Students of University of Technology Sydney (UTS) have created an app that provides tailored education and advice to help young people support the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), also known as the “Global Goals.” The SDGs have been adopted by the United Nations to encourage worldwide efforts to reduce human suffering, protect the planet, and greatly increase peace and prosperity around the world by 2030. The full set of ambitious SDGs is shown here:
The innovate app is called The SDG Guide for YouthBank Teams and it can be run here. The app was developed by the UTS students using the Neota software-development platform in partnership with YouthBank International, a nonprofit that provides financial grants to groups of young people that run projects to create positive change for their community. YouthBank is making the app available to all the young people participating in YouthBank projects around the world to help the young people understand the SDGs and easily get tailored guidance on how a particular YouthBank project can be tailored to ensure that one or more of the SDGs is supported by the project. For example, if a project involves the sale of items to the public, the app might suggest specific methods of pricing and discounting to help achieve SDG 1, which is to end poverty.
The app is valuable to the YouthBank teams because young people can struggle to think of specific ways that they can help achieve the ambitious SDGs, which can seem so lofty. But with this app, in just minutes, the participants can describe their project and get narrowly tailored guidance on specific things they can do to ensure that their project makes progress toward one or more of the SDGs. A senior executive of YouthBank noted that “our partnership with UTS and Neota has delivered more than a software tool – it has given us true momentum by increasing the capacity of young leaders to shape their communities with clarity and confidence.”
To create the app, the UTS students, with support from Neota Logic, created more than 200 variables and more than 400 rules in the Neota platform to ensure that correct information is delivered to each user based on the user’s situation. And to help maximize the user’s engagement with the app, the development team created a diverse set of 22 AI-driven avatars that appear in videos and “speak” directly to the user to convey helpful information based on the user’s situation. Here’s a look at one of the app’s many avatar videos:
As shown above, SDG 17 is to form “Partnerships for the Goals,” which is encouragement from the United Nations for organizations around the world to work together to support the all-important Sustainable Development Goals. Neota Logic is proud to partner with YouthBank International and University of Technology Sydney to help young people become compassionate, talented adults who can spend their lifetimes supporting the SDGs and helping to make the world a better place.
