Young people from Mexico and Central America train in the creation of digital content about migration

From September 8 to 11, young people throughout the region gathered for the first group sessions of the virtual course "Let's take the social networks! Creating digital content on migration", created by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in conjunction with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). The course will be completed in the first days of October.  

More than 100 young people are participating, from communities in Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Mexico, where IOM implements Communication for Development (C4D) processes. 

The course aims to enable young people to acquire knowledge and tools to create, from their cell phones, digital content for social networks, with a comprehensive approach to migration. The curriculum includes six modules with explanatory videos and computer graphics that can be viewed on E-Campus, IOM's virtual learning platform.  

"This space is a creative laboratory, students receive general knowledge about migration and communication, but the ultimate goal is to really explore and tell their stories related to the issues addressed by the C4D campaigns in each country. The most important thing about this exercise is that the target audience of the processes has the opportunity to create and be protagonist of its contents and messages" explained Tatiana Chacón, Communication for Development Coordinator for the Regional Program on Migration Mesoamerica - The Caribbean.   

Fabiola Aquino, one of the participants in the course in Ahuachapán, El Salvador, commented on her enthusiasm for the contents of the course: "I find the use of social networks to inform the population about such an important issue as migration interesting. My expectations are to learn and to be able to disseminate not only information, but to be able to reproduce knowledge to others in the implementation of the networks for other topics of equal importance".

It is planned that some of the content created by the young people will be published in the Somos Colmena virtual community, which hosts the digital efforts of all C4D processes in the region. For more information (in Spanish), click here. 

This course is held in the framework of IOM's Western Hemisphere Program, financed by the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Population, Migration and Refugees, and the joint project between UNICEF and IOM Nicaragua: Institutional Strengthening for the Protection of Migrant Children and the Prevention of Irregular Migration.