[DMYA] How would teens fund programs about youth and digital media?
The $10 Million Question
The youth at the recent Digital Media Youth Advisory meeting were challenged to develop their own foundation with its own funding priorities to address the following challenge:
You and your partner have 10 million to give to four organizations.
The organizations needs to meet any or all of the three following goals:
- Understand the role that digital media is playing in youth’s lives
- Support programs and policies that utilized the positive aspect of digital media
- Support programs and policies that addressed the negative aspects of digital media
The teens created the four following foundations:
SNARKIE FOUNDATION
Organization #1Name: GK News
How much you’re giving them: 4 million
What they do: Our mission is to educate what is really going on in the world. We would use broadcasting techniques to express our point of view, on such sites as You Tube.
Organization #2
Name: School Funding
How much you’re giving them: 5 million
What they do: Our goal is to ensure the education or students by providing suitable access to information. The Internet in schools would be limited to educational sites.
Organization #3
Name: Zapped
How much you’re giving them: 1 million
What they do: Our mantra is to give a space for anyone to interact and freely express themselves. It is an Internet website where people could design websites, set up their profile, have a daily plug and comment on other people’s sites.
SAMEDY AND DOLKER FOUNDATION
Organization #1
Name: No name
How much you’re giving them: 3 million
What they do: Support programs that allow young people to do their own recordings and have fun with music after a long day at school.
Organization #2
Name: No name
How much you’re giving them: 5 million
What they do: Support policies that limit the time of using the Internet [websites where students are attached to it 24/7. For instance, myspace and some others]
Organization #3
Name: No name
How much you’re giving them: 3 million
What they do: Support policies that restrict the invention of online games. This impacts the youth in a negative way – the time that they put into the games can be put into books.
NO NAME FOUNDATION
Organization #1Name: Global Kids
How much you’re giving them: 3 million
What they do: To help kids search better, get different experiences playing different games we create, and learn about world issues and media.
Organization #2
Name: Team Revolution
How much you’re giving them: 3 million
What they do: They help people create cloths and come up with names and also record themselves rapping and creating CDs.
Organization #3
Name: Faith Hope and Charity
How much you’re giving them: 2 million
What they do: They also help kids after school with different things to do like homework, dance, computer, artwork, poetry.
THE TEDDYG FOUNDATION
Organization #1Name: Yes to abstinence
How much you’re giving them: 2 million
What they do: They develop a game (like the sims) that promotes safer sex through game-based education.
Organization #2
Name: World Journal
How much you’re giving them: 3 million
What they do: Any young adults can access this site to report on local news to create awareness of world issue from many different countries.
Organization #3
Name: Digipic
How much you’re giving them: 2 million
What they do: Use digital cameras and video to portray the use of digital media throughout daily lives.
Organization #4
Name: DMC
How much you’re giving them: 3 million
What they do: The money provides the group to research how young adults use media in their life. They can interact and ask information.
After conducting this exercise the youth looked at what MacArthur was currently funding in this area and compared that funding with their own plans. After listing the groups that MacArthur was funding that addressed issue the DMYA also considered, they listed areas that MacArthur did not appear to be addressing, which included the following:
- Increasing access to computers for all youth
- Using YouTube or other participatory online tools to create and distribute youth media, in an organized way.
- The current funders are lacking social aspects e.g. how digital media can be used for promoting social awareness on local, national or global issues.
- The idea behind World Journal, where “any young adults can access reports on local news to create awareness of world issue from many different countries.”
- Develop a map that shows youth access and use of various digital media around the world and use that map to create programs that address the digital divide.
