The Kinia Academy is an online community learning space for educators. It will give them access to explore and enrol in a range of creative technology courses, so they can learn at their own pace, with engaging and interactive videos, reading resources, and options to download and discuss materials.

Liam Devanney is a youth worker for Include Youth Project, Youth Work Ireland Cavan/Monaghan and has taken part in a number of trainings with Kinia, specifically Mobile Filmmaking, Computer Science, and STEAM.

“Upskilling to keep up with emerging trends is a vital part of our job. By learning new skills, we are able to offer new opportunities and experiences for targeted young people in our area. From our training with Kinia, we’ve been able to run a wide range of STEAM activities/groups over the past 12 months. This included using Makey Makeys, SkriBots and Scratch, and Robot Wars kits. We’re currently delivering a mobile filmmaking programme to two different age groups.”

Kinia’s capacity building approach supports educators with implementing learning projects, so they can transfer knowledge to the students and young people they work with. Young people learn about the subject areas in a fun and engaging way, and they also develop key skills and competencies such as collaboration, problem solving, critical thinking, and creativity.

Each year, Kinia hosts two national youth events to celebrate the achievements young people have made in creative technology.

This year was the ten-year anniversary for Creative TechFest, an event set up to showcase the work of young people that have participated in Kinia programmes.

"The project provided a group of young girls (all in 6th class) with an opportunity to learn about the world of STEAM with a particular focus on the role Irish women have played, which helped inspire them to learn new skills."

“We competed in two Creative TechFest categories last year. Our senior group competed in the Robot Wars battle and our junior girls STEAM group developed an interactive board highlighting the role Irish women have played in STEAM.

Using conductive materials and Makey Makeys, the group were able to use Scratch to create an interactive board which told the stories of five Irish women in the world of STEAM.

The project provided a group of young girls (all in 6th class) with an opportunity to learn about the world of STEAM with a particular focus on the role Irish women have played, which helped inspire them to learn new skills. The group gained an understanding of the importance of teamwork, communication skills, time management, having assigned roles and working to a deadline, while also learning about conductive materials, working on their art skills and gaining some basic computer coding skills.”

Recognition of professional development and activation of skills is an important part of Kinia’s programmes.

Their credentials not only recognise educators’ achievements, but they allow an educator to award digital badges to the young people they work with.

When asked about the value of Kinia credentials for educators and the impact they will have for young people, Liam said:

“Having the credentials is great for your CV and offers further motivation to partake in the training and to deliver programmes to young people. I will be awarding credentials to young people who have engaged in past groups. Some of the young people we work with may not have completed 2nd level education, and having these credentials will provide them with some sort of recognition. It will give them something to put on their CV as they begin to look for employment opportunities. Everyone enjoys getting a cert; it gives us all a moral boost.”