A New Kind of CAMPUS where Young People can Build, Learn, Connect and Grow - A Conversation with Munguzo Kapera

Welcome to the Future Learning Design Podcast.

Of course, Campus Digital Hub, the main focus is on alternative education. We have graduates who are learning here, we have people who have not yet gone to school also learning here. So it is that community where everyone has equal access to opportunities to navigate, to learn, to understand, and to make sure that they sustain themselves.

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the podcast. My name is Tim Logan, and the podcast is produced by Good Impact Lab. There are amazing people building innovative and responsive educational alternatives all over the world right now. They're seeing the challenges in their communities and not waiting for others to act or waiting for systems to change, but rather creating, connecting, and building it themselves. Today's episode is with one such person who is doing this incredible work in some of the most resource-constrained environments in the Naka Valley refugee settlement in Uganda. Munguzo Kuperah is a refugee systems builder and educational entrepreneur, removing barriers to information, skills, and opportunity for displaced people. He is the founder of the Campus Digital Hub and creator of the Connect Refugee app, which is now available on the Play Store. Munguzo is also an alumnus of the International Training Center of the ILO, as well as an advisory board member for Kiarung, another amazing NGO working to support displaced people around the world. Thank you, Mungozo. Thank you for joining me on the podcast. It's a huge pleasure to meet you and be able to have this conversation together. Thanks to Fiston for making the introductions and really, really excited to hear more about all of the amazing work you're building there at Nakiralli. But Perhaps just to start with, we could just— you could share a little bit about what brought you to this place. Maybe people who aren't aware of what and where Nakavali is, but also what was your— some of your journey to getting there.

Thank you so much, Tim Logan, for bringing me to this amazing space to share a bit about me, my work. Yeah, so I go by the name of Munguzo Kapeera Djan. But I don't prefer the name Jean because where I'm located currently, it's an English-spoken country. So they call me Jean and I don't prefer that name that much. I prefer Munguzo. Munguzo means pillar in my mother tongue. I am a refugee. I'm also an educator and above all, I'm the founder of Campus Digital Hub. I arrived in Uganda in 2017 after leaving my country, the Democratic Republic of Congo. And one of the biggest challenges that I faced when I was here in Uganda was mainly about education. Yeah, I came from a French education system and I came with my high school diploma since 2017, but then I found myself into an English-speaking environment, so I had to start again from scratch. One of the things in here in Nakivade is that no matter how good you are at French, if you cannot speak English, you miss opportunities.

Yeah. Could you, could you say, are you comfortable sharing perhaps why you left DRC?

Yeah, sure. It's, it was basically about the Family conflicts. Yeah, I'm the last born in my family and I'm the only man, the son with daughters also, they're my sisters. But then people from my parents' background didn't want me as a person to hold the things that my father had. But then some of the cousins started putting pressure on my father that if you do not want us to have these properties, 'Your son is going to be damaged.' So some went into the rebel groups and others started hunting me. So it was hard for me until my father fled to Burundi for his own safety. So we remained there alone. But one of my father's friends, who was a pastor, told me, 'You are still young. You have a future in front of you. So if you keep on staying here, you will die for nothing.' So like we had to escape together, even my family didn't know. And at the time there was a big conflict between the rebels from the South Kivu and those who have been into the forest for a long time. So they could take that advantage and start torturing people, including myself. So we had to flee. Yeah. I found myself here in the refugee camp.

So you went to Burundi and then on to Uganda or just straight to Uganda?

No, it was my father who moved to Burundi, but I just came straight to Uganda and they didn't even hear from me for 3 years up to the pandemic. That's where they asked, and I just told them that I'm here. And up to now, those people are still there. So it has costed some of my family members' lives and I don't want to go back until it's safe.

Of course. I'm so sorry. And I'm not sure that listeners will necessarily be aware. Of the context of Nakivale? Obviously, you've spoken a bit about the language, but also perhaps you could just say a bit about the context, how big Nakivale is, you know, who are the people that you are meeting and working and living with every day?

Yeah, Nakivale is one of the largest but also the oldest refugee camps in Uganda. It holds more than 7 nationalities, like people from different backgrounds. There are people here who speak French, English, Swahili, Kinyarwanda, They speak Somali, like all the different people and backgrounds. So it is a diverse refugee camp. So I live with Congolese, I live with Sudanese, I live with Ethiopians. So yeah, we are just like a mix of people, but as one. So that's basically about Nakivale. It holds more than 200,000 people and others are still coming as they are fleeing conflicts. You know what is happening in the DRC currently, especially in the eastern part. Yeah, we are having so many people from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, but also others are coming from Somalia. So yeah, that's how it is.

Yeah.

It is located in the southwestern part of Uganda. From here to Rwanda, like Kigali, the capital city, it's just like 5 hours driving. So it's not that far from Kigali.

Yeah. Interesting. Thank you. And you shared an incredibly powerful statement in one of your posts recently. Saying, "I was told to survive and I chose to build." And so I found that an incredible thing to say. And so perhaps you could just describe what that was like, who was telling, I mean, what were the messages you were receiving when you arrived in Akivalli? And then what brought you to that moment where you were actually saying, "No, actually there's something that is needed from me here. I need to build something." And then we can talk about campus a bit more.

So at first I was just focused on survival like everyone else.

Sure.

Because here, here you, you are told to choose. Like, if you want to build, it will take so much, like, long time to build, and others are focusing on surviving. Yet this is not our place. So finding ways to eat, finding ways to learn, finding ways to understand new system, or to adjust into a new language, as I say, it's so much difficult. But again, I was helping young people to solve basic digital platforms after being taught myself, because I'm a self-taught learner. I used to teach like the basic of English that I can speak, but also the technology through a borrowed laptop. One of my friends who is based on Uganda actually, he was the one who showed me that organization that I used to volunteer from. So at the time, because I didn't have so much experience into working with the English environment here in the settlement, the name of The organization is called Unidose Social Innovation Center. That organization told me, okay, for you, since you are so much interested in this, let us give you a laptop and a bit of internet. In exchange, you will be fetching water in a tricycle. A tricycle comes with water, you carry jerrycans out, then we give you access to a computer and also the internet access. And that became my classroom.

Okay. Wow. Now that's amazing. And then So at what point did you begin? So no, maybe firstly I could ask, it feels like having met you before on a previous call and, and what you're describing now, there's a real sense, as you've just said, of this kind of the importance of this autodidactic self-directed learning and the motivation for learning that I just feel like it feels very strong in you as a spirit. Is that just who, you know, Munguzu is? You feel like it's this curious, you're a curious learner and wanting, is that part of maybe why you are being so successful with Campus Digital Hub?

During the pandemic lockdown in 2020, I didn't have anything to do apart from watching TV shows like series. Yeah. And maybe some of the people were learning at the time, but for me, I was just watching TV series. And what inspired me at the time was the TV show called 24 series. I don't know if you've heard of this.

Oh yeah.

Yeah, the movie of Jack Bauer.

Exactly. Kiefer Sutherland. Yeah, right.

Yeah. So when I was watching the lady Chloe, the one who was a data analyst, yes, I was so much inspired and I'm like, wow, how is she doing this? I feel like I can also do this because that was one of the things that I wanted, maybe to be a guy who is sitting in a room just sending emails to people and trying to bring just good things related to technology. But then I got so much interest into that and I was curious enough. Then I started asking people around me. Unfortunately, no one was into the digital system that we did, like the way I wanted it to be. So that's pushed me to ask again, Fiston, because at the time he was a CEO of that organization, if I remember. So he told me, well, Munguzo, at the time he used to call me John. I was like, John, what I'm going to give you, just follow me. So I followed him and, uh, he was the one who introduced us to website design using Wix. Surprisingly, he wasn't also good enough for that. He was also curious, but then he just wanted us to learn together. But for me, I got so much interest. I said, yes, this is what I want. Maybe I will be like that lady in the TV series. And that's where the inspiration came from. But also after seeing so many young people around me in the settlement who didn't have so much knowledge about that, so I said, "This will be the best." That's so good.

Oh, I love that. That's amazing. And just then maybe going a bit deeper on that, that last part about the need that you were seeing, cuz for example, one of the things you've also written about, which I, I found really interesting was you said the waste that nobody talks about in Nakivale is human time. So there's, there is this, an amazing resource and space of possibility with all of these incredible humans together in a space. And like you say, maybe they don't have access to the laptops or the internet connection, or they haven't been exposed to the skill development yet, but there is this huge amount of possibility. Just there in the community with 200,000 amazing humans. And as you say, the time that they have is also, if they're not using that time to be developing skills, maybe that's, we're missing an opportunity somehow. Is that part of what you were seeing that led you towards building Campus Digital Hub?

Absolutely, a great question. You know, here in the settlement, as you read, Human time, just try to capture this scenario whereby a mother wakes up early in the morning, then she decides to go and look for information about what is happening in the settlements. For instance, food distribution, or they're distributing a refugee attestation card. But then leaving early in the morning, she doesn't know what's going to happen at the office, but she just goes. And reaches at the office, then instead of start receiving information immediately from officers, they spend almost half of a day waiting for the information to come out. But then when the person comes to inform, they tell them, today your service is not going to be served, maybe come tomorrow or next day. But then multiply that number of one person by all the people who attended that particular event. So it becomes a waste of time that maybe the time wasted, a person would be working to feed their families because now as the rations of refugees have been cut, so some are becoming interdependent, looking for ways to sustain themselves and not relying on humanitarian aid. But then at that time, the time is not only lost as again, it could be used for learning or for building income. That's why most of the, the refugee camps currently are not contributing to the economy of the country because now what they are looking for is either information or survival and it becomes hard. So that particular scenario and situation pushed me also to think deeper and came up with this solution of creating the platform, the Connect Refugee app, to share trusted information about what is happening currently in the settlement. If it is food distribution, healthcare services, job opportunities, community news and events, all in one platform in the language the people understand. So if a person displays the information in English, if you speak Kinyarwanda, you read that information in Kinyarwanda. So it becomes easier for people to get and to manage, but also to to have the informed decisions into their daily lives. So that's what I meant actually when I was talking about the love of the time for you. Yeah.

Yeah. No, amazing. I mean, and just to say the Connect Refugee app is now, it's been launched on the Play Store and is available in general. And as you said, is it 7 languages that you're working in?

Currently it supports 5 languages, but because of the feedback of the people, we are trying to see how we can improve and put more languages inside the app.

Yes. Fantastic. So, because it, I mean, again, you've talked about this idea of information poverty, which is, I hear what I hear you talking to there. That's part of what the challenge is, is this lack of information at the, you know, meeting people at the right time in the right languages. So Connect Refugees are doing an amazing service there. And then is part of your vision with Campus Digital Hub, which is then going further than just providing the information, but then also providing opportunities for that ongoing learning, skill development, capability development?

The, the vision of Campus is to, what I used to think was to have the digitally connected society where everyone actually, no matter the background, no matter where they live, all people should have equal access to opportunities. Like the opportunities that you get from France, the opportunity that someone gets from Germany. If that opportunity is online, a person also in the refugee camp should have the same opportunity.

Yeah.

And, uh, the information itself is part of the solution that I brought. Apart from that, we also want young people to navigate online spaces and making sure that they get opportunities, they, they work, they learn. The education that I'm trying to, to think of here, of course, Campus Digital Hub, the main focus is on alternative education. We have graduates who are learning here. We have people who have not yet gone to school also learning here. So it is that community where everyone has equal access to opportunities to navigate, to learn, to understand, and to make sure that they sustain themselves. And for the information platform, which is Connect Refugee, I want it to be replicated because I believe the problem that is trying to address here in the settlement The solution, I mean, it is the same affecting other refugee settlements, all the 13 refugee settlements across Uganda and beyond.

And beyond, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

So we want to replicate this Connect2Refugee to reach more people and more refugee camps, but starting from Nakivale first.

Amazing. So cool. And could you just maybe give some examples of what are the kinds of trainings that people are accessing? Are they just the kind of available range of learning offers that, that anyone could access online from anywhere, or are you also talking about specific trainings that are happening in Nakivale in person?

Yeah, so currently, currently our main focus is still here in Nakivale, and one of the programs that we do are including digital literacy because we believe in the foundation. Some of the people don't— okay, they understand this may be a computer, this may be what, but to use it becomes so hard. So we do digital literacy, then we go into website development. We also do digital marketing because like many, many people here in the settlement at least have like small, small businesses, but then trying to reach customers around the settlement, okay, may be difficult a bit because of the competitiveness. So we try to teach them how to use the digital marketing to see how they can put their businesses online. Other than that, we also came to realize that so many young people, especially women, are facing these difficulties of— they're excluded from the digital world.

Yeah.

So we have the different programs that we are giving them, including— we call it DG Ladies 10x.

Nice. Love it.

Yeah. So we just teach ladies how to use online spaces by starting with the introduction to Google Workspace. Which leads them to understand better how to use online tools for collaborations, you know, and productivity. But also we have online gig work program. Like youth have skills, they know how to design, they know how to build websites, they know how to manage medias. But then we try to understand how can we do work online. Okay. Because now, and we can see the results, a young person here in Nakivale can compete with a person who is in Germany. For the same gig online. So this becomes something that we want all the people around us to know. And, uh, other than that, because for us we believe in like, because it is Campus Digital Hub, many people know us as Campus, but it is more than that. The Campus is an acronym, yeah, which stands for Connect, Assist, Mentor, Provide uplift and support. So we want to have all the people come together. Even if we do not provide the right program at the moment, but you want them to come tell us what they wish to learn, then we link them to online courses. Yeah.

Incredible.

Yeah. We just want people to come and do whatever they feel comfortable doing. As long as it resonates with education, we give them the space to learn.

Amazing. It's so cool. And as I said to you before, I just think the name is genius. It's such a good name. It works on so many levels, but, but also it makes me think what you just said there makes me think all around the world, people in universities and higher education are kind of questioning the old model of how they were providing, you know, highly expensive in-person courses and, you know, degree programs. What you are doing there, what you've just described there sounds like a fascinating kind of attempt at rethinking what a higher education institution could be in a really responsive way, as you said, for the needs of the people that you're serving. You're responding to what they're coming in and asking for, learners of all ages, digital, in-person, hybrid, you know, really kind of, I think, a really inspiring example of how these different learning communities post-schooling could actually look in a really interesting way.

Yeah, yeah. Interfree University Globally, because again, yeah, the name itself carries so so many meanings at the back. One thing is that we came also to check that this Nakivale itself has only 4 secondary schools, only 4. 4 secondary schools and 2 teach French and 2 teach English. Now we have so many primary schools, even private primary schools, even for the government, but then when the people finish these primary schools, it becomes harder for them to go and continue the higher education, right, the secondary school. But then those schools are very far from where people live because this camp has like 3 zones. It has Base Camp, which is at the center, that's the administrative parts, and, and then we have the other parts which are scattered. If you live in the Base Camp, you'll have to walk for a very long distance to reach that secondary school. But then, okay, you can work, but then it becomes again harder to pay for school fees.

Yeah.

So young people drop out. But then we thought, okay, instead of just remaining at home, come to campus and do the alternative education, the alternative learning. And it becomes so much exciting because even those who are going to school also come to campus to learn. Right. Yeah.

It doesn't exclude the people who are also enrolled in school. I love that.

Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

Really, really flexible model. It's so, it's so inspiring. And one of the other things you've said, which I, I really appreciated was also that sometimes there's a perception that we have to bring in experts from outside to run the training. And you've said that community-led training is more effective than programs designed from outside. Outside the settlement? Because what I hear you talking about is a real responsiveness to the fact that it's community-led, is you have a better understanding of what is needed and stronger relationships perhaps with also with colleagues and friends and peers in the settlement. So yeah, what would you say about that one, about in terms of kind of designing some of these courses and leading these trainings?

So first of all, for us, we do not train then we let people go. What we do, we go into the community, we ask because we are the community, we live the reality. We understand what, what is happening and we know what we need to go to from this level to a certain level. So what we do, we train people what they need to know. Then we ask for help from outsiders. That's why we make people to higher education online because we believe after them receiving what is needed in the community. They are now free to explore other possibilities online. Some of the, the non-government organizations, NGOs, come here with their own programs, well designed. So when they bring it here in the settlements, they get so many people much interested into that program because they provide not only the training. People don't go for trainings, they go for what is inside the training. While mobilizing, they, they tell people there will be some transport refunds, some refreshments, and people are like, okay, let me go and benefit from that.

Sure.

Because now, yeah, it's like the balance. Let me go and benefit from that. But then inside the programs which are designed, it does not meet the requirement of what people need. So they still go into that after being equipped, as one can see into different websites, people saying like, We have equipped thousands of people in the settlement with this skill, this skill. But if you come on ground and look for the people who have that skill, you will not find them.

Fascinating.

Now the, the question comes, where are these people going? Are we resettled? The answer is no, because only 1% of refugees in Uganda are being resettled. You get the point?

Yeah.

So for us, we design both for us and with us at the same time.

So powerful. I mean, yeah, it's such a strong and important point that delivering, in inverted commas, training does not equate to, you know, people actually feeling genuinely equipped or empowered to do more of what it is they're trying to do, right? It doesn't necessarily serve them just the fact that they've experienced the training. So yeah, no. And maybe I could ask you, because on the website you've written this amazing paper called The Last Mile of the Future of Work is Inside a Refugee Settlement in Uganda. And maybe you could just talk about that a little bit because it's, it's a really interesting time, right? To be doing digital literacy work anywhere, anywhere in the world. Mm-hmm. Let alone in a refugee settlement. Because I mean, there's so much talk all around the world of automation by advanced artificial intelligence, right? And so the idea that if the work is happening on a computer in a digital space, you know, how long have we got before that work becomes almost fully automated by advanced AI? So there was, I mean, so many interesting ideas about humanoid robots and all sorts of amazing stuff which you shared in that paper. What, yeah, how are you thinking about that in terms of capability building around digital skills in the context of AI?

When I first got that opportunity, I was so much excited. Like one of the digital coordinators of the International Labour Organization, who's called Melissa, she sent me that opportunity and she was like, Munguzo, given the fact that you are so much interested into technology and digital tools, I would really love you to explore this opportunity. It was a paid one. It was a paid course. But I told her, I'm unable to afford. And she told me, do not worry, we will give you a scholarship. And I'm like, what? But then I immediately applied. And after applying, I started, you know, learning. It took us 2 weeks. So I wrote about the thing that actually I see inside the refugee communities. So most programs and research look at refugees from the outside. People come, study the situation, design solutions, and then leave. But people living in the reality are not usually part of the design process, you know. And in my paper, I argued that refugees should not only be seen as people who receive support or as people who are, who study They should also be part of the work itself, not only as participants, but as also people who help design, test, and improve solutions based on what they need every day. But then I'm trying to push, like, to shift the thinking from designing for refugees to designing with refugees, because then AI now has almost changed how people are working there because like some of the gigs that we used to receive, for example, the data entry is this small work.

Yeah.

We can see that AI can now do and help respond to some of the repetitive tasks that people are trying to, to make. And this affect us because these are the gigs that we knew before, right? That would work for others, but then it comes. The gap that I came to realize, maybe it's not the lack of intelligence, but the lack of the tools that help people make sense of information and opportunities, you know, because now people spend so much time searching for things that they never, they would never see, or things that they never had access for. And now it becomes so much harder for AI itself, but then for this automation. As I said before, people come, they present solutions. Maybe you may see tomorrow after they come up with, of course, we should also learn robot, but you never see robot. We never seen it. Like we don't know even how it looks like. But then if you bring it here, it becomes difficult. So maybe the thing would be to let first the people know what is a robot in a theoretical way before bringing it to people. And then those work that are being taken from manufacturing companies and the rest, they are not yet affecting us because you are still learning and you are still adapting. Maybe the robots are just for those people who are meant to see what is happening in their side, but not for us yet. So for me, I see this AI as a tool that can either widen the gap or reduce it. But then the difference is that not the technology itself, but the way it is designed for different people, who is involved in building it, and whether it reflects the reality of people in our place, like the Nakivano said.

Right, exactly. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, as you also say in the paper, the exclusion and the, the kind of lack of access is, if it's concentrated in developing countries, it's particularly concentrated in refugee settlements within those developing countries within the Global South. So as you said, yeah, it's an incredibly powerful statement. And also, I mean, the thing, the other thing I just thought was amazing there, towards the end of that paper, you talk about how you've done, you've really built this incredible Campus Digital Hub and this Connect Refugee app, really with no formal training and with no real funding from external international organizations or from the external community. And as you say, what would be possible with serious institutional support? I mean, that's such a powerful question to me, to the global community about, you know, as you say, ways in which we might approach these situations differently in partnership with you and others like you who are living the reality of that, to co-build and co-design and, you know, or not even co-design, but just to provide the resources and support required when you need it to continue doing the amazing creative and inspiring work that you are already doing. So yeah, I mean, maybe just to wrap up, I mean, I'd love to leave a space for you to, is there a, an invitation that you might give to people listening to this about ways that they could if they're inspired, that they could reach out or support? Or obviously this takes amazing commitment from you and your team. It does take resource as well. So yeah, is there, is there anything there just to finish off that you would invite people to do? Yeah, sure.

Again, I, I built both Campus Digital Hub and Connect Refugee with no external funding. And for the Connect Refugee, I started building it since 2023, so which means I was Learning by doing, learning by doing until it came to the reality. At first I wasn't even expecting that this, this would exist, but I just made it, you know.

So good.

Yeah. I just want to let the people know that when they hear about refugee settlements, they shouldn't be just thinking about crisis, aid, or just survival. You know, the camp has so many young people here who are learning, building, And trying to create solutions even with very limited resources.

Yeah.

Now the question comes in is that what happens if we are given, let's say for example, a fully equipped computer lab that can start equipping these people? Because if I built something and it's, it worked, it means all the people who learn with me, with Campus Digital Hub, can also create solutions. Yeah. So I think we as Campus Digital Hub would really love to, to receive, to get more partnerships, more collaborations to making sure that these people do not only rely on learning, but also doing. We have so many problems that are affecting our daily lives and we believe with technology, with collaboration, with support, we can combine all of these things and start responding to some of the community challenges, because if we say like we solve problems, it means that we no longer have work. That means we solve problems and it ends from there. Yeah. But we are responding to some of the community needs, and we believe that by collaborating, by being fully equipped with the necessary tools and resources, we will not only make this camp more reliable, but we will build for future generation. Which is coming to also not pass through the roads that we were passing.

Yeah, it's amazing. So powerful. Thank you, Munguzo. It's just that idea of that learning and doing and, and as you say, somehow contributing, problem solving, serving, they're not separate things. They can all happen in the same action, right? The same doing of being together in a spirit of learning as we build our own skills, but also in a commitment to to kind of making the situation better for ourselves and other people. I mean, it's just, I think that feels like such a powerful invitation to everyone, anywhere, wherever they're based, that learning can really be part of that process. So, nice. Thank you for everything. And thank you for sharing about it today. So appreciate it.

Thank you, Tim Logan.

Amazing. We hope you've enjoyed this episode. Please feel free to continue the dialogues with our guests, with us at Good Impact Labs, on our blog or on social media, or within your own networks.