The YouthMADE Festival is a global celebration of youth creativity and innovation that invites students, educators, and advocates to showcase youth-led work. Leading up to the 2026 YouthMADE Festival, we are sharing a series of stories highlighting youth creators and changemakers around the world who are putting their hands, hearts, and minds toward projects and causes they care about.
In this story, high school student Ayush shares how he and his co-founder Jashith developed Tech4Equity to expand educational opportunities to young people in their community. Ayush is part of the Young Voices Council at Teach the Future, which was recognized with a YouthMADE Festival Amplify Grant in 2025.
We are Ayush and Jashith, two 10th grade students driven by a shared sense of purpose: to make technology education accessible to every child, regardless of background. Together we co-founded Tech4Equity, an initiative aimed at providing tech education to underserved students in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India.
Tech4Equity works to bridge the digital divide by providing underserved students with access to devices, digital skills, and quality technology education through workshops, open-source learning content, and hardware donation drives. Our goal is to ensure that every student has equal opportunities to learn, innovate, and succeed in a digital world.
How We Started
Tech4Equity began when we noticed that many capable students around us were unable to access digital learning due to a lack of devices, connectivity, and exposure to technology. This motivated us to start by conducting basic coding sessions and digitising the coding curricula of our partner NGO, Code to Enhance Learning (CEL). Over time, this grew into a structured initiative delivering workshops, open-source resources, and hardware support across communities, including digitised coding content that has received 20,000+ YouTube views and is now used in municipal schools across three Indian states.
Key milestones include building NGO partnerships, reaching 300+ students through workshops, collecting 250 kg of e-waste, refurbishing and distributing seven laptops to students in need, and raising $1,100 (₹1,00,000 Indian Rupees) to donate devices. We continuously refine our programs based on feedback from students and educators, making sessions more interactive and relevant.
Expanding Our Impact Through Futures Literacy
Our journey gained momentum as Ayush became a founding member of the Teach the Future Young Voices Council—a global youth network powered by Teach the Future, a nonprofit dedicated to futures literacy and equipping young changemakers with the skills to navigate and shape an uncertain world.
At Teach the Future, we learned how futures literacy expands our capacity to think critically and systematically about the future—not in the sense of predicting it, but in learning how our ideas about tomorrow influence the actions we take today. Frameworks like Foundations, Inbound Change, and Outbound Change helped us understand how our aspirations should drive purposeful action and how we could anticipate change in education, technology, and society.
Equipped with these futures-thinking skills, we set out to address a gap that went beyond curriculum—one rooted in access, opportunity, and equity.
What We’ve Learned
Through working on Tech4Equity, we have developed strong skills in content creation, teaching, curriculum design, public speaking, leadership, project management, and collaboration.
Ayush began recording lessons for CEL when he was 12, which helped us both learn how to explain complex ideas in simple ways for young learners and how to use feedback to improve our work. One surprising lesson was realizing how a small effort—like recording videos at home—could impact thousands of students across schools in the states of Maharashtra and Gujarat, especially when we later saw classrooms using the content and students recognizing Ayush during school visits.
Some of our biggest challenges included feeling isolated in the early stages and initially struggling to accept feedback, but we addressed this by learning to reflect, adapt, and stay focused on our purpose. Over time, this work helped us become more patient, resilient, and purpose-driven leaders.
Collaborating with partners such as CEL, Alkem Foundation, Rotary, Shikshantar, and Muktangan—while building Tech4Equity together—has helped us grow from individual contributors into confident changemakers.
How We’re Experiencing Powerful Learning
Our work with Tech4Equity exemplifies Powerful Learning because it fosters agency, purpose, curiosity, and connection. By designing workshops, creating curricula, and leading e-waste drives, students and volunteers are not just learning skills—they are seeing the real-world impact of their work, gaining confidence, and building a sense of purpose. Creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving are essential because they allow learners to take ownership of projects, adapt to challenges, and create solutions that genuinely matter to their communities.
Our advice to teachers is to provide guidance without over-directing, encourage exploration, and help students connect their learning to meaningful outcomes. Celebrate small successes and emphasize reflection—it helps students see the impact of their work.
For students, we encourage starting small, being consistent, and embracing feedback. Focus on solving real problems, collaborate with others, and remember that even small efforts can have a large impact when done with commitment and curiosity.
The Future of Tech4Equity
This project is deeply important to us because we have seen how limited access to technology can restrict potential, and we believe that empowering students with the right tools and skills can transform their futures. Through our initiatives, we aim to impact underserved learners by building their confidence, technical abilities, and readiness for future careers, while also strengthening the capacity of partner NGOs and schools.
In the future, we aim to scale nationally, build community-led learning hubs, and integrate advanced digital and futures-thinking skills. Individuals or organizations can support us by volunteering, donating devices, partnering with us, funding programs, and spreading awareness.
Showcase and Celebrate Student Creativity and Innovation
- Register for the next YouthMADE Festival Info Session to learn about showcasing student work at the 2026 YouthMADE Festival and applying for a 2026 Amplify Grant.
- Have a story about youth creativity and innovation? Share your story using the form on YouthMADE.org, or send an email to youthmade@digitalpromise.org.
- Follow YouthMADE on Instagram.
- Join our Maker Learning Collective LinkedIn Group for Educators.
- Register to attend World Futures Day – Young Voices on March 1 by Teach the Future.
- Topics: Core Content
- Programs: Global Education