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BUK
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Yahoo Boys Computers
BUK Emerges Top in Global Digital Challenge, Gets
Facebook Honorable Mention
Bayero University Kano (BUK) has emerged top four among world
Universities in the just concluded Fall 2019 Peer-to-Peer: Facebook
Global Digital Challenge.
The University emerged runner up after Masaryk University —
(Czech Republic) – FakeScape, Middle East Technical University —
(Turkey) – Kiz Basina, Xavier University – Ateneo de Cagayan
(Philippines) – I AM MINDANAO, thereby defeating Haigazian
University Lebenon, Lithuania Christian College International
University, ABTI American University of Nigeria (AUN) and Lagos
State University Nigeria, most of whom were defending
champions.
This season, the top three teams will be presenting their
campaigns at the end of March 2020 in Brussels, Belgium to a panel
of senior leaders, policymakers and guests.
In an email to participating teams, the Programs Project
Manager, Paige M. Blair stated that, “The variety, insight, and
creativity of the campaigns this term were beyond impressive and
made judging quite difficult. All schools are commended for the
innovative ways they positively impacted their local
communities.”
BUK’s campaign was themed “HeartUmight,” and it focused on
ethnic based hate speeches as a bane on our collective unity and
source of other divisive tendencies with a view to inspiring at
risk youths and the silent majority into countering such narratives
online.
As runner up to the finalists, BUK’s HeartUmight got a honorable
mention from Facebook and a $500 Facebook Ad Credit to continue
scaling their work online.
Speaking, the Faculty Coordinator of the program, Dr. Nura
Ibrahim, who is also the Head of the Department of Information and
Media Studies said, “We are glad we made impact and got recognized
for the impact we made. Our long term aims were clearly mapped out
from the outset and our vision is to create an online inclusive
society where culture and diversity is unified.”
Also speaking, Dr. Muhammad Danja the Staff Adviser for the
campaign and also a lecturer with the Department expressed
enthusiasm about future of the campaign. “As a build up on our
previous effort, we were able to look inwards and design ba
campaign that will make impact, stand firm and scale up in line
with the overall goal of the challenge, that was why we were able
to defeat Haigazian and ABTI American University who were actually
defending champions this term so I am optimistic we shall emerge
finalist in our next outing.”
On his part, the team lead, Muhammad Dahiru Lawal a 300Level
Student of the Department of Information and Media Studies explains
that, “In planning our strategy for the Campaign, we discovered
that apart from religious based hate speeches, ethnic based hate
speech are basically the most dominant in our online trails as
indicated by our research, hence we decided to design a campaign
that is unifying.”
He further said that, “we had hoped to make the finalist but at
least we made a difference by winning in our own way. This is not
the end of the road.”
Facebook Global Digital Challenge, is geared towards making a
social impact on internet behaviour especially as it involves posts
and comments considered violent, debasing and inflammatory by the
receiving party.
The P2P Challenge is sponsored by Facebook and managed by
EdVenture Partners (EVP).
As at the end of the Fall 2018 term, the P2P Challenge has been
implemented over 695 times at over 400 universities in 75 countries
and 40 U.S. states. P2P has generated over 200 million combined
online and offline impressions since its inception in spring
2015.