WorldVuze

Building a generation of critically thinking global citizens using our unique safe alternative to social media for K-12 students

In a rapidly changing world, with a proliferation of ‘fake news’ and digital media, there’s a critical need for, and yet a marked absence of, safe K­-12 online spaces, where teachers can moderate and nurture meaningful and respectful diverse student perspective exchange and provide learning opportunities to foster innovation, creativity, critical thinking, social and emotional learning and skills building.

Many K-12 educators are concerned that current social media dialogue often occurs within an echo chamber, where individuals engage mostly with those who share their views. A 2014 report It’s Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens, found that students’ online communities are just as racially and economically homogeneous as their offline social networks (Boyd, 2014).

Moreover, digital media is not designed to be safe for K-12 student use and is often the root cause of systemic student wellbeing issues, such as cyberbullying. When interaction occurs among those holding opposing views, it can lead to harshness and student disengagement (Vanfossen, 2006) and contain personal insults and offensive language that, in the context of online anonymity without teacher monitoring, can turn into hate speech with racist, sexist, or homophobic tones.

Other technologies, such as Skype, can be monitored by teachers, however they’re not designed to ensure students can regularly access the broadest, most diverse representation of peer perspectives locally, nationally or globally or deeply explore these perspectives. Nor do they allow every student voice, including diverse learners, to be heard equally in the exchange.  Students outside the original exchange cannot access or add to the discussion. As a result, using current digital tools can reinforce Chimamanda Adichie’s “danger of the single story.”

Our solution was to build WorldVuze, an innovative safe social media alternative and free online global discussion platform for K-12 students and their teachers.

Our unique platform design allows students to regularly and safely share their own perspectives, as well as explore and compare the vast diversity of potentially every other student perspective around the world on local, national and global issues without fear of cyberbullying. In the process, students learn how to respectfully and thoughtfully engage in dialogue, both on and offline, with peers from diverse cultural, economic, linguistic and geographic backgrounds and become more aware of and open to world views outside of their own communities and social media bubbles.

As they collectively practice and build their social and emotional competencies on the platform, they also acquire the global competencies (i.e. critical thinking, intercultural communication, collaboration, creativity and problem solving), they’ll need to help them effectively tackle complex local and global issues as active citizens now and in the future.

Here’s how it works: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-NBDeTF_KU

Using WorldVuze, teachers have a free, unique and effective approach to support innovative, 21st century learning. Our tool has the potential to reach and connect millions of K-12 students around the world and ultimately help teachers build a generation of critically thinking global citizens who can effectively work together to tackle complex local and global issues.

Our unique WorldVuze design created a new, safe social media alternative and global learning community for K-12 educators and students.

WorldVuze is the only K-12 student dialogue platform providing a free, safe digital environment for teachers to connect their students with a broad, dynamic database of global peer perspectives and engage in meaningful, respectful discussions initiated by classes, non-profits, and experts on important social and educational topics and issues. It allows qualitative and quantitative exploration and comparison of diverse viewpoints, every voice to be heard, and ensures K-12 student privacy, safety, and educational needs are met.

Our solution would not be possible without our open source, web-based, online global discussion platform, WorldVuze, and the following embedded technology:

• A rigorous authentication component, allowing only K-12 teachers, their students and WorldVuze administration site access

• A profanity filter and flagging system, moderating potentially inappropriate posts

• A map interface showing global discussions as question icons

• A search and filter component to find questions by specific criteria

• A summary component showing a graphical representation of, and ability to drill down and filter, all perspectives, comments, and mindshifts (map connected)

• Individual user activity feed

• A profile component

• Student moderation controls for teachers

1. Implement single sign-on with major K-12 Learning Management Systems

2. Home page revision better aligned to our three key stakeholders (students, teachers, and partners)

3. Build partnerships with value aligned non-profits, science centres/museums and government

4. Create lesson plans to help teachers use WorldVuze to support 21st century learning

5. Grow from 3,500 to 25,000 regular student platform users

In order to support teachers to foster 21st century skills globally, reach the broadest global diversity of students as possible, represent their perspectives on the site and empower and amplify their voice to influence decision makers and successfully advocate for positive change in their communities, we plan to:

• Create a WorldVuze mobile app

• Create offline capability to better support classrooms with limited or unstable Internet

• Move from a bilingual to multi-lingual site

• Integrate our technology with more K-12 education Learning Management Systems

• Build partnerships with more regional, national and international youth-serving partners to access new and harder to reach communities

We'll work to complete our 12 month goals and 3-5 year plan, as outlined above.

This will help scale our solution, reaching as many teachers and students as possible, allowing for the broadest most diverse peer perspectives to be represented on the site, which in turn increases its effectiveness.

This also translates to more student insight and feedback available for each discussion, helping our discussion partners design youth programming and policy better aligned to students’ self identified needs. This will draw and retain our key value aligned regional, national and international youth-serving partners.

We connect 494 K-12 teachers and 3,498 students in 13 countries to over 14,000 peer perspectives on 426 discussion topics.

Students are:

• Engaged, connected to what they’re learning. “I feel like I matter, because of WorldVuze I respect other people’s opinions even if I disagree with them.” (11-year-old from British Columbia)

• Empowered

• Heard

• Able to help shape policies affecting youth and create positive change in their communities

Teachers can:

• Safely engage students and regularly support 21st century skill and competency building. One teacher shared “WorldVuze is an important way to create a globally minded classroom. This is 21st century learning.”

25,000 K-12 students and their teachers in 12 months across Canada will share, explore and learn together, hone 21st century skills and competencies and affect positive change in their communities. Scaling nationally, (see 12 month goals mentioned above), and current grants received will support this.

250,000 K-12 students and their teachers in 25 countries in 3 years by:

• Further integration with K-12 Learning Management Systems and other compatible education technology

• Partnerships with organizations (as outlined above) 

• PR and marketing

• Improved accessibility for diverse local and international communities (i.e. multilingual, mobile app, offline access)

Director of Technology (Amir Sobhi), built the WorldVuze platform with extensive knowledge of in-demand technology stacks, Director of Education (Ellen Palmer), WorldVuze co-founder with 15 years of administrative experience in K-12 education and Executive Director (Julia Coburn), WorldVuze co-founder with 10 years experience in the nonprofit sector.

Our combined knowledge and expertise creates a balanced skill set to implement the mission and strategies outlined in this proposal.

We also draw from the invaluable K-12 education, non-profit, finance, social enterprise, fundraising and legal expertise of and support from our board of directors, advisory board and teacher advisory board.

To ensure the integrity of our mission and vision, we’re a non-profit organization. WorldVuze is and always will be a free resource for K-12 teachers and students. Lack of funds is never a barrier to student participation, ensuring an equal playing field and encouraging the largest, broadest diversity of K-12 perspectives on our site.

Our existing revenue model supports the sustainability of our organization as we scale, by running platform discussion campaigns supported by value aligned non-profit partners, municipalities/government, academia, science centres or museums.

Our model has positioned us for long-term sustainability as we’ve proven there’s a market for our services by running multiple successful discussion campaigns in the past (with UNICEF Canada, Kids Help Phone, Canadian Heritage and the Children and Youth Planning Table). We believe that opportunities to host discussions on our platform will expand proportionally as we scale across Canada and internationally.

Additionally, the opportunities our model affords to empower and engage students and hone 21st century skills in the process, supports innovative K-12 student learning aligned with the interests of the K-12 education community we serve.

We are applying to Solve as we believe it can help us gain recognition in the K-12 education market, grow our K-12 user base and deepen the impact of our technology in K-12 classrooms around the world.

We are particularly interested in the support we can access from mentors with knowledge in software development, K-12 education, diverse international markets, and reaching and supporting underserved communities. We’re also excited about the possibilities to connect and build critical partnerships that can help us to scale.

We believe Solve can help support:

1. Building strategic regional, national and international partnerships (with the types of organizations we mentioned we’re currently working with above) to scale our technology

2. Access to additional funding opportunities through grants (via connections, references, partnerships) that can further our software development (i.e. create a mobile app, support multiple languages, offline capabilities) and grow our team to support expansion

3. Greater exposure in the K-12 education market and PR and marketing efforts to build increased awareness about our WorldVuze platform technology with K-12 teachers, students, and potential partners