There are many questions that people are pondering over during this lockdown — What would a post-COVID world look like? What does education and work look like? What about travel? "It is Gen Z who, we believe, are the problem solvers of tomorrow, who are thinking about this more than anyone else," says Aditya Soma, Executive Director and CMO of Worldview, an experiential learning company. Worldview is best known for their flagship event Harvard Model United Nations (HMUN), which they were going to organise in the month of June in Dubai.
Just like HMUN, they had many other plans lined up for the year and being an experiential learning company, they bring together children who are then required to work in teams in another city or even a country. While also those plans stand cancelled, they still wanted to help Gen Z discover the answers to the new problems plaguing the world today. That's where Gen Z Solvers Interactive comes in. It is a series of online sessions from various field experts to gain insight into all the questions that we have been asking ourselves lately.
To lay the groundwork, the leadership team made 200 calls to various youngsters and parents about what's on their minds. "They were wondering about what cities will look like, what will be the impact on the environment and a variety of things," says Aditya and adds, "That's how the interactive was born. Since we are in our tenth year, we wanted to do something in a blended format and this was it!" Thus, sessions like Global Citizenship In Times Of A Pandemic; For Most of History, Anonymous Was A Woman; Precious Water, You Are What You Eat were planned. Reading Nature, Writing Stories; The Miracle of Mindfulness, Stories From The Past For The Future, which are slightly lighter in nature, have also been lined up. "We chose the topics also keeping in mind the issues that Gen Z need to act on and where the opportunity lies," he reasons. "More than standing out, our aim was to be contextual for Gen Z," he informs and adds that the sessions are free and open to everyone. Gender diversity, climate change, sustainability feature prominently in the sessions. Stalwarts like water conservationist Kalpana Ramesh, Monika Froehler, CEO, Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens, Shalini Sarena Bahad - Founder, WomenInTech and many others will be speaking.
To spread the word, Worldview has been reaching out to everyone from their networks, educational institutions, teachers, parents and students and since students from various demographics are usually a part of their events, they remain positive about the fact that the series will help a diverse range of students. They are also going to record these sessions to ensure that they are permanently available and accessible to everyone, anytime and from anywhere. To ensure that the sessions remain interactive, and the bad network of the participants doesn't get in the way, they are circulating a number to which all participants can text their questions. And even if they are not answered during the session, they will be answered via other mediums, Aditya assures us. Another impressive move is the timings they have chosen for the sessions, 4 pm to 8 pm IST. "These timings suit a very large part of the world like Indonesia and all the way to Western Africa. We want to get through to young people from different parts of the world, our intention was to make it as global as possible," he says.
These interactive sessions are definitely not a one-time thing, they want to do more of them for specific age groups, specific communities and perhaps specific demographics as well. "We want to help everyone come out of this pandemic into a better world," concludes Aditya.
To find out more, check out worldview.global/interactive