unicef.org/indonesia/stories/innovation-and-youth-superpower-coding 

https://www.unicef.org/indonesia/stories/markoding-challenge