Webit.Foundation is first and foremost socially engaged in different initiatives – from investments through education to developing the local ecosystems wherever we step foot on.
It all starts with education – every profession, every living. Value it.
One of the major topics for the past couple of years is education, due to increase in dialogue at both political and enterprise level regarding the huge hole in educating youngsters using the instruments of the future. While it took 10 years for the online shopping to become the norm, every other day a new norm is born. This and many more examples determine the idea that now is the time to take action.
The topic of education was discussed at both the Opening of Webit.Festival Europe 2018 and the Digital Entertainment and Media Summit with distinguished professionals in their respective fields.
Having been teaching for 20 years Sharan Burrow, now the Secretary General of the International Trade Union Confederation shares that
“…education is a lifelong venture. You have to start with early childhood education and it’s probably not withstanding the deficit in investment across all spheres of education and skills.
It’s the one that has been left out. It’s often where inequality starts.”
For a long time the business community had a short-term thinking. Jim Green, the VP Government affairs gives an example that many executives were thinking “Who can I hire right now” But the trend is now different and looking towards the future so what Mark Benioff, being the CEO of Salesforce, took on is a one-one-one model – 1% of the equity, 1% of the product and 1% of the employee time goes into volunteerism.
“Technology is part of the solution, it can help, teachers and students, but we shouldn’t kid ourselves that technology is the only answer.”
It’s not only companies, however, that invest in future education, it’s organizations like Breakthrough Prize Foundation which tries to make science and mathematics cool again.
“How come everyone in here can name a World Cup player, but have a lot of trouble naming an alive top scientist?”
Education is about inspiration and personal example. Kids don’t just learn in front of the computer today, says Esther Wojcicki, they need more interaction. One of the strongest points of the discussion was toned by Jim Green who saw technology as irrelevant with the shortage of teachers, which is a worldwide problem.
“The teachers must be phenomenally passionate of what they do, because they cannot make a living out of teaching.”
One of the newest initiatives of Breakthrough is Junior Challenge where kids from 13 and 18 years old may participate by sending a 3-minute video of their innovation to win the prize of $250,000 post-secondary scholarship; $50,000 for the teacher and $100,000 for the Breakthrough Science Lab + a trip for the winner and their parents to receive the award personally. The challenge is international and we strongly encourage you to take action.
You can see the details here.