Jorge Serrano-Malebrán, Gianni Romaní, Jessie Pulgar-Ramirez, Ignacio Ramirez-Ojeda, Kevin Rojo-Valenzuela

Proceedings of the 27th World Multi-Conference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics: WMSCI 2023, pp. 185-189 (2023); https://doi.org/10.54808/WMSCI2023.01.185

Jorge Serrano-Malebrán
Economics and Business Faculty, Entrepreneurship and SME Center, Catholic University of the North, Antofagasta, Chile

Gianni Romaní
Economics and Business Faculty, Entrepreneurship and SME Center, Catholic University of the North, Antofagasta, Chile

Jessie Pulgar-Ramirez
Economics and Business Faculty, Entrepreneurship and SME Center, Catholic University of the North, Antofagasta, Chile

Ignacio Ramirez-Ojeda
Economics and Business Faculty, Entrepreneurship and SME Center, Catholic University of the North, Antofagasta, Chile

Kevin Rojo-Valenzuela
Economics and Business Faculty, Entrepreneurship and SME Center, Catholic University of the North, Antofagasta, Chile

Cite this paper as:
Serrano-Malebrán, J., Romaní, G., Pulgar-Ramirez, J., Ramirez-Ojeda, I., Rojo-Valenzuela, K. (2023). Young People Without Technology, Young People Without Access to Education: Experience of a Social Reward-Based Crowdfunding Campaign in Chile. In N. Callaos, E. Gaile-Sarkane, S. Hashimoto, N. Lace, B. Sánchez, M. Savoie (Eds.), Proceedings of the 27th World Multi-Conference on Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics: WMSCI 2023, pp. 185-189. International Institute of Informatics and Cybernetics. https://doi.org/10.54808/WMSCI2023.01.185

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many university students did not have access to a personal computer, which was a fundamental tool for participating in courses and studying during the health contingency. In response to this issue, a group of students from the Entrepreneurship Seminar set the goal of launching a reward-based crowdfunding campaign to purchase computers for students at the Universidad Católica del Norte in Antofagasta, Chile. They managed to raise 26% of the total goal through the Idea.me crowdfunding platform, and an additional 12% through contributions from a strategic partner. The campaign successfully provided 11 university students with new computers and one with a refurbished computer. Other results showed that 52% of the population who contributed to the campaign were not familiar with this type of financing, 81% found the page secure, and 90% were very likely to contribute to similar initiatives in the future. Through this initiative, the students learned about the dynamics of crowdfunding through hands-on experience.