Social media app designed specifically for Indigenous youth
A York University student has created a social media app that connects Indigenous youth. Grad student Alejandro Mayoral Baños created the app—Indigenous Friends—in order to provide Indigenous youth with a safe online space where they can connect with each other and access resources such as Elders and emergency crisis counselling. Baños, who is from Oaxaca, Mexico, worked with Mohawk elder Blu Waters and the North-South Partnership for Children, a charity that works with 30 remote First Nations communities across northern Ontario. The app has been developed from an Indigenous perspective and embeds traditional knowledge into the interface. The group is approaching high schools across ON to create awareness and encourage participation; schools in the Yukon have also expressed interest in the app.
