Seattle’s Youth Web Design Program Empowers Young Creators

In 2020, the Urban League of Metropolitan Seattle (ULMS), in partnership with the Seattle Office of Economic Development, launched their Youth Web Design program, which connects high school students with small business owners to develop and launch websites for their businesses.

In response to the economic and social challenges exacerbated by COVID-19, the program is dedicated to educating, training and employing young people to create modern websites for small businesses.  The Youth Web Design program focuses on assisting Black and immigrant-owned businesses that either lack a website or have a limited online presence. 

Rob Jones, Vice President of Education and Workforce Development for ULMS, says that he created the initial curriculum for the program but later partnered with the AVELA engineering program at the University of Washington, which modified the program to what it is today, including the addition of a coding component to the curriculum.

Throughout the six-week cohort, participating youth work directly with business owners to design professional websites that meet the unique needs of the individual business and that can be used as part of their professional portfolio for future employment opportunities.

According to Jazmine Johnson-McCoy, Program Lead for the Youth Web Design Program at ULMS, the program is a win for both students, who get real-world experience designing websites that impact the overall success of a business, and business owners, who get a professionally designed website with the functionality needed to succeed at no cost.

“This program is meant to give 16 Black business owners the ability to get a website, and we are teaching 16 students how to develop websites for these business owners,” says Johnson-McCoy.

Eva Hightower, a graduate of Garfield High School who participated in the program, says that the program was just what she was looking for to get her started on the career path to being a web designer.

“I was inspired to participate in the program because I wanted to pursue a career in design, and I think this program would help me get connections,” says Hightower.

According to administrators with ULMS, the Youth Web Design program pilot was originally launched to respond to two emerging needs. First, because of COVID, businesses that were without websites and digital tools before the onset of the pandemic were further impacted economically and faced higher barriers to getting online. Secondly, paid employment and internship opportunities for youth were instantly reduced or eliminated, creating an economic crisis for young people who relied on these opportunities to generate income.

As part of the program, youth are taught industry-standard skills including HTML, CSS, and JAVA, and will also earn technical certification for the coding skills they learn.

In addition to learning web design, program participants also learn social media strategy and marketing skills as part of the program’s curriculum to help business owners have a stronger social media presence.

“The advantages for these business owners are that they have a social media presence, and they are able to direct their audience and customers to a site that they can order from,” says Johnson-McCoy. “They will no longer have to use third-party ordering sites that take a percentage of their profit because it will fully go to these business owners.”

Laelah Jones, another former student at Garfield High School who participated in the program, says the program taught her valuable skills.

“During this program, I learned how to create a website, and in that, I have learned how to cooperate with the information that I am given,” says Jones.

Rob Jones believes that the program is a springboard to other opportunities that youth didn’t think they could be a part of before joining the program.

“From what I have seen so far with all of the sites that have been created in the program, I see a lot of the youth shocked that they could do something like web design, or even just understanding the coding component and turning it into something,” says Jones.

Currently, the Youth Web Design program is offered only at Garfield and Foster High Schools due to logistical constraints, including location and after-school time slots. Despite these limitations, Jones and his team are actively working to expand the program.

“It is not necessarily for all students in Seattle. Originally, it was designed that way just because of funding coming from the city of Seattle, but now it is not,” says Jones. “A lot of the time I have people come to me with questions about why I don’t offer this program at this or that school. We are trying to figure out how we can do this on a broader scale and make it more viable for students to get involved.”

Despite the limited pool of participants, the online nature of the program has extended its reach and taught students how to work remotely.

“I think learning from Zoom has been really interesting. It’s different from how I think it would be if it were in person,” says Kalani Rossman, another Garfield student who participated in the program.

At the end of the program, the newly established or updated websites created by students in the program and future management will transition to business owners.

“Having a website nowadays is no longer just ‘nice to have,’ it is vital for a business to thrive. Yet, it is out of reach for many small businesses—especially ones that are owned and operated by immigrants and other marginalized communities,” says former web design business participant Hong Chhuor, whose family owns King Donuts. “In addition to the time needed to build one and the costs associated with maintaining a website, there are language barriers to overcome and a digital literacy gap to bridge. Our work with the Urban League of Metropolitan Seattle and students participating in the City of Seattle’s Youth Web Design Program gave us the support we needed to get started.”

To date, the program has supported getting 30 businesses online and connected with digital tools for long-term stability and trained more than 20 youth. After the initial launch, in 2022 with the help of new funding, an additional 50 youth and 50 businesses were supported throughout the year.

According to the ULMS website, each student receives paid stipends for participating in the program and soon will also be able to earn Career and Technical Education (CTE) credits through Seattle Public Schools that will go toward their graduation credit requirements.

“The benefits for the students are that they will have a competitive advantage starting in the world of tech,” says Johnson-McCoy. “So for students to start getting the experience and skills now from the program, they will be able to use that in whatever industry they truly choose.”

Johnson-McCoy believes the program is important because it allows the students to express themselves, build confidence, and develop a marketable skill that they can turn into a career and/or business.

“Students need an outlet, they need a competitive edge, they need to be creative, and they need to be able to fill their time up with good things. I think this program allowed all of our students to use their artistic flair and design something that will really help a business owner,” says Johnson-McCoy.