Facilitating Communication in the RCE Americas Youth Network Case Study Presentation Ms. Melissa Sanchez, RCE Borderlands México-USA & Ms. Brittany Foutz, RCE Greater Atlanta 8th Americas Regional Meeting 23-25 September, 2019, Burlington, USA

1. Facilitating Communication in the RCE Americas
Youth Network
A Presentation by
RCE Borderlands Mexico-USA, Melissa Sanchez,
and
RCE Greater Atlanta, Brittany Foutz
RCE Americas 2019 Meeting
Burlington, Vermont

2. Background of the Facilitators
Melissa Sanchez Brittany Foutz
Brittany is a Professor in the Department of
Conflict Analysis and Dispute Resolution at
Salisbury University in Salisbury, Maryland (120
miles from D.C.). She is a Research Fellow with
the Woodrow Wilson Center (one of the top ten
think tanks in the world), Senior Research Fellow
with the Bosserman Center of Conflict
Resolution and Research Associate, has been a
Program Manager with the United Nations
Institute for Training and Research’s CIFAL
Division. She speaks five fluent languages.
Melissa Sanchez is a third year law student at
Universidad La Salle Chihuahua. She is one of
the Youth co-coordinators of the RCE BMU. She
is one of the founders of CIERVO (a group
created by university students to overcome
social conflicts, currently a part of 4 local
universities), she teaches in the language center
at her university and she participates with local
projects to help shape society. She speaks 3
fluent languages.

3. The Role of Technology in Facilitating
Communication and Implementing the SDGs
● Technology and innovation are central to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
● When utilized effectively, technology can be mobilized to identify barriers to and provide solutions for
sustainable development challenges from the local to global level.
● To reap the full benefits of technologies, it is also important to understand the social, cultural,
political, regulatory, environmental, and economic factors influencing access to technologies. This
includes several ongoing policy agendas within the UN system:
○ intellectual property rights
○ technology transfer mechanisms
○ technology banks
○ efforts to strengthen statistical capacity

4. The Role of Youth: By youth, with youth, for
youth
● Youth have the creativity, the potential and the capacity to make change
happen – for themselves, for their communities, and for the rest of the world.
● The innovative potential of young people, combined with the power of
technology, is already proving to be a powerful force on the road to achieving
the Sustainable Development Goals.

5. The world today is home to the largest generation of young
people in history, 1.8 billion
● Aged 10 to 24 years
○ Noting that there is no universally agreed international definition of youth and while
recognizing that the UN Secretariat for statistical purposes defines ‘youth’ as those persons
between the ages of 15 and 24 years
● Close to 90 % of them live in developing countries, where they constitute a large proportion of the
population.
● Connected to each other like never before, young people want to and already contribute to the
resilience of their communities, proposing innovative solutions, driving social progress and inspiring
political change, in urban as well as rural contexts.

6. Questions raised at the 6th Economic and Social
Council Youth Forum at the UN
● What measures must be undertaken to bridge the technological divide?
● How can youth digital engagement via social media be harnessed into real
world solutions to implement the sustainable development goals?
● How are youth already leveraging appropriate technologies in their local
communities to achieve the SDGs?

7. ● Barriers in collaboration in RCE Americas locations
○ Language
○ Distance
● Practices of innovative technology and education for sustainability.
● Implementation of a social media campaign with the Americas locations’
youth networks
● Using the tools in our toolbox: Facebook, Instagram
● United Nations Peacemaker Digital Toolkit
The Role of Technology in Facilitating
Communication and Implementing the SDGs

8. Healthy Food Challenge
● Posting photos of nutritional and healthy
food and beverages
● Each month is a different city to run/bike a
marathon. Can calculate all the miles to
see how everyone in the entire world.
● #UNwellbeing #salud, #bienestar,
#goodhealth, #wellbeing, #sdg3

9. Emma Watson Book Challenge
● Actress Emma Watson started a global,
monthly Goodreads book club of feminist
texts. She's recruited a team to hide books
for people to find all over the world. She
once took a year off from acting to read
more (really!). She even allows everyone to
keep tabs on her growing reading list.
● #protecteducation, #protegarlaeducacion,
#sdg4, #qualityeducation,
#educaciondecalidad

10. Water Security Project
● Some kind of competition to get clean
water to more communities. Find
communities that lacking water.
● Water.org sponsorship
● #water.org, #cleanwater #sanitation,
#agualimpia, #saneamiento, #sdg6

11. Lights Off City Challenge
● Challenge a particular city: turn off light at
certain time every day.
● Each month is a different city.
● #sdg11, #sustainablecities,
#ciudadessostenibles

12. https://hashtagify.me/
This website helps explore
popularity, correlations,
trends, top language and
spelling variants, and usage
patterns. One can see the
top influencers that use the
specific hashtag.

13. https://tagboard.com/
The Pinterest of hashtags. Tagboard is a great way to get a quick, visual snapshot of how a hashtag
is being used across multiple platforms. One can also see hashtags that are linked to the one
searched for, which is handy for major events that often have multiple hashtags.

14. Conclusion and Questions
Our contact information:
Melissa Sanchez
melysnchz4@gmail.com
Brittany Foutz
blfoutz@salisbury.edu