The goal of CREDIBLE is to transform the way people interact with their information environment, creating resilience to mis- and disinformation and ultimately empowering youth to engage in fact-based discourse and decision-making.

This five-year USAID-funded project will strengthen information ecosystems and shift norms around information engagement by building media and digital literacy by energizing local media and the broader information space with youth voices and perspectives. To accomplish this, IREX works together with Entrena (Dominican Republic), Paz Joven (Guatemala), CEDRO (Peru), and Laboratoria (Peru), leveraging IREX's approaches such as Learn to Discern (L2D), Vibrant Information Barometer (VIBE),  and Organizational Performance Improvement (OPI) to empower local actors to address informational challenges in their own societies and encourage more informed, productive, and inclusive civil discourse.

• Low news reliability, increasing use of social media, and low trust in governments have enabled foreign and domestic actors in Latin America and the Caribbean to undermine democratic principles through information influence operations.
• Disinformation has an outsize impact on youth. Youth are the most active users of social media and messaging platforms and use these platforms as their principal source of information.
• Constant exposure to complex and coordinated disinformation campaigns, hate speech, and polarizing politics are leading to heightened social discontent and decreased civic engagement among youth, with many retreating into online echo chambers, detached from their communities.

CREDIBLE Fact Sheet

• Youth and other targeted populations have improved digital and media literacy skills and promote positive community social norms that support informed political participation and civic engagement.
• Local media, particularly young journalists, and local youth influencers, are engaged with their communities, produce quality content, and lead others in positive local norms around civic responsibility, civic engagement, and information.

Youth are a tremendous force for positive, transformational change in the information space – they readily engage with information, innovate, and act with greater agency, visibility, and voice.

• CREDIBLE is a regional program building community resilience to disinformation, implemented through local approaches.  CREDIBLE will directly address the unique effects of disinformation on diverse populations of youth and their communities.
• Active listening and iterative learning and scaling. CREDIBLE combines a youth-led, adult-supported approach to developing youth assets and agency, promoting youth contributions, and improving the enabling environment. Once partners can scale media and digital literacy skill-building, they will spark multiplier effects within their beneficiaries and communities at large.
• Diverse youth represented. Youth steering committees (SOL Teams) will be launched in each country to ensure diverse and gender-balanced support to program design and guidance on adaptation and scaling of media and digital literacy and content production initiatives.
  • Entrena, in the Dominican Republic, will co-create and scale interventions with 11 youth-driven social development hubs serving vulnerable youth.
  • Paz Joven, in Guatemala, is a youth-led organization that will elevate the voices of a vibrant and diverse network of youth leaders in local communities across the country.
  • CEDRO, in Peru, will galvanize the support of youth coalitions across Peru to consolidate interventions in formal education on digital civics.
  • Laboratoria, also in Peru, will mentor networks of young women equipped with MDL skills as they form a more diverse and inclusive digital economy sector.
  • The region’s professional media, social media influencers, and youth journalists will be engaged to increase youth-resonant content.

• Laura Agosta, Chief of Party | lagosta@irex.org
• Nick Ebert, Senior Program Officer | nebert@irex.org
• Diana Rodriguez, Program Officer | drodriguez@irex.org
• Christine Doherty, Program Associate | cdoherty@irex.org
• Katya Vogt, MIL | kvogt@irex.org
• Joy Amulya | jamulya@irex.org
• Tara Susman-Peña | tsusmanpena@irex.org