Glocal Hubs Spotlight: Abeokuta Hub

The YouthxYouth Abeokuta Glocal Hub came to life during Adekunle Stephens' and Precious Osemwonta's 2023 Weavership journey. Their vision began with the collective learning question, “How can we build self-reliant, hardworking, and independent Nigerians through digital training?” Inspired by this, they decided to organize free digital tech training for young people in Abeokuta, Nigeria.

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We asked Adekunle why it felt important to start this initiative:

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“In Nigeria, we have a huge gap between education and employment. Our education system is outdated, so we are still using old curriculums, and this does not really accommodate current trends [towards digitalization]. Moreover, before you can work in any organization, you need some job skills. However, all those skills are not really something that they provide for you…so after capturing all of this [the problems], we were able to come up with this initiative to give everyone an equal chance to be able to delve into tech.”

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In the process of bringing this initiative to life, the Abeokuta Glocal Hub weavers identified what young people were seeking and from this focused on four skills they wanted to offer through their tech training. These skills are web development, graphic design, product management, and data analysis. They found people with expertise in these fields who volunteered their time to train students in these capacities.

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On the 15th of December, 2023, the Glocal Hub officially launched their initiative, and trainees began attending their lessons three times a week with “tutors who later became their mentors,” as Adekunle says.

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This experience was so meaningful that during the Abeokuta Hub’s first in-person meet-up in January 2024, the idea emerged to extend the 2-month training to a 10-month program, consisting of 4 months of training followed by a 6-month internship phase. With the help and support of Youth Weaver Pearl Oriele Perumal, this became a reality.

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Currently, as of May 2024, all trainees have portfolios that showcase their experience and learnings from their training, aiding them in the current internship phase.

“We are solving a problem right now, we are leading people, we have created a community of people. We have been able to begin solving the problem of unemployment and the digital divide in Nigeria. Weaving this Hub has been a great experience” – Adekunle Stephens, Abeokuta Hub Weaver

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Looking ahead, the Abeokuta Hub plans to continue offering free digital tech training on a cohort basis and is excited to extend invitations for this virtual offering to young people globally, particularly those from other YouthxYouth Glocal hubs. They are also working on securing additional partners and grant opportunities to sustain and expand their initiatives.

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The Abeokuta Hub, a vision nurtured and woven by two inspiring youth weavers, exemplifies how young people are weaving local and global perspectives to influence, design, and transform their learning experiences, altering systemic inequality.

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To get in contact with the Abeokuta Hub in regards to questions, curiosities, or collaborations you can email them at abeokuta@youthxyouth.com