Digicel Supports Youth Challenge Vanuatu in the E- Learning Pilot Programme

June 21, 2020 11:38 pm | Posted in Business News | Share now TwitterFacebook

Youth Challenge Vanuatu (YCV) has expressed its heartfelt gratitude to Digicel Vanuatu for their support towards the YCV members who are participating in the E-Learning Pilot Programme.

YCV Director, Mr Steven Noel, said; “Digicel support of free sim cards to the 27 students participating in the first E-Learning Pilot Programme is very significant, as it will help them afford to watch online videos and other training content from their personal phones or tablets.

“Without this generous donation from Digicel, these students wouldn’t have afforded to participate in the programme because there was no other funding available to pay for the mobile internet needed to download e-learning videos and courses on students’ phones or tablets. Many of these students come from disadvantaged backgrounds and are not currently employed.”

The students could also access their e-learning courses for free using Youth Challenge Vanuatu’s computers and internet at the training centre.

However, a key goal for the pilot programme was to have students experiment with doing online learning outside of the training centre on their own.

“Thanks to Digicel’s help with the cost of data, Youth Challenge Vanuatu and its pilot students can experiment together, identify challenges and opportunities for making more future online learning available from people’s phones or computers, and from workplaces or homes at any time,” added Mr Noel.

“By experimenting with delivering training online as e-learning, Youth Challenge is increasing its flexibility to deliver training at whatever time and place suits a group of learners; which could be groups of employees, youth, volunteers or other target groups in the future,” stated the YCV Director.

The goal for the E-Learning Pilot is to increase YCV’s ability to keep providing trainings or other online support when disasters strike, following the forced closures of the training centre premises, due to cyclone Harold and COVID19.

Selected students at Youth Challenge Vanuatu were given free access to online training resources as a 6-week trial, commencing from 11th May.

They can login to their personal online training account and study any time, at any place using their smartphone, tablet or a computer and a reliable internet connectivity to login to the UpSkill E-learning website.

Digicel Vanuatu CEO, Deepak Khanna said; “We are delighted to be able to support the youths of Youth Challenge Vanuatu with their new remote learning programme, by providing free data to access their learning resources and websites.

Part of our role as an essential service provider is to ensure we keep Vanuatu connected, especially throughout these challenging times. Many of our customers have adjusted to working from home, bringing new ways of working and challenges to their daily lives.

However, it is also an opportunity for new methods of teaching, learning, and developmental opportunities for our future leaders”.