Theme: Blockchain Solutions For African Universities:
[BorderlessEDU]
Social Handle of Your Organization:
@BorderlessDev
Eligibility Criteria:
To qualify for the BorderlessEDU grant, the following criteria must be met by individual projects:
General criteria:
- Projects must be affiliated with a registered university in Africa.
- Projects should have an active community presence.
- Data for all projects must be open source, including but not limited to costs, codes, and structure of projects to be carried out.
- Projects at any conceptualization stage are welcomed but must have a road map if still in the planning phase.
Blockchain innovation criteria:
- Projects must have clear blockchain applications.
- Projects must have a detailed method of impact measurements.
- Projects must be scalable and sustainable to their communities in the long run.
Team criteria:
To help promote diversity and inclusion in the African ecosystem, projects must comprise diverse team members(age, gender, etc). Projects must also showcase their expertise in the field their projects are based on.
Reminder: All rounds must comply with Gitcoin’s core rules, which include no fraudulent activity, quid pro quo, hate speech, or other activities out of alignment with Gitcoin’s essential intents.
Round History:
This community round on gitcoin would be our first opportunity to run a community round, however we have been a recipient of other Gitcoin grants in the past.
Team Running This Round:
For this grant process, we have the following persons as our team members;
Round Operator:
- Name: Ifeanyi Princewill,
- Relevant Experience: Greenhill Network Contributor,
- Bio: A research and Technical writer and current team lead for Borderless Tech Community UNN,
- Social Media: @PrincewillJuni6 (twitter)
Team Member 1:
- Name: Tina Truth
- Relevant Experience: Borderless Tech Club director, and Co-founder Fruitzo.
- Bio: A marketing and blockchain expert with a flare for poetry.
- Social Handle: @_tinatruth (twitter)
Team Member 2:
- Name: Iberedem Udo.
- Relevant Experience: Lead Volunteer and Community manager at B<>rder/ess
- Bio: Registered Blockchain Professional and Information Security Associate.
- Social media: @soll8348 (twitter)
Alignment with Gitcoin’s Mission and Essential Intents:
This round aligns with Gitcoin’s mission and essential intents by driving a community-led blockchain education and adoption, equipping young people with relevant skills to enable individuals to build and contribute to projects in the ecosystem.
Anticipated Size of the Matching Pool:
The matching pool is anticipated to be $1000, fundraised through funding from partners in our current blockchain cipher sessions and contributions amongst other project partners.
Funding address: arb1:0x0f41667C713c501208D5571D9FB4f165358A9Beb
If necessary, we intend to raise more funds through
*fundraising activities among our circles as has been done already, as these projects are pivotal to our missions andvision.
*B<>rder/ess Treasury
*B<>rder/ess Blockchain Partners like Lisk Superchain, Bitsave Protocol and Crypto Smart
Advisors for This Round:
Advisor 1
- Name: Karla Obakpolor
- Relevant experience: Founder of Cryptosmart and Lead partner at B<>rder/ess, with extensive experience in grants for public goods.
- Social media: @_karlagod (twitter)
Funding Mechanism:
Because we are a community-centered organization, we aim to make use of quadratic funding as it is the best type of mechanism for funding community-driven projects that can be influenced by the community itself. This type of funding is also usually unpredictable and hence would prevent doctored results.
Community Size and Engagement:
Community size: Our community consists of approximately 500 members
Number of grants participated in 7 rounds of Gitcoin Grants
Tangible metrics: 250 participants in the previous funding rounds with a donation of above $1000 in the past 12 months
Type of Projects to Fund:
Borderless aims to bridge the funding gap for community-driven blockchain education and expansion projects in African universities, fostering a new generation of tech-savvy innovators. African tertiary institutions are grossly populated with young, enthusiastic individuals eager to embrace the rapidly evolving landscape of technology.
Despite the efforts of community-led initiatives in promoting blockchain education, they often struggle with limited resources, hindering their potential for growth and impact. Our primary focus is on tech and blockchain education projects within African universities, led by communities and designed for long-term sustainability.
These projects may encompass digital skills development, web3 education, blockchain events, hub creation, and other initiatives driving tech and web3 adoption in tertiary institutions. We aim to support projects at various stages; those at early conceptualizastrong texttion, as well as those with established presence in multiple institutions and scalable projections.
Estimated Number of Eligible Grantees:
15 to 25 grantees would be eligible to apply for this round.
Impact Assessment Plan:
To enable our grant to be a success, we would first make use of regular reports, independent auditing, and community feedback mechanisms to aid in the tracking of the impact of the grantees, whilst making use of hypercars to enable us to check and evaluate the impact of the Borderless community. Both over successive rounds.
Additional Considerations:
Community members should consider creating templates for their projects that can be referred back to, as well as serve as a model for future grants.
Potential Conflicts of Interest:
There is currently only one area that may constitute an area of conflict of interest, this is due to the fact that some communities under Borderless may become eligible to this round.