Why The World Should Pay Attention To The Nexus Between Technology and Children’s Mental Health

If you have ever been wondering what will happen to your under 17 children in this age of mass onslaught of technology on privacy, this age of broad day light data robbery, this age of destructive screen time, this age of game over books… then you are in the right place.

If you have ever been wondering what will happen to your under 17 children in this age of mass onslaught of technology on privacy, this age of broad day light data robbery, this age of destructive screen time, this age of game over books, then you are in the right place.

If you smell and impending danger for the world, then you are a liar. But don’t worry, your lies are backed up by data. However, in other not to be become a prophet of doom, why don’t you convert your anger to strength, why don’t you soro soke about where Technology is taking your children to. Is it a palace or a dungeon?

When I started impact 717 (formerly digital Peace Conference for Children) my assumptions were clear. Children are the most blameless demography but they suffer the most of our biases, inequality and injustices, especially during wars.

If this has been the case with physical man-influenced disasters, are we going to let this happen with biased Algorithms and AI?

If we are not going to let this happen, then what technologies are we going to leverage on to forestall this?

This is questions gave birth to many ideas. It was difficult to choose where to start in this seemingly infinite mass of tools to leverage on in solving a humongous problem.

Here are some of the things we initially arrived at:

I will involve research, planning and product design for a project that seeks to provide a digital platform for children to pioneer unique solutions to global peace and share their thoughts on threats to their future in four key areas (Wars and Forced Migration, Environment and Climate Change, Bullying in School and Domestic Violence at home). The goal of this project is to leverage on emerging technologies to give children the best experience in the (physical and) digital world and to prepare them for solving global problems while leveraging on technology.

The expected outcomes are an app that provides a kind online General Assembly(e-conference) for children to talk peace in comprehensive terms, a complementary physical conference that brings together children making outstanding contribution to local and global peace, an annual Forbes-like publication that profiles the outstanding contribution children make towards global peace and a book like electronic device that leverages on AI and Machine Learning to provide alerts and advice on mental health based on user’s(children) daily input.

Here is what we are doing right now:

We obviously have to start from something small. I have spoken at a handful of events related to children and Technology. But with the main tech work, we are starting with a landing page that comes with a waiting list. We are raising $10,000 in the next 40 days to start work on our website and a platform that will bring children of each of the 36 states (plus the Federal Capital Territory for our first 717 Peace Conference.

If have to invest in our children’s mental health as it relates to Technology. Designers and Developers are not sufficient to get this done competently. The have the skills but not the tools for the conversations and the money required, especially at the level of big data.

Thank you for reading. That’s all I need from you, right now.

@AmirSesay