Mariana Costa Checa was honored with her own Barbie. Is this one of the top highlights of this Peruvian entrepreneur’s life? I don't think so, but it's certainly interesting for a woman who dedicated her life to improving digital skills for women in Latin America and the Caribbean. She says it herself in a note: "It was really an honor that Barbie’s company wanted to include me on the list.
Over the past year, the labor markets in Latin America and the Caribbean have regressed at least 10 years-with 23 million people temporarily removed from the workforce losing their jobs and their income, according to the International Labor Organization. But the unemployment rate tells only part of the story in this region of the world. According to the ILO, there was an unprecedented change this year where many people just gave up looking for work due to the lack of opportunities.
Education is being challenged from many fronts: students are not learning what they need in the basics (literacy and numeracy); they are abandoning schools; they need to be prepared for jobs that don’t yet exist, and skills that were not traditionally taught (or at least not formally and effectively included as part of the curriculum and teachers training), are now in high demand. Schools are operating for a mass-production model and not necessarily for a knowledge-based digital economy.
Emma Näslund-Hadley, IDB Lead Education Specialist
Juan Manuel Hernandez-Agramonte, Deputy Regional Director of Innovations for Poverty Action for Latin America and the Caribbean
Kelly Montaño, Research Associate of Innovations for Poverty Action for Latin America and the Caribbean
How do you know somebody comes from a low-income background? In Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as in many other countries around the world, you ask a simple question: What school did you go to? That means that school is not precisely a great equalizer; unfortunately, rather the opposite.
The largest shift in the future of both working and learning is happening. In fact, this shift has been placed into “high speed” by the global pandemic that began almost one year ago. What does this shift entail, and why is it happening? Multiple factors have positioned youth and young adult unemployment and/or unemployment at historical highs. And the long-term ramifications of youth employment show that youth unemployment is directly related to adult unemployment.
It is very common for technology and digitization to dominate conversations and debates about innovation. However, innovation has other faces: those of the people who are at the center of the projects, the generation of knowledge and shared learning.
We have experienced this thanks to a wonderful alliance that was created 4 years ago with this innovation approach to promote the development of children in their first years of life in Latin America and the Caribbean: The Early Childhood Development Fund.
Guiselle Alpizar, Loreto Biehl (BID), Juan Manuel Hernandez-Agramonte (IPA), Ursula Luna, Laura Ochoa Foschini, Juan Maragall (BID), Carolina Méndez (BID), Kelly Montaño, Olga Namen, Emma Näslund-Hadley (BID), Brunilda Peña de Osorio (MINED) y Jennelle Thompson (BID)
Fake news, viral memes, hundreds of hours of video are uploaded to the internet every minute, 3.80 billion people using social media worldwide, users creating and sharing content everywhere. But have you ever considered what happens after you post a comment, upload a picture or a video on the “net of nets”? As Bill Gates said, “content is king”, but who should take responsibility for its accuracy and validity?
Emma Näslund-Hadley, Juan Hernandez-Agramonte (IPA), Brunilda Osorio-Peña (MINED) & Mariella Hernandez (Visión Mundial)