Spanish Education by Polkadot México

Requested Allocation: $52,165 USDC

Beneficiary: 16erHfjin7aWozKBpEU6ocxtJY7t38pFnnHvhHLiJYSywS3t

Duration: 5 months (6 milestones)

Description: Polkadot México is proposing a 5-month, Spanish-language education program for university students and developer communities across Mexico. The program combines 4 weeks of remote fundamentals training with a 5-day in-person bootcamp and a 24-hour hackathon ($5,000 USDC in on-chain prizes), fully built on Parity's 2026 product stack (Product SDK, DotNS, Individuality/PoP, Browse, Bulletin Chain).

What's different this time: the workshop itself runs on Polkadot. Before M2 funding is released, we deploy 4 original mini-apps on the Polkadot Products Devnet (Campus Quest, Workshop Passport, Hackathon Live, and Certificate Mint) that manage attendance, prizes, and certification on-chain. Every deliverable is a transaction hash, not a testimonial.

Why Now?

In July 2026, the Polkadot Community Foundation and Parity launched the Polkadot Products Devnet, the first environment where Browse, Individuality, PoP, Festival, and the full "Triangle" stack operate together. For the first time in Polkadot's history, a developer can ship a complete product (wallet + identity + storage + naming + app store) in a single afternoon.

Browse currently has only a handful of community-built apps. We believe this is the ideal moment to bring this technology to Mexican university students in computer science, web development, and engineering, while the ecosystem still needs early builders and early adopters.

How This Differs From Referendum #1896

Our earlier referendum (1896) proposed a similar education initiative but relied on self-reported attendance and manually tracked metrics. This proposal replaces that model entirely with on-chain verifiable infrastructure:

• Before: self-reported attendance. Now: Workshop Passport, cryptographic daily check-ins with block timestamps.
• Before: manual leaderboards. Now: Statement Store powered live leaderboards.
• Before: PDF certificates. Now: soulbound NFT certificates (Certificate Mint), publicly verifiable by address.
• Before: "we'll send the prize." Now: smart-contract-executed, automatic prize distribution (Hackathon Live).
• Before: testimonials as evidence. Now: every deliverable is a transaction hash.

Program Structure

1. Online Reach: content hub, YouTube, Skool, social media. Expected reach: 15K+ views.
2. Remote Sessions: 8 live sessions over 4 weeks. Expected reach: 80–120 attendees.
3. In-Person Bootcamp: 5 days × 6 hours. Expected reach: 40–50 students.
4. Hackathon: 24h build + Demo Day. Expected reach: 40 people / 10+ teams.
5. Retention (weeks 17–22): technical support + on-chain metrics. Goal: an active dev community in Mexico + LATAM.

Why two phases? Moving all theory online means in-person time is 100% hands-on, no slides, no lectures, just building. Remote assignments also act as a natural filter: only committed students reach the bootcamp.

Curriculum (Road to Products for People)

• Module 1, From Money to the Internet (Remote, 8 sessions): Bitcoin to Ethereum to Polkadot, wallets, and the new Products stack (pad, DotNS, Browse).
• Module 2, Smart Contracts: Programming Money (Bootcamp Days 1–2): Dual-VM development, Solidity via resolc/Hardhat-Polkadot and Rust via cargo-pvm-contract, both deployed on PolkaVM (Paseo Asset Hub).
• Module 3, Building Products on Polkadot (Bootcamp Days 3–5): Product SDK, Statement Store, DotNS, Individuality (Ring-VRF Proof of Personhood), Festival soulbound pattern, and the full T3RMINAL stack.

Alongside the technical program, we produce a 35-video, 340-minute Spanish-language content library (26 educational + 9 tutorials) published permanently on YouTube, Skool, and our website, designed for anyone in LATAM with no prior blockchain background.

The 4 On-Chain Infrastructure Products

All four are built and deployed on Products Devnet before M2 funding is released, the most direct proof of technical capability we can offer delegates.

1. Campus Quest: Gamified, QR-based campus treasure hunt. Every location badge is an on-chain transaction; completing the map earns a soulbound "explorer" NFT.
2. Workshop Passport: Daily cryptographic check-ins replace attendance sheets. Any delegate can query the contract and see every check-in with its block timestamp.
3. Hackathon Live: On-chain team registration, judge scoring, live leaderboard, and automatic $5,000 USDC prize distribution via smart contract.
4. Certificate Mint: Soulbound NFT graduation certificates, publicly verifiable by wallet address, alongside the physical university certificate.

Milestones & Payment Plan

• M1, Tools & Setup (Week 1): $800. Released upon referendum approval.
• M2, Content Creation + Event Products (Weeks 2–7): $19,422.50. Released upon completing M1.
• M3, Remote Sessions + Coordination + M4 Logistics (Weeks 8–13): $12,800. Released upon completing M2.
• M4, 5-Day Bootcamp + M5 Advance Logistics (Week 14): $10,766. Released upon completing M3.
• M5, 24h Hackathon + Prizes + Final Report (Weeks 15–16): $8,376.50. Released upon completing M4.
• M6, Retention + Extended Final Report (Weeks 17–22): $0. Released upon completing M5.

Total: 5 months / 6 milestones / $52,165 USDC

Budget Breakdown

• Team Fees (7 people, content, products, sessions, bootcamp, hackathon): $29,882 (57.3%)
• On-chain Prizes (automatic, via Hackathon Live): $5,000 (9.6%)
• Bootcamp Logistics (merch, travel, certificates, domains, lab): $5,530 (10.6%)
• Hackathon Logistics (catering, AV, photographer, kit, streaming): $4,000 (7.7%)
• Total Operational (content, products, sessions, bootcamp, hackathon): $2,080 (4.0%)
• Tools & Setup (M1): $800 (1.5%)
• Post-Event Report (documentation + documentary): $1,000 (1.9%)
• Contingency (exchange rate + minor expenses): $3,873 (7.4%)

Total: $52,165 (100%)

Team rates are intentionally below blockchain-market rates ($50–$150/h for developers, $40–$80/h for instructional designers). This is a community-driven initiative, not a for-profit engagement.

Team

• Erick Ramos: Project Director, Series 5 Presenter, Hackathon Mentor. Co-founder of Polkadot México (2022). OpenGov participation via Decentralized Voices (Trustless Core cohorts 4–5).
• Brandon Correa: Senior Instructor / Lead Developer, Hackathon Mentor. Polkadot Ambassador, founder of AradiaPad, lead dev of the 4 event infrastructure products.
• Danyiel Colin: Senior Instructor, Content Co-Creator, Hackathon Judge. PBA Buenos Aires 2023 alumnus; co-creates technical content with Brandon (80h + 80h).
• Javier Eli: Technical Facilitator / Instructor, Hackathon Mentor. Community growth specialist with experience at Gear Foundation / Vara Network.
• Armando Castro: Content Creator / Instructional Designer. Leads video production and community content, including the 6-month retention phase.
• Amaury López: Community Manager. Polkadot Ambassador since 2023, co-organizer of 15+ events in Mexico.
• Rodrigo Hernández: Events & Logistics Coordinator. Industrial Engineer with a Master's in blockchain applications.

Partner Universities

• Tecnológico de Monterrey: Primary target.
• UANL: Primary target, active relationship (Blockchain Student Chapter).
• Universidad del Valle de Puebla (UVP): Active relationship, site of our July 2025 pilot.
• UNAM: Contact in progress.
• Iberoamericana: Contact in progress.

Direct precedent: On July 25, 2025, Polkadot México ran the workshop "The Future is Web3 and It's Built with Polkadot" at UVP with Google Developers Group Puebla: 40 students, 40 GitHub forks, 28 commits. This proposal scales that model with on-chain accountability built in from day one.

KPIs & On-Chain Verification

• Products deployed on Products Devnet: 4 (Browse + .dot.li URL)
• Workshop Passport check-ins: > 200 (Contract query)
• Campus Quest badges collected: > 200 (Contract query)
• Sites deployed on .dot.li: > 50 (Public URLs + tx hashes)
• Smart contracts deployed on Paseo: > 35 (Block explorer links)
• .dot domains registered: > 45 (DotNS contract queries)
• Mini-apps published in Browse: > 15 (Browse listing)
• Prizes distributed on-chain: $5,000 (Hackathon Live tx hashes)
• Soulbound certificates issued: > 35 (Certificate Mint contract events)
• Unique developers impacted: > 200
• Social media impressions: > 50,000

Transparency & Accountability

• Monthly reports published on the OpenGov forum with full on-chain evidence
• Milestone-based payments, evidence required before each release
• Receipts and invoices for every operational expense
• Surplus automatically returned to the Treasury, with documentation
• Open-source content, repositories, and materials
• Live-streamed Demo Day for community oversight
• Public GitHub project board tracking all tasks

Previous referendum for context: Referendum #1896

Polkadot México on X: @PolkadotMexico_

Full Proposal: The complete, detailed version of this proposal including the full budget breakdown, curriculum, and team compensation tables is available as a Google Doc and permanently archived on IPFS for censorship-resistant, long-term access.

We're not asking for funding to explain Polkadot on slides. We're asking for funding to run a workshop where the infrastructure itself runs on Polkadot, where students use the Polkadot App before they write a single line of code, and every deliverable is a transaction hash, not a testimonial.

We'd love to hear the community's perspective on this initiative. Our doors are open to collaboration, both within this proposal and across the wider LATAM ecosystem.