Digital ambassadors to teach ins and outs of wifi to Joburg
12 August 2015
The Jozi Digital Ambassadors Programme is a co-operative project between the
city of Johannesburg and University of Johannesburg (UJ) that will offer residents
the opportunity to learn how to access and use the various public wireless facilities
around the city.
Launched on 7 August, the programme will roll out over the next 18 months,
offering interested young people an opportunity to become digital educators to
residents and the chance to gain the digital literacy knowledge that will make
Johannesburg a truly connected city.
Johannesburg Mayor Parks Tau says the initiative forms part of the city's roll out of
1 000 wifi hotspots. Digital ambassadors, consisting of ambitious young residents
with a basic knowledge of IT and an innovative spirit, will be selected to teach over
700 000 city residents in the art of competently using and substantially benefiting
from the broadband connections in their areas.
Training of
the selected digital ambassadors will be given by UJ staff and students
from the engineering, IT, management and education departments. It will be hosted
by UJ's School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, using a cloud-based learner
management system incorporating open source learning.
"The digital ambassadors will enable the broader Johannesburg community to
engage with digital technology; for example, in online job-seeking opportunities,
banking applications and access to digital services," says Professor Johan Meyer,
the head of the university's School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering.
Digital ambassadors will be mentored in business acumen and given insight into the
digital world to enable their own innovation enterprises.
Interested young people can apply to be digital ambassadors through the Jozi@Work
portal on the city of Johannesburg website. Once selected and trained, the
ambassadors will be tooled with electronic tablets,
branded marketing material and
deployed in designated areas where free, public wifi has been installed. They will
teach residents how to access online services, including banking and digital map
navigation, as well as how to interact with platforms such as Jozi@Work and other
employment-search tools like the LinkedIn social network.
Joburg hopes its Digital Ambassadors Programme will turn entrepreneurial young
people into service providers who offer the crucial knowledge and digital literacy
that is needed to fully utilise its high speed broadband. In addition to increasing
Joburg's digital footprint, it is believed the programme will further create a platform
for innovation, economic growth and community development.
Source: News24Wire
Digital ambassadors, trained by the University of Johannesburg and powered by the city of Johannesburg, will teach residents how to engage with digital technology for online job-seeking opportunities, banking applications and access to digital services. (Image: Flickr)
