Paths in the Digital Era

Imagine

Imagine you are starting over. Your possessions have vanished. Your career has been erased. Your network, your finances, your experience, and your education have all disappeared too. You are left with only your innate, unpracticed talents and the will to succeed. Put your phone down, close your computer, and imagine it for a moment.

Chances are you overlooked something critical in this exercise: Your Literacy.

The theme of International Literacy Day this year is “Promoting literacy in the digital era to empower youth.” We at Asante Africa Foundation recognize that reading and writing are paramount, and today’s learners must become double literate. First in language skills and then in technologies like computers and internet tools.

Advancing in education increasingly depends on the digital landscape, as do areas of livelihood like competition, commerce, and even functions of daily life. Those without opportunities to build digital and technology literacy will not realize their full potential. This is the concept of the digital divide.

We think of the digital divide as a river. On one side, there is a city with abundant access to the tools of momentum. A place where each success cascades into new opportunities. Where people can achieve their highest potential in education and then flourish in life with a little hard work. From the other side, that city looks like a futuristic neon metropolis. It is held fixed at a distance. And only the blinking lights cut through the infinite fog.

Lighting the Path

For nearly two decades, Asante Africa Foundation has helped learners in East Africa build paths into digital literacy. In 2024 alone, Asante Africa Foundation engaged with 2,500 teachers and parents in 163 schools and communities, reaching well over 140,000 lives.

Many students do not have routine access to the internet or computers, so the Accelerated Learning Program is often their introduction to digital learning. This program endows teachers with specialized training and leads many students to create their own businesses. In 2024, there were 464 scholarships granted, based on merit and/or need, to get them started.

For learners who have gained momentum, the Youth Livelihood Program and DEEP Initiative continue that support into the next level. These programs have helped award IT and Developer certifications using real world experience with partners like Google, Cisco, Salesforce, and Amazon. It even includes computer programming studies, which feature game coding challenges to keep it fun!

But these students do not simply learn the material and go home. Many are pushed much further. Partnering with King’s Trust International, Asante Africa Foundation has implemented the Enterprise Challenge program in East Africa. In it, youths develop and pitch their own unique business plans at local, regional, and national competition levels. They are supported through the process with feedback and coaching. The national winners receive startup capital to implement their vision.

Asante Africa Foundation’s CEO, Geoffrey Kasangaki says of the program:

"This partnership is accelerating the depth of learning and broadening the reach to more rural young people who are frequently forgotten. We have first-hand experience that young people, when given the tools and knowledge, will collectively solve challenges their communities face and make money doing it."

By the time they are graduates, students have honed an ability to think big. As Africa’s underdeveloped energy and IT infrastructure is stressed by the growing number of digital users, it will take a new generation of problem solvers to meet these challenges at scale. We believe the will, talent, intellect, and ingenuity are all present in the youth we serve. It is only a matter of getting them on the path that equips them to move forward.

Clicks

Many of us have forgotten the first time we opened a computer and learned how to use a mouse and keyboard. It has become part of the day-to-day activity we take for granted. But there is a student doing that for the first time right now, eyes wide with delight, and perhaps even a little nervous!

As you think about International Literacy Day, we ask you to consider what you can do to promote literacy. How can you help a student begin to cross the river into the neon city? If you are motivated to contribute, we welcome your partnership.

Readable at Asante Africa Foundation

Listening Hard: Why Asante Africa Foundation Remembers
the Soweto Uprising

The Echo

There is an echo that has traveled for nearly 50 years. It bounces from student to student, school to school, through communities and over borders. To new generations of learners.

They are the reverberations of a 12-year-old, who made a sign, stood up, and cried out against the dogs, the tear gas, the guns, and a government that did not listen.

It resounds through all of Africa and reaches outward over the oceans. It is the decree of ten thousand children, which says:

“I have a right to learn.”

In the weeks leading up to the Soweto Uprising (which began on June 16, 1976), the South African government issued a mandate that Afrikaans would become the required language of instruction in schools. The immediate effect of this change meant pausing the educational development of children and teens who relied on classes that supported instruction in their indigenous languages.

After teachers, parents, and other well-meaning adults failed to prevent the measure, ten thousand youths rallied in peaceful protest to defend their dignity and education. The event turned tragic when several of them lost their lives in an escalation with law enforcement. In the following protests and riots, hundreds more lost their lives. These events drew international attention to apartheid and contributed to its ultimate dismantling many years later.

Why We Still Listen to The Voices of 1976

At Asante Africa Foundation, we do not advocate for violence of any kind. We also do not shy away from historic events. Because it is only by looking back that we can measure change. There is still much progress to make across the continent.

Our ongoing efforts in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda provide tools and resources for learning life skills. We believe that education is the medium that empowers local youth to first thrive as individuals, and as a result, improve their communities with enduring change. As our founding board member, Charles Waigi, said:

“Enriched minds will collectively find solutions to all other problems. Enriched minds come from quality education.”

Today, as we reflect on the events of the Soweto Uprising, we take the time to grieve for those lives lost so long ago… yet not so long ago. We refuse to let the echo fade out into the distance. Instead, we open ourselves and let it resonate within, even though it is difficult to do so.

As each new generation discovers how to self-advocate and channel their determination, it is crucial that those who hold power discover how to hear them. We recognize our own organization as one that holds some influence over the outcomes of young learners.

Thus, it is clear:

Our Mission Is to Listen Hard

We remember the Soweto Uprising in the hope that children will never again feel compelled to march in defense of their education. That progress will flourish and speak louder than any protest. That the boldness, ingenuity, and determination of young people will remain channeled directly into opportunities for learning and growth. That those opportunities are kept stable, viable, equitable, and well protected. And that our participation in those outcomes is aligned accurately with the true needs and the will of this generation.

Readable at Asante Africa Foundation