Boosting Cardano In South Africa

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem.

Boost the adoption of Cardano and Project Catalyst through a grand outreach event for university students, developers, and business personnel in South Africa 🇿🇦.

[GENERAL] Summarize your relevant experience.

The project will be supported and mentored by Catalyst School and Wada with the goal of boosting the Cardano adoption rate in South Africa.

The beautiful images in the attachment section of the proposal confirm our experience and past successes in terms of events and outreaches.

[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

This is an improved version of our Fund 7 proposal (which received good rates and approval by the community but unfortunately didn't get funded) with regards to helpful advice received from Community Advisors. This time, we hope to get funded and implement the project successfully as we have reflected and provided answers to all relevant questions and suggestions in this draft.

Our solution is to host an appropriate outreach event where South African students, business personnel, and developers will feel welcome and learn about all they would need to know about Cardano and Catalyst on the basic level. Aside from education, participants will have the opportunity to interact and communicate with the tutors and themselves. With this initiative, we are focused on educating members on the following topics:

• Introduction to Blockchain: Kaelo Lentsoe (Cape Town, South Africa)
• Introduction to Cardano: Bernard Sibanda (Johannesburg, South Africa)
• Introduction to Project Catalyst: Nana Safo (Accra, Ghana)
• Introduction to the Cardano Dev Tools: Bernard Sibanda (Johannesburg, South Africa)
• Introduction to Cardano Wallets: Richmond Oppong (Accra, Ghana)

Proposal Structure

• The great outreach event will be hosted on the 60th day of getting funded.
• This is going to be strictly a face-to-face event as the government has issued new COVID-19 regulations that allow face-to-face public gatherings. You can read more from these links: https://www.capetown.travel/new-covid-19-regulations/ & Updated Covid rules for schools in South Africa (businesstech.co.za
• Both online and offline marketing strategies will be used to create awareness. 
• The target audience would include university students, developers, businessmen and women, and government officials residing in South Africa 🇿🇦.
• We target having no less than 100 participants show up at the event.
• The event will be hosted in the city's central (Cape Town).
• Slideshows for the presentation shall be created by the core team members and verified by the Catalyst School to ensure the safe delivery of rightful information.
• We’ll create social media pages (WhatsApp, Telegram, and Discord) to onboard and engage attendees for subsequent events and workshops.
• We’ll help participants set up their Cardano wallets, preferably Yoroi and Nami, to make their first token purchase and delegation.
• This will be the first of many outreach events to be hosted by the team with the aim of spreading Cardano awareness in the South African region.

[IMPACT] Please describe how your proposed solution will address the Challenge that you have submitted it in.

The solution will increase the number of South Africans interested in the growth of the Cardano Community. At the end of a successful implementation, there will be an increase in the number of catalyst participation, the quality of Project Catalyst projects coming through from the South African region, an increase in the number of Cardano Dev participants, and an increase in the number of individuals from South Africa, interested in blockchain. 

Our main aim is to ensure that South Africans, especially university students, business personnel, developers, and government officials, are exposed to the accuracy of information revolving around blockchain, its capabilities, and most importantly, the opportunities it has for everyone. Hence, we will be required to host many more outreach events like this to achieve such a goal.

[IMPACT] What are the main risks that could prevent you from delivering the project successfully and please explain how you will mitigate each risk?

• Attendance: Natural people are skeptical about things they do not understand. This can affect attendance. The alternative solution is simply distributing blockchain content through marketing channels and using concepts that they can relate to. Another alternative solution is direct marketing, to approach university departments, business personnel, developers, and government officials.
• Inflation: It is clear from several projections with regard to the current status of the global economy that it is being hit by several negative factors, of which the Russia-Ukraine war is key. This has led to the upsurge in prices for goods and services in the past few months and thus projects that costs will definitely shoot up a little more in the coming months. This is a huge risk that might affect the successful implementation of this project since it's heavily reliant on goods and services. However, to mitigate this risk, we have allocated a 1,000 USD as miscellaneous to handle any price increment on goods and services that may occur as we approach implementation.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed plan, including timeline and key milestones for delivering your proposal.

Roadmap

This would certainly not be the only outreach event our team seeks to host in South Africa, as the goal is to boost Cardano and Project Catalyst's adoption rates in South Africa through diversification. This means that we need to host more outreach events, workshops, hackathons, etc to ensure that the adoption rate of Cardano and Project Catalyst in South Africa is boosted upwards. With this being said, we plan to attain at least a 10% boost in the adoption rate per event. Thus, our roadmap looks like this;

1st to 58th-day post-funding; preparation for the event:

• The booking of event space 
• The booking of media coverage 
• Booking of catering service for snack preparation
• Booking of flight tickets and hotels for external presenters
• Online and offline marketing of the event
• Hosting of mini-seminars across universities to spread awareness
• Visiting government officials' offices to give out invitations
• Recipient of external presenters to South Africa
• Preparation of presenters and presentation slide decks

60th-day post-funding (November 30th hopefully):

We would demonstrate our ability to boost Cardano/Catalyst adoption in South Africa by hosting our grand outreach event.

61st to 70th-day post-funding:

• Conduct an online exam to evaluate the attendees with regards to understanding grasped from the presentations made on the various topics mentioned above. The proof link will share a summary of the results with the community in the various Telegram and Discord groups. Prior to the results of the evaluation test, all attendees who scored below 80% would be contacted by the team to encourage them to engage with numerous workshops organised by the Catalyst School to ensure further understanding and inclusion, while those who score above 80% will be directly coached to begin their contribution to the community journey.

• Conduct an online survey to collate suggestions from event attendees as to what could be improved in subsequent events to be hosted and what they seek to do with the knowledge gained.

Please take some time to enjoy some of the beautiful images in the attachment section of the proposal, confirming our experience in hosting outreach events successfully.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown.

• 2,000 USD: Project management 
• 5,000 USD: Event Costs (Event Center, Catering Services, Media Coverage)
• 3,000 USD: Presenters' incentivization (600 USD x 5)
• 3,000 USD: Marketing (Ad Posters, Mini Seminars, Face-to-Face Invitations)
• 1,800 USD: Hotel reservation and interior transportation costs for presenters from the outskirts of Cape Town. (7 days)
• 2,500 USD: Administrative Costs
• 1,000 USD: Miscellaneous Costs

Please note that only one of our presenters lives within the skirts of Cape Town. The rest live on the outskirts and hence require a flight to safely get to the city centre for successful implementation. Hence, the cost for the flight is as follows:

• From Johannesburg to Cape Town (In and Out): 188 USD
• From Accra (Ghana) to Cape Town (South Africa) (In and Out): 8,920 USD.

Grand Total = 27,408 USD rounded to 27,410 USD (per Catalyst recommendation)

Kindly note that the costs above were not assumed but were determined by a series of research in which engagements with agencies who are involved in providing these services in South Africa was a key method. Prices may seem to be high, but that's due to the level of inflation happening around Africa and South Africa specifically.

[FEASIBILITY] Please provide details of the people who will work on the project.

This project is backed by a collaborative effort from a team with a wealth of cultural and technical experience in the Cardano community as well as in Africa. All team members are very active in Catalyst, and community groups across our ecosystem. They are a diverse bunch united by the Promise of Cardano:

Wada: Cardano-based community network of 25+ professionals focused on connecting the world to Africa using blockchain and AI. 20+ funded proposals with strong partnerships within the Catalyst ecosystem. A trusted source for both African-based projects and wider ecosystem contributions.

Role: Overseer

Website

The Catalyst School: The Catalyst School is a place created to enhance the impact of Catalyst as a whole by improving the contribution of all its different players and roles. We onboard new members and help improve their skills along the way, in any way they decide to engage with Catalyst: as a proposer, a Community Advisor, a Veteran Community Advisor, or without any specific role within the process.

Role: Overseer

Website

Kaelo Lentsoe: Blockchain Education Network Ambassador for South Africa - [introducing students to the blockchain education network portal, inviting them to workshops, and mentoring them]. Wada country leads South Africa.

Role: Project management and a presenter on Blockchain(General).

Telegram: @KaeloLentsoe

Email: lentsoekaelo@protonmail.com

Nana Safo: University Ambassador for Wada and the Blockchain Education Network (BEN) in Ghana, Co-proposer and Community Ambassador for Landano (A Catalyst funded project), Proposer and Project Lead for Cardano Recycling DApp (A Catalyst funded project), Successful (Community Advisor (now Proposal Assessor) since Fund 4, Veteran Community Advisor (now veteran Proposal Assessor) since Fund 5, Proposal mentor since Fund 6, Challenge Team lead since Fund 7, Co-proposer since Fund 6, Proposer since Fund 7), and a passionate Cardano advocate since 2020.

Role: Project management and a presenter on Cardano Project Catalyst.

Telegram: @Nana_Safo_01

Discord: Nana Safo#6233

Email: safonanakwadwo2a1@gmail.com

LinkedIn

Richmond Oppong: Richmond is a graphic designer with over 10 years of experience in logo designs, print and poster designs, business card designs, 3D signage, and advertising and marketing. He holds a Higher National Diploma in Graphic Design from Takoradi Polytechnic, Takoradi-Ghana. Richmond is a blockchain enthusiast and is actively part of the Cardano project catalyst community. He was a Community Advisor in Catalyst funds 5 to 8, was a Veteran Community Advisor in fund 8 and a Catalyst Challenge Team member for ‘Scale-UP Cardano’s Community Hubs’ challenge settings for fund 8. He is also an expert in education on creating and manipulating Cardano ADA wallets and staking.

Role: Design and Presenter (Introduction to Cardano Wallets)

Twitter: @cardanoholious

Email: holious45@gmail.com

LinkedIn

Bernard Sibanda: BSC Computing, BTech Education, MCP, Plutus Pioneer.

Founder of 3 companies namely: Tobb Technologies (IT Consulting) South Africa (https://tobb.co.za), Women In Move Solutions(Blockchain and IT - 4IR) South Africa(https://wims.io) and ABL Tech Pty Ltd (Australian IT Consulting) Australia (https://abltech.com.au).

Software developer and Architect (14+ years), Educator(+20 years). UNISA School of computing voluntary curricula advisor member.

Cardano Plutus Pioneer student and promoter 1st, 2nd and 3rd Cohorts(2021-Current), Member of Wada and Cardano (since 2021).

Successfully established and maintained an international community(WIMS-Cardano) with professional(teachers, nurses, developers, business people)membership from SADC countries, Ghana, Nigeria, Norway, and Australia.

Established and successfully maintained WIMS-Cardano telegram(80+ members), WhatsApp (40 members) with these platforms:

https://github.com/wimsio

Role: Presenter (Cardano) and (Cardano Dev Tools)

Discord: wims#5274

Telegram: @WIMS2020

LinkedIn: bernard-sibanda-04832817

Email: cto@wims.io

Note: Collectively, the above team, forms the organizing team to ensure successful implementation.

[FEASIBILITY] If you are funded, will you return to Catalyst in a later round for further funding? Please explain why / why not.

Yes, the project needs to be self-sustainable, and the Cardano Project Catalyst is the source of funds that will make the iteration of this project successful. The nature of the project, including its mission and vision, is to raise awareness by educating and ensuring the adoption rate of Cardano in South Africa is boosted. 

For the project to be self-sustainable, it's going to need a few rounds of funding to expand and build the proper foundation for its growth. 

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or any member of your team working on any other proposals in this Fund9?

[FEASIBILITY] Are you or your team working on any other proposals from previous Funds?

[AUDITABILITY] Please describe what you will measure to track your project's progress, and how will you measure these?

The community can basically track the progress of this project through the Project Catalyst Monthly Reporting Sheet and the Wada YouTube channel, where the recorded version of the grand event will be published.

Also, all relevant resources that are shareable would be shared with the community via the various community channels on Discord and Telegram.

Bonus: After a successful implementation, we may host a Twitter Space to discuss sort of what the experience has been like for all team members, and this would definitely be open to all to come and join us to celebrate the success!

Key Metrics

• We estimate (>=150) potential attendees.
• We estimate (<=150) actual attendees.
• An estimated (>=75) number of attendees should be onboarded to the Cardano Development community.
• An estimated 100 attendees should be onboarded to Project Catalyst to contribute to various roles.
• An estimated (<=75) new Cardano wallets should be created (Yoroi, Nami, CC Vault).
• A good number of viewers for our YouTube uploaded version of the event. We cannot quantify it because we do not know who will be visiting YouTube and at what time they will be doing that. However, we expect a progressive viewership. A figure for this activity can be tracked on YouTube after a month by the community.
• A good number of follow-up calls, emails, and messages come through seeking guidance and inquiries from the core team. We cannot quantify because we do not know who will be following up with questions after the event. However, we envision attendees who may not have grasped the full understanding to follow up with questions seeking clarity and guidance. This figure will be posted to the community a month after the event.

[AUDITABILITY] What does success for this project look like?

Having a strong network of university students, developers, business personnel, and government officials from South Africa where ideas are explored while educating them about Project Catalyst and helping them to engage with the Cardano ecosystem by becoming Community Advisors and submitting highly reviewed Catalyst Proposals.

At the end of 3 months;

• At least 100 individuals (university students, developers, business personnel, and government officials) in South Africa have attended our event and are aware of Cardano and Project Catalyst.
• A good percentage of the total attendance has signed up to become part of the Cardano and Project Catalyst community.
• Individuals approach the core team with their innovative ideas to be fine-tuned into project catalyst proposals for submission.

[AUDITABILITY] Please provide information on whether this proposal is a continuation of a previously funded project in Catalyst or an entirely new one.

This is a new proposal, in addition to the various outreach events hosted by Wada and The Catalyst School. Upon successful implementation, the success attained is going to encourage the setting up of a Blockchain hub by Wada in South Africa to attract more interest.

Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Rating

Goal 4: Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all.