In addition to cash investments, we’re acting as a convener to bring together these organizations to share best practices.”Ī part of this community-based skills program includes what Santa Lucia calls “a community of practice.” It offers a space for community leaders to come together and discuss concerns and issues they are having while Microsoft helps navigate solutions including tech enablement. Naria Santa Lucia, general manager at Microsoft and lead on the larger skills initiative, explains the thinking behind this program: “It was designed with internal and external voices focused on community at the table. As part of this, Microsoft’s community skills program will provide financial grants and tech enablement to community-based nonprofits reaching 5 million unemployed workers who need it most. In June, Microsoft made a public commitment to be more inclusive as an employer and to extend Microsoft’s support and outreach programs in Black and African American communities. Microsoft’s skills initiative, of which this program is a part, hopes to help 25 million people around the world secure digital skills. The only way to get to the millions of talented people who are shut out, he continues, is by enabling not just one individual at a time, but via training programs and talent sources like these. “Actually, they’re one of millions, not one in a million,” he says. Auguste says that often employers hire someone great and think that they just got lucky. “If you can do the job, you should be able to get the job,” he says.Ī part of the solution is building access to larger talent pools like i.c.stars does. Auguste, however, thinks qualifications are what should matter. One of the issues is the idea that you need a certain background to do a job. Auguste is a member of the advisory board for Microsoft’s community skills program that supports nonprofits in Black and African American communities. There are several issues with hiring that further lock in inequality, says Byron Auguste, the CEO and co-founder of, an organization focused on economic inclusion. Despite this knowledge, the workplace does not reflect this. Research shows that companies with diverse leadership are more likely to be profitable. The program includes grants, leadership development and technology enablement.
It will include a $15 million investment over three years for Black- and African American-led nonprofits that are working to increase skill development and economic opportunities. On Wednesday, Microsoft launched a new community skills grant program, part of the company’s commitment to racial equity and digital skills. Programs like this are vital to accelerating the distribution of digital skills.
I.c.stars is a rigorous, tech-focused program that provides young adults from low-income communities with the tools to develop the technical and leadership skills needed for a career in technology, a field that continues to lack diversity and be in high demand. I never would have imagined having the life I have without i.c.stars,” he says. There is no doubt I would not be where I am without the program. It sparked his curiosity, and learning to build a website was the beginning of a new chapter for Gates: “i.c.stars helped me stumble on what was a passion of mine, and that passion has led to a career. He says he heard “HTML” mentioned for the first time. Gates remembers his first conversation with i.c.stars. Today, that young man, Kevin Gates, is a principal cloud solution architect at Microsoft. It was pretty incredible, and we said, ‘All right, we’ve got to have this kid joining the cohort.’”
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“And this was back in the day, 20 years ago, so he had all these floppy disks with his code on it to show us what he had built. Kastrul says she asked him to “go and build a website and come back.” So he did. “He was 17 or 18 years old when he applied,” recalls Sandee Kastrul, the CEO and a founder of i.c.stars.
But first he had to prove that he was ready for that journey. In the spring of 2000, a young man walked into the Inner-City Computer Stars office in Chicago, determined to join this nonprofit’s digital skills training program and build a future for himself in technology.
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