Infosys expands partnership with youth development program
Global technology services group Infosys is expanding its collaboration with Young Change Agents with the aim of reaching 500 students across Australia and New Zealand over the coming year.
Now more than a decade in operation and pushing towards 200,000 participants, Young Change Agents (YCA) is a social enterprise which works to equip students with the critical and creative thinking tools for problem-solving through a variety of programs.
The non-profit has partnered with Infosys since 2022, with the extension of the relationship to focus on YCA’s entrepreneurial ‘Impact Boss’ program and First Nations students in Australia, as well as Māori, Pasifika, and underserved youth for the first time in New Zealand.
“I’m very proud that we are expanding our CSR (corporate social responsibility) activities with our new New Zealand YCA program,” said Infosys NZ country head Patrick Kouwenhoven. “We have three schools participating in October for our inaugural program, a team judges all lined up, and I’m sure we’ll be seeing some amazing ideas and solutions from our young participants.”
The ‘Impact Boss’ program sees late primary and secondary students challenged to identify problems in their communities and then develop innovative social enterprise solutions by applying root-cause analysis and design thinking, before then seeing the idea all the way through to roll-out and beyond while learning about business models, finance, strategy, project management, and more.
Reflecting on and reframing challenges as opportunities while demonstrating to the students that they have the agency and wherewithal to devise solutions, YCA says, teaches not just business and entrepreneurial skills, but builds confidence by developing softer skills such as collaboration and communication, flexibility, adaptability, and the value of continuous improvement.
“I love seeing what happens when young people are trusted with real challenges instead of being told what their future should look like,” said A/NZ CSR leader Stacy Evans. “They already have the ideas, creativity, and potential to make a difference – sometimes they just need the opportunity. An idea, a problem worth solving, a chance to be heard; that can change much more than we realise.”
For Infosys, which first worked with Young Change Agents on its ‘Climate Action Youth Design Challenge’ on the consultancy’s free, equity-focused digital learning platform Springboard, the expanded partnership will also provide further volunteering opportunities for its employees, including as mentors and as panellists when the participating students are given the chance to pitch their ideas.
