Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have expressed why their children will be “grateful” for the responsible usage of technology.
On Wednesday 2 August, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex appeared in a video to announce and congratulate the first-ever recipients of the Responsible Technology Youth Fund’s grants. As noted by the youth fund - which was founded by the Archwell Foundation - the philanthropic initiative has awarded $2m in grants to “intergenerationally led organisations shaping the responsible technology movement”.
As they proceeded to make phone calls to grant recipients in the video, the royal couple gave a sweet shoutout to their four-year-old son, Archie, and two-year-old daughter, Lilibet.
“Thank you for doing everything that you do, our kids especially are incredibly grateful,” Harry said on the phone, while speaking to a woman named Sneha, who is a part of youth-led coalition Encore Justice.
Meghan chimed in to acknowledge that when her children get older, they’ll be grateful for the work that these young leaders have done. “They don’t know it yet, but they will,” she added.
According to the Responsible Technology Youth Fund’s website, it raised $2m from 14 funders, with awarding amounts ranging from $25,000 to $200,000 - based on the stage of the organisation and funding needs. The fund also states that its repsponsible technology movement is about “building, shaping, and stewarding our tech ecosystem to safeguard human rights”.
Following the release of the new video, many grant recipients have also opened up about their experiences speaking with the duke and duchess. During an interview with People, Tazin Khan Norelius, founder and CEO of Cyber Collective, said that the couple was not only “really proud” of her company’s work, but Meghan even offered to greet the younger leader’s family.
“She said: ‘Tell Baba I say hi!’ Which was really sweet,” she recalled. “The impetus of me starting this organisation, one of the reasons was because Dad got hacked. When I was able to share that story, I think that maybe resonated with them, and they congratulated me. When I told my dad, he was just so excited about it.”
Meanwhile, Sam Hiner, executive director of the Young People’s Alliance Education Fund, said that when Meghan and Harry called, he “really appreciated that they saw the importance of the work that we were doing”. He also praised the pair for speaking about the importance of getting “young people” involved with the technology movement.
“More broadly, connecting it back to how important it is for our democracy that young people are engaged, because if our next generation doesn’t get engaged then we’re going to have serious issues as we start to move into leadership positions as a generation,” he added.
In February, the Archewell Foundation first announced the launch of the Responsible Technology Youth Power Fund, as part of the “foundation’s ongoing commitment to the future of technology and its impact on society”. The foundation also shared that organisations like Omidyar Network, Susan Crown Exchange, and Hopelab, were just some of the funders involved in the program.
