Youth Forum@ICANN Hyderabad
3 – 5 Nov 2016
What is ICANN?
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is an international organization responsible for coordinating the unique identifiers – top level domains (TLD), such as ‘.com’, ‘.org’ and ‘.net’, etc, between computers across the world and building the global Internet.
ICANN holds their meeting 3 times every year rotating in different continents. Almost 2000 people from around the world is attending which they include industry experts, civil society, government representatives, reporters and journalists, etc.
For more information about ICANN and ICANN meetings, you may visit the following websites: http://www.icann.org/ and http://meetings.icann.org/.
What is Youth Forum@ICANN?
Youth Forum@ICANN was initiated by a youth-led organization, NetMission.Asia, one of the recognized groups under the At-Large Advisory Committee of the ICANN structure in Beijing 2013 and later on emerged to the NextGen@ICANN program with the collaboration and support from the ICANN APAC Hub at 2014 Singapore meeting. NextGen@ICANN has now become a permanent program of each ICANN meeting for youth engagement. The NetMission Ambassadors believe that the role of our next generation in the Internet world is more than a user only, but also a contributor as a citizen of this virtual world – “netizen”.
While they have been to many ICANN meetings and other Internet-related conferences such as Internet Governance Forum (IGF) before, they found the presence of youth is rather low and they think it is difficult to take part in the intensive discussion as newbies and outsiders of the community.
Therefore the idea of Youth Forum@ICANN is created to equip the youth on Internet Governance discussion and open their door to the ICANN fora. It aims to provide a platform for young people to understand the structure of ICANN and truly participate in the policy discussion.
About Youth Forum@ICANN Hyderabad
Youth Forum@ICANN Hyderabad is a 3 day program from 3 to 5 Nov 2016, seeks to raise interest and awareness of ICANN policy discussions among young adults in India, and to groom future industry leaders by engaging the local students. The program features a model ICANN board meeting where participants will be simulating the multi-stakeholder structure of ICANN and role-playing different stakeholders & constituencies to discuss a policy topic. Participants will be attending lecture by ICANN senior members, some of the main sessions of ICANN meeting with the additional internal discussions facilitated by the NetMission Ambassadors. ICANN Hyderabad is held from 3 – 9 Nov at Hyderabad International Convention Center.
Objectives
- Engage and capacity building for young adults in Internet governance participation
- According to the Pew Internet project in 2010, 93% of young adults aged 18-29 go online. Young people are frequent users of the Internet, and they are gaining access earlier in their youth. Yet they rarely appear in the ICANN discussion due to lack of information and knowledge. This would be a first step for them to understand Internet governance issues at the forefront with industry experts. As a strong believer of ICANN’s multi-stakeholder model, youth’s engagement further reinforces the diversity of the ICANN policy dialogue.
- Train ICT leaders in the future
- Via youth engagement programs, our vision is to see youth’s direct engagement in policy discussion in ICANN together with other industry experts. They will become the future leaders in the industry.
Expected Outcomes
- Raised interest and understanding among youth delegates on the ICANN policy discussion
- A statement/recommendation report on a current policy is developed with the youth perspectives
- Enhanced youth participation on actual policy dialogue of ICANN and equipped youth to take part in the multi-stakeholder governance model of ICANN
Affiliations (tbc)
Co-Hosts:
NetMission.Asia
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)
Co-Sponsors / Supporting Organizations:
Ajitora.Asia
DotAsia Organisation
Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad
Core Elements
ICANN Topics lecture
To prepare participants attend the ICANN meeting, get to know the discussion topics of ICANN is crictical. Lectures will be conducted to introduce ICANN’s governance structure as well as tech and policy topics such as DNS, DNS security, IPv6 addressing, IDN and New gTLDs
Model ICANN Meeting
Delegates will be assigned to unique stakeholder group within the ICANN Structure which is replicated the ICANN process. It is the time which the multi-stakeholder model be seen with different stakeholder groups exchanging their viewpoints and to discuss a specific policy issue currently discussed in ICANN. The whole simulation enables youth to understand different stakeholders of ICANN, and pass the discussion outcome to related working group to give actual input from youth perspective.
ICANN Community Members Meet-up
Veterans and long-time ICANN community members from the actual committees will be invited to mentor and share their experiences with the youth delegates. The youth participants are also tasked to attend the related-meetings of their constituencies or structure. It aims to bridge the delegates with the actual community and enhance their dialogue on the policy issues. Youth delegates can seek advice and feedback from the community members or mentor on their discussion direction.
Public Forum
A public forum is where all ICANN participants have dialogues with the board on various policy issues. Youth delegates are encouraged to speak up at the open microphone to voice out their opinion after the series of capacity building discussions and trainings.
Sustainable Development Goals
On 1 January 2016, the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development — adopted by world leaders in September 2015 at an historic UN Summit — officially came into force. The SDGs are on high agenda of the Internet Governance discussions where Internet is playing an important role in fulfilling the global goals. Ajitora will meet the youth delegates to share how Internet contributes to SDGs and Tx2 program. Brainstorming sessions will be held for youth delegates to innovate ideas/solutions to address the SDGs and social needs.
Program Agenda
| Date | Youth Forum@ICANN Activities |
| 3 Nov (Thu) (@ IITH Campus) |
|
| 4 Nov (Fri) (@ICANN Venue) |
|
| 5 Nov (Sat) (@ICANN Venue) |
|
Campus Location:
Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad
Kandi, Sangareddy – 502285 Telangana, INDIA
ICANN Venue:
Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC)
Novotel & HICC Complex Hyderabad, Telangana 500081, India
* Shuttle bus will be arranged for IITH students to travel to and from IITH and HICC on 4,5 Nov
Contact Us
If you have any enquiries, please contact Mr. David Ng at admin@netmission.asia
Registration
Eligibility
This program is designed for motivated undergraduate and graduate students from IITH and those engaged in Internet Governance relevant entities in India. As the sessions and discussions are conducted in English, a good grasp of the English language is preferred.
Application
For students in IITH, please contact Prof. Kataoka for registration.
(need info from Prof. Kataoka)
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