ConCiencia

According to UNESCO less than 30% of scientific researchers in the world are WOMEN and this continues to be done due to the social devaluation, the lack of quality education and the gap in gender equality that still exists in the world. On the other hand, artistic creativity is certainly the unique expression of humanity and it would be difficult to imagine a society where the virtues materialize with excellence without the creative color that art provides, but unfortunately we know the little intervention of women in art.

ConCiencia has made the decision to change this reality, creating spaces and providing tools for the learning and empowerment of women with STEAM methodology and conscious leadership. It will be in which women will have the opportunity to explore their incredible potential, all women can be leaders and creators of their own destiny.

The problems that we are trying to solve are:

• The gender gap that still exists in the world and in Ecuador.
• Lack of quality education with lack of spaces for expression, experimentation, implementation of science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics, 4 out of 10 university students are women who decide on a STEAM career, only 18% of rectories of universities are led by women because most of them occupy junior positions with a high percentage in management and little decision, less than 30% of teachers in the Higher Education System with PhD are women, only 21% of scientific articles in the world he has a woman for correspondence.
• The social devaluation that women still face, an example is the workplace: an Ecuadorian woman works an average of 77 hours and receives a salary equivalent to $ 295 and a 60-hour man receives a salary of $ 369 (average labor income) Employment is more difficult, the male unemployment rate is between 3.6% and female unemployment is at 6%.

ConCiencia is sure that contributing a space to generate a possibility of action with intervention and learning tools in the areas of science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics accompanied by conscious leadership as an integrating process of the daily life, many Women will come to empower their path and they will also be interested in these areas with a social, environmental and human tint, with this we are convinced that the figures would be different and the fate of women will be extraordinary.

ConCiencia will use various forms of intervention, both manual and technological, depending on the ages and needs of our target group, for example we are creating radio capsules with the participation of women from outside the project, guiding them in the use of their voices and in the management of a microphone to record and send your voice audios by electronic means such as cell phones, computers, tablets.

ConCiencia is launching challenges to generate participation from the target groups it will impact, by means of which we are checking interests, likes, sensations when participating, and what ideas they have to continue with us, we have been surveying our objectives groups to know their needs, what they want, what would motivate them to learn.

We focus on women of all ages divided like this:

• Women under 12 years of age: the construction of a kit for mad scientists in which they will include a manual to do experiments at home and to be shared in their community.
• Women between 12 to 20 years old: STEAM workshops and finally the scientific-art work will be carried out in their communities.
• Women over 20 years old: a 6-month laboratory where we are going to train women who have not had access to an education in the STEAM areas so that they can insert themselves into the workplace or decide to study higher education (they we will support your education).
• For all: the elaboration of radial capsules with STEAM themes for reflection, motivation for social action.

I am a woman and ConCiencia connects with the history of my life because it is thought from the needs and desires that I always had for myself and now for many women.

This project is focused on two objectives of sustainable development: 4 that speaks of Quality Education and 5 that deals with Gender Equality; I firmly believe that by empowering women with conscious leadership and generating spaces with STEAM methodologies, we can reduce the numbers that still exist in Ecuador. The idea is focused for action, for intervention, for reflection and learning, we are going to build community.

We provide tools and generate spaces of intervention with STEAM methodology according to age and in turn we share with the community, our solution is innovative because we empower more women to make them the future managers of more solutions for their community and the world , they are the ones in charge of new technological educational models, they are the future managers of new changes, it is innovative because we use technology and also the imagination at the door of all, within the reach of the majority.

In most cases we provide concrete solutions and it is for the benefit of many, but I propose a solution that also promotes a quality education and the action of more women for a true change in their reality, in their communities, in the whole world.

The project in general will have a web page where it will house all the information of our importance.

According to the ages, a different type of technology corresponds, for women younger than 12 years the experiment manual will include some examples of the creation of certain simple circuits.

For women between 12 and 20 years of age, the workshops will contemplate the intervention of initial, medium and advanced robotics through a programming system.

For women over 20 years of age they will have training to make web pages, programming systems.

The radio capsules are made by means of voice messages sent by cell phones, computers, tablets, and they are put together in special programs for the podcast (we provide tools for these radio capsules to be made).

We make the radio capsules with the collaboration of women from outside the work team, we provide them with the technological tools necessary to create them and we accompany them in the process, they can listen to our podcast.

"If we generate spaces and provide tools with STEAM methodology, the woman will be empowered to generate more collective action” 

Activities:

Generate spaces and provide tools with STEAM methodology

Outputs:

- Women under 12 years of age: the construction of a kit for mad scientists in which they will include a manual to do experiments at home and to be shared in their community.

- Women between 12 to 20 years old: STEAM workshops and finally the scientific-art work will be carried out in their communities.

- Women over 20 years old: a 6-month laboratory where we are going to train women who have not had access to an education in the STEAM areas so that they can insert themselves into the workplace or decide to study higher education (they we will support your education).

- For all: the elaboration of radial capsules with STEAM themes for reflection, motivation for social action.

Short term outcomes: 

Interest in new areas of learning, trust in herself.

Medium term outcomes: 

Create new actions with STEAM, more participation in STEAM, active participation in the program

Large term outcomes: 

Femal empowerment and agents of social change in their comunities

We are currently impacting 50 women from Ibarra and Quito, in one year we hope to impact 1000 women from Ibarra, Quito, Guayaquil and Cuenca and in five years we want to impact 5000 women across the country.

We are going to achieve this because we are making an alliance with Enseña Ecuador to increase the participation of women of all ages in STEAM.

Our five-year vision is to reach out to impact 5,000 women of all ages or older to become involved in STEAM-related areas.

We are going to achieve it this way:

1. Strong alliances with Enseña Ecuador and then with the Teach for All network, as an alumni of these organizations I am sure that I can have strategic alliances to scale in other countries that the network is located, as well as educational districts and communities.

2. Make strategic alliances with governmental and non-governmental organizations for the execution of our business models.

3. Apply to new opportunities for entrepreneurship in the area of business incubators or accelerators, seed capital, etc.

4. Make alliances with the House of Culture throughout the country, and with community radios to be able to broadcast our radio material and to allow the active participation of women from the same communities to carry them out.

5. Increased growth by word of mouth or by organized challenges to promote social action and that people continue to know us.

I think that the barriers that the project has at the moment is the situation of COVID19, however, I feel that it is also an opportunity to adjust details, to rethink the business model. Due to the situation of COVID, the important thing in many families is that they can feed themselves at least 3 times a day, or in many cases 1 time, but this has generated unemployment and economic imbalance and this greatly affects women as I had mentioned it in the first points when I was talking about the problem.

I think that covid19 has been presented as part of our path on earth, and this has to put us more interesting challenges to solve the path.

The way to solve it is to take with our team the clear idea of empowering more women in STEAM and that there are ways to collaborate in a voluntary way for women who have had the opportunity to have access to an education and involve more women. For your path to be different, then the way to solve it is not to let this be a barrier but an opportunity to achieve what we propose, I think that due to the issue of Covid, opportunities like Solve's have also been opening up for social entrepreneurship , and I believe that it is carried out with the same aim that the pandemic does not become an obstacle but an opportunity to manage new alternatives of social construction, that we empower ourselves on our way and that there are new ways of cooperating as a society.

We are a group of 6 base women, 3 are in charge of the content part, 2 are in charge of the communication part, and 1 is in charge of the administrative part.

The administration team, generating alliances, connections.

The content team does all the research, expression, experimentation for STEAM. The communication team is in charge of the communicational part in certain broadcast spaces.

We have an external person who is in charge of the Image of ConCiencia and we have the support of a graphic volunteer, she is collaborating in the production of scientific stories with shadow micro theater.

I think that the most powerful thing is when through your need it becomes an enterprise, I have not had access to the top of education in my country, I have always had an education that has not filled me in many ways, I firmly believe that if Consciousness had existed when I was young at this moment I would be doing and proposing more things than I have been able to do now. I studied food engineering and leaned towards education when I entered Enseña Ecuador, there again I was able to realize the low opportunities we have for people with limited economic resources and much more for women, this is where I once again affirm the need to do something by and for them. I have a multidisciplinary team, one that is aligned with scientific research, another that is a mechanical engineer, another that is an anthropologist and artist, another that is a social communicator, environmentalist and educator, but we are united by the desire to change our realities as women, as Ecuadorians.

We have three partner organizations at the moment: 

- Casa Cultural AContraluz, artistic space that provides education for the intervention of the arts. 

- Enseña Ecuador, an educational organization that through it we carry out our piloting.

- Scientific Disclosure, Quinto Pilar, colleagues who are committed to science and who collaborate with us with material for content.

In this link could you see the Canvas

We have a wide range of services and products that we are going to generate to be sustainable along the way, in addition, we want this to be an opportunity to generate jobs as well.

The services: children's programs for women under 12 years old, STEAM workshops for women 12 to 20 years old and more specific workshops for women over 20 years old, radio capsules. 

The products: scientific kit, podcast, pedagogical material for the workshops.

We are applying to Solve because it seems to us a beautiful opportunity to make our business model known, and mainly because we would love to receive mentoring and strategies from you, we believe that having tutors or people who can help you consolidate the work in a more structured way It is very beneficial for the path of our work, in addition to obtaining this opportunity we will also open our range of possibilities with more entrepreneurs, founders, experts who are looking for or who are already making great changes in their communities and throughout the world, also the Networking is important for sharing, learning and transcending. We are applying Solve because we firmly believe that collaborative work, assertively believing that it will allow us to obtain better results and also because one of the limitations is the economic reduction in which we are going to be involved by COVID 19, and this too It would be a great opportunity to access financial funds and be able to count on that so that our project does not die.

I think that our business model is very ambitious and for the moment we are managing it at the same time, but it seems to me that we must go by each age segment in order to have more control and management of the actions we are taking. Our business model carries technology, however I consider that if we have mentoring from more specialized people, we will have better results or we will get better what we are looking for. I think that marketing, media and exhibition is very important in what moves us, what makes us sense, so connect with people, of really understanding what they are all looking for and creating an environment of safe and trustworthy exposure so that we have to reinvent ourselves, sensitize ourselves, make ourselves visible and expose ourselves to be scalable along the way.

I would like to partner with Solve Members because I would love to be part of a network of entrepreneurs who collaborate with each other and also to create and enhance ideas from all parts of the world, it is the perfect opportunity to open your mind to more possibilities of action and make it the perfect excuse to continue contributing to our communities. I think that being in a place like this could help many enterprising people from my country to apply as well and that we can generate great changes in our connections and realities, it would also be an important contribution to contribute in what is necessary to generate a network of members even more powerful.

Solve Members would help to consolidate my project in a sustainable, collaborative way, it would give me tools and new experiences to put them into practice, being able to generate spaces for interaction is important to create new expectations and experiences for what you are proposing, in addition to knowing the realities of more people from other contexts makes one get rich from diversity and at the same time we understand that from wherever you come from, the needs are the same or very similar and the only thing we can do is act to change them.

The reason is because I was born in that need that my solution proposes, and now I want to support more women in order to have more possibilities on their way. I was not born in a space of privileges, but I have not missed all the opportunities that have been presented to me in life, and that is why, like me, there must be thousands of cases of women who want to leave anonymity and say here i am i can do it Our team will use the award to make all the actions it wants to achieve viable, and I dare say it is the opportunity to accelerate the process and increase the impact in less time, I feel that an education in STEAM (we have added art) , it is the best alternative for our realities, the mainstreaming and accompaniment of it in daily life is more powerful and meaningful, and the most important reason is to be able to empower these women so that they do not feel barriers to grow personally and professionally, it is and it will be the most powerful action that Conscience can do for them, because it is necessary, because it is vital, because it is reality, because it is just.