Grant Proposal: Unit Masters

#1

Project Name: Unit Masters
Description:

An online, flexible and open to all 6-week free Masters programme that onboards participants of all geographies, genders and backgrounds to the new economy making it inclusive and equitable for all.

Vision: A world where blockchain fundamentals are common knowledge between all people around the world.

Problem Statement: According to earthweb.com there are more than 300 million crypto users in the world in 2022. That is a bit more than 4% of the world’s population. It is difficult to also know how many of the 300 million have at least knowledge of the fundamentals of the space beyond simply going on an exchange and buying Bitcoin. Additionally, according to the study report published by Chaise and the International Association for Trusted Blockchain Applications (INATBA) on the Blockchain Labour Market Characteristics there is currently a bigger demand for blockchain-related skills than supply could satisfy. Finally, according to the Vietnam Investment Review, there is currently a lack of qualitative and affordable blockchain courses which build skills and address the aforementioned two problems of lack of knowledge and skills for the workforce and for understanding the technology in general beyond buying Bitcoin.

Solution: Unit Masters is a 6 week free high quality masters programme which teaches the fundamentals of Blockchain and aims to instil blockchain literacy to anyone who is interested in the technology beyond the superficial understanding and onboards them to the new economy. Unit masters adopts SDGs and enables its students to use their newly acquired blockchain skills for good and to create sustainable economic growth, opportunity and prosperity through job opportunities in their local and global communities.

Although the programme welcomes everyone, we try to target women (50% of our enrolments are ladies) and students from developing countries (55+% of our enrolments) as we think misrepresented and disadvantaged communities have the most to benefit from this technology.

More specifically, Unit Masters is cohort-based giving participants a 360 degree view of Blockchain, Crypto, Tokenization, the Web3 ecosystem and its latest developments.

Each cohort consists of a line of 12 rotating industry experts who educate and mentor participants by offering their practical knowledge and experience. This enables the education content to always remain relevant in a fast moving industry.

Additionally, each cohort splits students into different study groups and those study groups have a study group lead who helps, engages, coordinates and facilitates the learning process of the group.

  • Week 1 Topic: Decentralization and the internet of value
  • Week 2 Topic: Blockchain & Crypto Ecosystem
  • Week 3 Topic: Blockchain and incentive alignment
  • Week 4 Topic: NFTs, Metaverse & DeFi
  • Week 5 Topic: Stakeholder Capitalism & Sustainability
  • Week 6 Topic: Unit: A token driven economy

During the 6 week period, students read and watch content in the form of videos and articles and complete assignments which in total takes approximately between 3.5 to 5.5 hours per week. Additionally, they have a Mentorship and AMA sessions weekly with the different experts per cohort which takes approximately 2 hours per week, and one hour of coaching session which brings the total amount of hours invested to 6.5 to 8.5 hours a week.

At the end of the cohort, successful students receive an NFT certificate of completion as proof that they successfully completed the programme.

The speakers of our previous cohorts can be found below:

## Cohort 10: speakers to be uploaded

Cohort 9:

Cohort 8:

Cohort 7:

Cohort 6:

Cohort 5:

Cohort 4:

Cohort 3:

Cohort 2:

Cohort 1:

Progress so Far:

We have launched 10 cohorts so far while the 11th is ongoing as I am writing this proposal. We have had:

  • 10.000+ students from all over the world
  • 7.000+ newsletter subscribers
  • Had a 300% growth from 2021 to 2022 in enrolments and we are still not at the end of 2022
  • 50% of our participants are women
  • 55+% of our participants are from emerging economies and regions.

In the future we plan to expand in a number of major languages to teach people who do not understand English. A number of languages we plan to expand to are:

  • French
  • Spanish
  • Portuguese
  • Italian
  • German
  • Vietnamese
  • and more

Team:

Thy-Diep (“Yip”): An award-winning blockchain influencer, who is known for her work in educating thousands of students in blockchain literacy and provided several hundred scholarships to women to attend global blockchain conferences. Previously, Yip has led strategy & digital transformation projects at McKinsey & Co. She is author of the entrepreneurship book “Beautiful Brains” and holds an MBA from INSEAD business school.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/beautifulbrains/

Katia Miroshnikova: A web3 advocate, investor, and strategy and technology solutions architect. Previously, she ran a software consultancy, designing business and technology architecture for leading international software technology companies in the U.S. and Asia.

Katia was a 7-time national champion and international medalist, representing Russia in Track and Field at an international level, and NCAA Division I in the United States.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/katmiroshnikova/

Maíra Santos: A graphic designer and creative arts director. She is a highly regarded sales & marketing leader, having led teams of 30+ agents at age 24 handling turnover of several million USD in the hotel industry for the Latin American markets.

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maíra-santos-71866625/

Michael Healy: An early crypto adopter (2010), full-stack, mobile and blockchain developer (Rust & Substrate). He has developed the WikiLeaks Android App, and exited an encrypted peer to peer video conferencing software used by several million people. Previously, he has worked with Wellington Partners (800M EUR AuM), Google, KPMG, Founders Forum, Saatchi & Saatchi, L’Oreal, Imperial College, Unilever, London Business School and others.![|162x162]

LinkedIn: [https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhealyco/![|162x162]

Thorne Davis: A multi-disciplinary creative & developer (front end, UX/ UI). He is a professional musician with TORA, an award-winning electronic music band with millions of followers across the globe. He is founder of Nuine Records and Rulique, a global website design agency!

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thorne-davis-73b191136/

Joe Rotondi: An economist, lawyer, investor, and technologist that has worked at leading think tanks (Cato Institute and the Mercatus Center), litigated for the Institute for Justice, and served on the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Financial Services and as Investment Officer at the U.S. Small Business Administration ($34 billion AUM). He holds an MBA and JD from University of Minnesota.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joe-rotondi-8a71401/

Grant Amount Requested: Between 5 and 10k

What will it be used for? The grant will help us launch our next cohort, cohort 12. We aim to spend 40% on marketing and approximately 60% on operations and unpredictable events for risk management

How did you hear about the MGD funding program?

You are listed on Ethereum’s website as one of the projects that gives funding.