Project 02OngoingDigital Skills & Youth Employment

Computer for Youth – SURCOD Innovation Hub

Digital skills, innovation and pathways to education and employment for rural youth.

SURCOD's Computer for Youth work began as a practical response to the digital divide facing young people in Chikwawa. The initiative combines computer literacy, innovation, entrepreneurship and exposure to further education, and evolved into the SURCOD Innovation Hub as a longer-term platform for youth skills development.

Location: Chikwawa Boma, Chikwawa District, Malawi
Dates: 2018 – ongoing
Countries: Malawi
Youth participation: 24 youth reached in the first funded phase; later cohorts continue through the Innovation Hub

Project overview

A community digital hub built around practical opportunity.

The original Computer Lessons for Youth Development and Employment project was launched in November 2018 with support from World Connect. It responded to limited access to tertiary education, employment opportunities and productive spaces for young people in Chikwawa.

The computer centre developed into the SURCOD Innovation Hub in Chikwawa Boma, a space where young people learn digital skills and develop practical ideas for employment, enterprise and community innovation.

Related SURCOD programme

Youth & Digital Innovation →

Objectives

What the initiative set out to achieve.

Build practical computer literacy among young people with limited access to digital technology.

Improve young people's readiness for employment, further education and self-employment.

Create a productive youth space that supports creativity, innovation and peer learning.

Connect digital skills with entrepreneurship and locally relevant problem-solving.

Strengthen pathways between local youth development and international learning opportunities.

Methodology

Hands-on, practical and connected to real opportunity.

The initiative uses hands-on training rather than classroom-only instruction. Participants learn by using computers directly, completing practical tasks, experimenting with enterprise ideas and working together in an innovation-hub environment designed to keep digital learning connected to real opportunities.

Activities

Training in Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint and general computer literacy.
Introduction to designing, coding and web-development concepts during the first funded phase.
Innovation-hub activities combining technology with creative enterprise and environmental ideas.
Training in production of marketable products as an additional livelihood pathway.
Exploration of locally relevant innovations, including drip-irrigation concepts and organic-waste solutions.
Linking participants to further education and international youth-learning opportunities.

SURCOD implementation role

A locally managed platform for digital learning and innovation.

✓SURCOD established and managed the computer centre and later the Innovation Hub in Chikwawa.
✓Local facilitators provided practical computer and innovation training to participating youth.
✓SURCOD connected the hub with external partners and technical collaborators.
✓The organisation used the space to combine digital learning with entrepreneurship and community problem-solving.
✓SURCOD supported participants to identify education and international learning opportunities beyond the training centre.

Results

Skills that opened pathways beyond the training room.

24 youth gained computer and innovation skills

By March 2019, 24 young people were learning computer and innovation skills through the centre.

14 participants completed the first training cycle

Fourteen participants completed the first six-month programme in Microsoft Office and additional digital skills in 2019.

6 progressed further in education

Six participants from the first training cycle used their new skills and confidence to continue their education in 2019.

3 joined an international youth exchange

Three participants travelled to Frankfurt, Germany in June 2019 and developed an online-shop concept for youth-made products.

Impact and follow-up

The first funded phase demonstrated that a community-based digital centre could give rural youth practical technology skills while also creating pathways into further education and international learning.

SURCOD subsequently maintained and developed the concept as an Innovation Hub, extending the original investment into a longer-term youth-development platform rather than treating computer training as a one-off course.

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