Youth Connected: education and digital inclusion aims to promote the insertion, the protagonism and the autonomy of 45 marginalized young people aged 15 to 21 living in vulnerable conditions in favelas of Rio de Janeiro. The project will guarantee internet access, psychological support, guided group debates about citizen participation, and the essential democratization of access to information for vulnerable young people. Furthermore, the project will also improve their digital skills.
The vulnerable social condition of young people aged 15 to 21 from favelas in Rio de Janeiro is a corollary of poverty. The COVID-19 pandemic aggravates the social inequality in Brazil, with a heavy impact on young people from favelas. The social distance method to face the pandemic brought a new challenge to access information, to study, and to participate in social debate.
This project will provide the social and technological tools for the insertion, protagonism and autonomy of vulnerable young people aged 15 to 21 from favelas. The access to the internet combined with one year of educational orientation and psychological support to beneficiaries will pave the way for a new future with more opportunities and based on human rights, professional skills, and youth empowerment.
By promoting digital literacy, educational orientation and psychological support for vulnerable young people from favelas, this project will guarantee access to information by poor young people, stimulate a protagonist participation of them on social and political issues related to their lives and communities, improve their professional skills, contribute to their autonomy, and mitigate the long-term impact of the actual marginalization condition.