DTCs’ digital skills as the basis for sustainable development

Last week, our General Secretary Josef Noll and Digital Inclusion advisor Danica Radovanovic, participated and presented at the ITU in Geneva, Switzerland. From 11 to 13 February, 2020, the ITU organized meetings for the Digital Transformation Centers (DTC) project  - Phase 1. The primary function of DTCs are to deliver digital skills training to enhance digital literacy and foster uptake of digital tools among those at the bottom of the social pyramid and to improve livelihoods, and thus, bridge the third level of digital divide. Also, DTCs aim to improve the capacity of policymakers to design and implement digital skills programmes, and further conduct them to ensure scalability and self-sustainability in digital skills capacity development.

Ten DTCs have been selected for the first phase which will run for 18 months from January 2020 to end of July 2021. The 10 DTCs have been selected from Africa (4), Americas (3), and Asia Pacific (3) regions. At the end of the first phase, an open call will be made for more potential DTCs to join the network.

We presented and participated in a session where we proposed strategies to scale and reach underserved communities. During this session, various strategies to scale was discussed, taking into account the national demand for training (demand driven strategy), and the institutional capacity of the DTC to address the national demand (capacity- driven strategy). The strategy discussions reviewed the approach towards target setting for the DTCs as well as establish the framework for setting KPIs. Finally, the session covered the train-the-trainers programme, as a sustainable tool to reach the different communities.

Josef Noll talked about strategies for scalability towards digitally empowered Societies, implying the steps from digital transformation to societal empowerment. Danica Radovanovic offered solutions such as open source software that can freely be used to create and deliver open learning resources, thus scaling digital skills programs. This is actually a great way for scalability of digital transformation centers and spread digital skills to wider audience including nonprofit organizations and governments of low income countries.

You can take a look at our presentation and topics we talked about here.