Tata consultancy Service (TCS) challenges tertiary students around the region to rethink, reimagine and reinvent education via TCS Sustainathon ASEAN 2021.
The education landscape has been drastically disrupted in the past one to two years and will continue to evolve rapidly. How can we innovate and leverage technology to help learners adapt, ensure inclusive and quality education for all, and promote lifelong learning, while supporting the well-being of all learners? Calling on forward-thinking tertiary students to develop technology and innovation solutions to transform education and learning. It has to begin with someone somewhere – why not you now?
RELEVANT SUSTAINABLE GOALS
Challenges
The covid-19 pandemic has caused a setback in our continued push towards the UN Sustainable Development Goal 4 on Quality Education for all. As per UNICEF, over 1 billion children are at risk due to school closures across 188 countries when the pandemic hit. 90% of the countries adopted remote learning to ensure continued learning. But not all the children have access to technology – 31% of the children could not continue learning due to lack of access to technology.
The education landscape was drastically disrupted in the past two years and it will continue to evolve rapidly beyond the pandemic. In a drastically disrupted education landscape,
With the overarching theme of “Reimagining Education,” the Sustainathon 2021 hopes to enable senior high school and college students to join discussions on pressing issues surrounding education today and hopefully develop ideas on how to have an “Inclusive Education for all in 2030.”
challenge statement & WEBINAR
Initially launched in Singapore in 2020 with the theme of combating food waste, Tata Consultancy Service (TCS) Sustainathon serves as a platform for young minds to collaborate with private companies, nonprofit organizations and government agencies to co-create solutions for real world sustainability issues using digital technologies.
Back in 2020, ninety-eight students from more than 15 educational institutions in Singapore developed plans on fighting food waste, which has been one of the major challenges faced by many countries. This year, TCS expands its initiative to the Philippines and Malaysia to promote inclusivity in education as these countries implement blended and flexible learning.
Top TWO teams / individuals from each country will qualify for the ASEAN finals to be held in March 2022. Qualifying participants will be contacted by the TCS Sustainathon Team after the country finals and receive a flash challenge statement, along with participation details.
Watch the TCS Sustainathon ASEAN 2021 launch webinar below :
TCS has put together an exciting lineup of webinars for experts and leaders to share their views around sustainability, reimagining education, technology and innovation. You can find webinars from our participating countries, Malaysia, Philippines and Singapore. Click here to find out more
TCS Sustainathon SINGAPORE 2021
Participants can register and submit their entries at the TCS Sustainathon Singapore website until 26 November. The top two winners will compete alongside Sustainathon Philippines and Malaysia winners at the ASEAN Championship in March 2022.
TCS Sustainathon MALAYSIA 2021
Millions of Malaysian children, families and teachers have been impacted by covid 19 pandemic – from facing connectivity issues to struggling with teaching and learning in an unfamiliar online format. For us at TCS, the Sustainathon is our effort to aggregate ideas, technology and innovation to address pressing real-world issues. This year, we are focusing on education, to help bridge the gap in education by addressing inclusivity and limitations.
The TCS Sustainathon Malaysia 2021 is open to tertiary level students in Malaysia from pre-university to university cohorts from any discipline, including students in public and private institutes of higher education as well as technical education institutes. Participants can submit ideas as individuals or in teams of up to five members. Students under the age of 18 as on 20 September 2021 must obtain consent from their respective parent or guardian to participate in the Challenge.
Idea submissions should be based on four challenge areas, as follows:
● Challenge #1: The Digital Divide and Disconnection, where ideas should explore ways to enhance community engagement and provide access to high quality higher education in a more inclusive way during and after the pandemic, employing technology to create blended learning experiences that include the B40 group and people with disabilities.
● Challenge #2: Absenteeism in Remote Learning, where ideas should offer solutions to drive behavioural change in students and motivate them to be actively present in their online learning journey.
● Challenge #3: Integrated Digital Learning Platform, where ideas should offer a one-stop digital solution for monitoring and managing online teaching and learning, to improve the quality of online teaching and facilitate communication among parents, teachers and educational institutions in an integrated manner.
● Challenge #4: Accessible Education for the Blind, where ideas should offer digital solutions to enable inclusive education for visually-impaired students and re-visualise traditional teaching practices.
Submissions for the TCS Sustainathon Malaysia 2021 will close on 30 November 2021. Webinar sessions to help interested participants refine their ideas and improve their entries will also be held, with recordings made available after the webinars. More information on participating in TCS Sustainathon Malaysia 2021, including the submission guidelines and judging criteria, can be found here. The organisers can also be contacted via email at tcs.sustainathon@tcs.com.
TCS Sustainathon Philippines 2021
Nobody was prepared when the COVID-19 pandemic happened in 2020. Businesses halted operations. Roads were empty. Lockdowns were implemented. Greatly affected by the pandemic was the education sector.
In the midst of the pandemic, over 24 million students from kinder to senior high school were enrolled in both public and private schools in the Philippines in 2020. In preparation for the new normal of classes, the Department of Education released a memorandum guiding the regions in implementing various learning modalities. However, amidst the flexibility, remote learning posed issues about accessibility and inclusivity. Some of the main pain points were on technology and infrastructure, access to learning materials, and inclusion of children with disabilities.
TCS Philippines invites Filipino students to join the TCS Sustainathon 2021. Senior high school and college students from public and private institutions across the country are welcome to participate either individually, or a team with a maximum of four members. Each individual or team must choose a challenge statement and create ideas or solutions to address the challenge statement, on the theme “Inclusive Education for all in 2030.” Entries must incorporate the use of technology to create innovative, practical, and concrete solutions for the chosen challenge.
Participants can register and submit their entries at the TCS Sustainathon Philippines website until 19 November. The 1st place winner will receive P150,000 while the second and third placers will receive P100,000 and P50,000, respectively. The top two winners will compete alongside Sustainathon Singapore and Malaysia winners at the ASEAN Championship in March 2022.
The article was initially published on 26th October 2021.
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