What we do

YAI works in countries that have been impacted by years of war and are striving to rebuild.  We focus our efforts on improving digital literacy amongst young people as a tool to help them break out of extreme poverty.   By providing opportunities for livelihoods, YAI helps to foster economic growth and thereby stabilize democracy by increasing access to digital literacy.   

YAI accomplishes its mission by establishing computer labs for high schools, hosting community based computer training workshops and creating applications that foster digital learning. 

This enables beneficiaries to access distant learning opportunities, qualify them for certain jobs, and creates new earning opportunities. 

In developed countries, digital literacy is embedded in learning from an early age. Similarly, medium income countries in Asia such as China, South Korea and India have prioritized ICT education as being critical to growth and development.  These investments have been instrumental in creating a highly skilled workforce, which attracts international investment opportunities. 

Africa lags behind in terms of this kind of investment in education and risks the chance of not being able to reap the full benefits from the digital age.  Although Africa has a large youth population with over 60% of its population being under the age of 25, young people have very limited access to computers or the internet. UNICEF estimates that only 34% of African households have access to the internet, only 8% of students in sub-Saharan Africa have access to a computer and 14% have access to the internet at home (usually by mobile phone). 

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