This week at the Youth-n-Democracy Fellowship, fellows were introduced to the topic of Digital Advocacy. The session was facilitated by Ms. Nitya Sriram from Martha Farrell Foundation and aimed at imparting the skills for digital advocacy. The session started with a brief discussion around the importance of social media. Fellows shared about its ability to connect and network, learn about issues and organization, platform for youth to lead change, as some of the reasons. Nitya further helped fellows in having a better understanding of the importance of using social media platforms. Social media platforms can be used for building solidarity, awareness, decision-makers attention, policy action, information sharing, coordination and collaboration, immediate relief, and mobilization, she added. For example, journalists try to bring light to the issue, which is often left out by traditional media through their social media platforms.
Later, fellows were sent into groups where they briefly shared some of the strengths and challenges of using social media platforms. After the stimulating sharing, fellows were introduced, with steps of developing digital campaigns. Ways for developing content strategies, smart goals, among other steps, were discussed in length. Fellows, through case studies, formulated smart goals and came up with innovative ideas and strategies for designing digital media campaigns. These insightful discussions enabled the fellows to think about the use of digital platforms and tools for digital advocacy for their social action projects.