FutureU

FutureU is a online careers advice platform that:

1) Aggregates real time job data and labour supply across industries & countries all in a single place

2) Enables disadvantaged 16-24 year olds to make informed decisions about what skills they need

3) Connects them to local organisations who support them developing these skills

Currently, according to Foundation of Young Australians 60% of young people are studying and training for jobs that won't exist within 20 years.

Consequently, the decisions 16-24 year olds make about the skills and career they pursue has the power to either break or entrench disadvantage.

What if you invest in career that gets automated? 

To make informed decisions about the future, you need access to information and this is the problem FutureU addresses. 

It provides disadvantaged young people with the critical information they need to make informed decisions about how to navigate this rapidly changing world. 

In 10 years of experience working with young people, the most substantial influences on their choice of study and career are their parents and their access to information and experiences on careers. 

The rapid changes in the world of work mean that parents are increasingly ill-equipped to support and guide student choices. This is further exacerbated for families experiencing socio-economic disadvantage.

Our theory of change is:

By providing young people with access to real time information on the changing demand for careers they can make more informed decisions about their career, future proof themselves and break the cycle of disadvantage.

Beneficiaries & Deployment:

FutureU will be accessible via a free web platform for young people aged 16-24 years old, their parents and school career advisors in Asia and the Pacific. 

Impact:

By providing young people with real time trends on the job market (demand and supply) across industries, careers and countries, the impact of FutureU is that it will help them make more informed decisions about what skills and careers they should pursue to future proof themselves. 

FutureU will also connect young people with local organisations who can help them develop these skills through training and work experience opportunities. 

Tracking the number unique users of the platform via web analytic tools - 1,000,000 young people, parents and schools in Asia-Pacific accessing our web platform to make study and career decisions

Tracking the number of inquiries to local organisations listed on the web platform - 100,000 young people connecting with local organisations to learn and apply new skills

User surveys and career quizzes to determine how student choices change through accessing the platform, and students perception of how it helped them. - 250,000 young people identifying that accessing the platform positively influenced their choice of study and career pathway

Our solution provides young people with real time access to job trends so that they don't make decisions about skills and training on outdated information.

We aggregate all of the data in a single place. Currently, all of the data on changes in jobs and employment is dispersed in fragments all over the internet and there is NO way for a young person to be able to easily work out what career and skills they should pursue.

The platform will democratize access to this key information by being 100% free for young people to use regardless of socio-economic background. 

This solution has emerged from 10 years of work helping thousands of young people across Australia answer the question, "What am going to do with my life when I finish school, and how do I get there?"

Young people we have worked with constantly complain that they don't know how to make this decision because they don't have any clarity or information on what careers are ACTUALLY in demand and growing.

We are building an advisory board of young people to shape and design the solution, so it's truly a platform by young people for young people.

Our solution will be accessible via a mobile responsive website, so that our solution works across all devices including tablets and mobiles.

Young people will also be able download and print career profiles and skill recommendations.

The website will be 100% free for young people to access as long as they have web access via a device. 

Referral Fees & Commission from Organisations

Our solution will link students with local organisations who can provide them with the training and support to develop the key skills they have chosen to pursue. We will charge a fee/commission to these organisations for these referrals to their business. 

Company Profiles for Recruitment & Hiring

Companies will be able to create profiles to showcase what they do and to be able to list jobs to recruit new team members. We will charge companies to develop these profiles and to recruit from our user base. 

Fees for Access to Data and Additional Research

We will be aggregating job data across careers, industries and countries. We will charge organisations to access this data - via our API, or tailored reports we provide them with.

Funding:

We currently need funding to build the pilot of our solution. We've created the specification document and now need to hire a UX/UI designer to create story boards, user personas &  journeys, wireframes and designs, before going to development.

Data:

The data we need is dispersed across the web in fragments and isn't available yet for ALL countries. In some cases we won't also be able to get matching data across the same categories for different countries.

Team:

We need to find a fantastic UX/UI designer, front end developer and full stack developer to build the solution. 

https://www.facebook.com/artofsmart/

https://www.artofsmart.com.au

We are applying to Solve so that we can develop and launch our pilot of our solution to better help young people make decisions about their future.

We are hoping that we can additionally connect with potential new team members through the incredible community Solve has developed that are passionate about solving this challenge for disadvantaged young people.

We would also love to develop partnerships with members of the Solve community to further enhance our ability to make difference by refining our solution and accelerating it's development.

KYDS (Ku Ring-gai Youth Development Service) and Code Create.

PathSource - careers app that provides data on jobs and career profiles for US only.