Name: Gauthamraj Elango

Organisation: F-infotech

Country: India

Stakeholder Group: Academia

Thematic Area: Digital Literacy and Empowerment

Session Title: Digital Literacy as a tool for self-empowerment

Session Format: OPEN FORUM (30/45/60 MINS)

Co-organizers Name (if any):

Speakers Name: Gauthamraj Elango

Speaker Status: Confirmed

Relevance of the issue with specified session theme: The goal of this session would be to give the initial idea that Digital Literacy can address most of India’s socio-economic problems. With Digital Literacy as foundation platform, when people develop skills to be self-learnable and self-sustainable they will be self-empowered. The ability to see digital tools beyond communication and entertainment to find answers to their unknowns can be a game changer.

Content of the session (Objective of the session): I will be delivering my research finding of the positive impact of Digital Literacy in the society. Over the last 1.5 years, I was running a cybercafe in tier-3 town of tamilnadu known as “Perundurai”. The purpose is to understand opinions, barriers, constraints and treats of people with diverse background and qualification regarding the Internet. We came across very interesting observations and findings leading to the hypothesis between education and digital skills. Based on the outcomes, we created a simple model for self-empowerment of common man with Digital Literacy as foundation platform.

What is USP of the session: The idea of self-empowerment of common man by helping them develop skills for self-learning and self-sustainability with Digital Literacy as the platform itself is our simple, clear but possibly very impactful USP. The simple idea is to make “every individual capable of finding answers to all their unknown” independently. Allowing them to explore different areas, finding their interest, develop skills and to create/find new opportunities.

Please describe how you will use your speakers and how their views/ perspectives /expertise will be included in the session: I will be delivering the session because of my direct involvement at the ground level during the research I can deliver with real time examples/scenarios. The big goal is to use Digital Literacy as foundation platform to develop skills for self-learning and self-sustainable that can lead to self-empowerment. This idea is only tested with a small group of people from Tier-3 city of Tamil Nadu. We expect to gather more diverse insights and broader picture to evaluate and make changes to our idea of “Digital Literacy as a tool for self-empowerment”.

How are you bringing diversity in your proposed session whether it is relevant to the specified theme?

When we say, empowerment of common man it includes both the genders so diversity is not a question here. However, we also aim to self-empower more women who can use Digital Literacy to explore, find interest, develop skills and make wonderful career growth from their place of convenience.

Relevant Tags (Minimum 3 tags)                                     

Self-empowerment, Digital Empowerment, Digital Literacy