News from DOT!

Hello,

We are delighted to bring you the latest edition of our annual newsletter. As we reflect on 2024, it has been a year of impact, collaboration, and youth-led innovation for DOT.

This edition highlights key milestones, including strengthened partnerships, program expansions, and the inspiring journeys of young changemakers across Africa, Europe, and the Middle East. From equipping young entrepreneurs with digital and business skills to advancing climate action and promoting gender-inclusive digital literacy, our network continues to drive meaningful change.

We hope you enjoy reading this edition, and if any of our updates spark your curiosity, don’t hesitate to reach out to us at [email protected].

- The DOT Team

DOT in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation

In May 2024, DOT officially announced six youth-led and youth-serving organizations to support the implementation of the Going Beyond Project in Tanzania and Malawi. The Going Beyond Project is a collaborative initiative by Digital Opportunity Trust and the Mastercard Foundation aimed at equipping 300,000 young people in Africa with technology and business skills to access dignified jobs and lead purposeful lives.

The first six partners include Hakizetu, Her Initiative, Sheria Kiganjani, and Songambele from Tanzania, and MHub and Emerge Livelihoods (formerly Mzuzu eHub) from Malawi. Engaging over 120 Youth Leaders as program facilitators, the project has already empowered more than 6,200 young entrepreneurs with business and digital skills, as well as business development support. Some participants have also received seed funding to kickstart their ventures.

In 2025, DOT is expanding the project’s implementation to Zambia and C?te d’Ivoire, partnering with nine additional organizations to further its mission of fostering youth empowerment and promoting sustainable development.

2024 proved to be a year of innovation, experimentation and transformation, catalyzed through the collective energy of young people - who continuously design and shape a path of change for DOT, their communities, and themselves.

Join me in welcoming 2025 with Marwa Deeb, Jean-Désiré Kouassi, and Wendy Shewiyo - three exceptional people from the Digital Opportunity Trust network who have inspired me through a thoughtful, honest and full-hearted conversation about our hopes, dreams and intentions for 2025.

I’d like to share our conversation with all of you, in hopes that it will inspire you just as much as it did me: https://dotrust.org/change-is-contagious/

- Janet Longmore, Founder and CEO of DOT

DOT Rwanda launched the Digital Skills for Employability (DSE) program, a four-year initiative in partnership with the Mastercard Foundation?and in collaboration with a consortium of local youth-serving organizations, including?Intango Technical Secondary School (TSS),?Igire Rwanda Organization (IRO),?Knowledge LAB (kLab), and?SOLVIT Africa.

The DSE program will equip over 10,000 young people—particularly young women—with the digital and entrepreneurial skills necessary to secure dignified and fulfilling livelihoods in Rwanda’s digital economy.?

DOT is pleased to announce the expansion of the DOT Climate Program with support from the Cisco Foundation. This builds on the success of the pilot climate project in Lebanon and Tanzania, which will continue in the expanded initiative.

This new phase, "Youth-led Climate Action at Scale," will broaden DOT’s climate program to include Jordan, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Kenya, Zambia, and Malawi, creating greater global impact while deepening the impact in Lebanon and Tanzania.

Click here to read more about the expansion.

Want to learn more about our programs and hear directly from the inspiring young leaders in the DOT Network? Visit dotrust.org/blog to read the powerful stories of impact, innovation, and the youth-led action shaping communities across Africa and the Middle East.