Thate Pan Hub

In Myanmar, young learners from lower socio-economic backgrounds are handicapped to learn quality Computer Science Education due to language barriers, lack of standardized local courses and financial constraints. Moreover, there is no adequate free online-learning platform with Myanmar Language for Computer Science and Coding. Therefore, to tackle this problem, we would like to propose our solution.

Thate Pan Hub Platform is an online learning platform where every Myanmar student can freely access and learn about the basic concepts of Computer Science and Digital Literacy through numerous fun games and unplugged activities in Myanmar Language and localized contents. We will mainly feature cultural themes and characters which the students can easily relate to, so that they can gain not only Computer Science and coding knowledge but also important knowledge about ethnicities’ traditions, arts, culture, history and more. 

Thate Pan Hub Platform will contain multiple courses related to Computer Science, Coding and Artificial Intelligence. Anyone with a computer, tablet or phone and an internet connection will be able to sign up, log in and learn any course they wish to take. Inspired by cord.org, “Thate Pan Hub” will contain interactive instructional videos and texts, games and a coding workspace. There will also be offline content which can be brought to rural areas without stable internet connections so that the students from these areas can get access to the content through our outreach activities and through our partner organizations. 

Due to the nature of the platform, Thate Pan Hub Online Platform bears no limit in the number of beneficiaries. The platform has a robust foundation for sustainability and can be scaled to reach over 50% of all children of age (8-17) in Myanmar.

Every project that Thate Pan Hub has done is solely implemented with the community needs in mind. Before we crafted the initial project idea, we researched about the overall education system in Myanmar and talked to the grass-root community in order to deliver an impactful project. The state of Myanmar’s basic technology education landscape has been far from remarkable. At a micro level, most public highschools lack well-functioning computers and devices to be used for technology education. The technology awareness of teachers is also questionable as there was no adequate technology knowledge upskilling programs for teachers. Only a handful of children from affluent families can afford private computer science lessons due to the high class fees. Financial barrier is only the tip of the iceberg as there are a lot more forces at play which hinders the efforts towards inclusive egalitarian basic technology education.

Our research alongside the input from the communities indicate that there are 3 main obstacles in Myanmar which hinders the movement of technology education in Myanmar. 

Lack of adequate basic computer science infrastructure - As we have mentioned, the public basic education system does not have enough infrastructure (lack of functioning electronic devices, skilled teachers and low technology awareness, to name a few) to support the adoption of basic technology education. 

Language barrier - There is a very low amount of free resources for basic technology education available in burmese and other ethnic languages. As most free online resources for learning computer science and technology education are in English, local children and youths who do not speak foregin languages are marginalized further from the technology education.

Lack of internet access or device - In the vulnerable and marginalized communities, there are internet connectivity issues and some areas do not even have access to the internet. No access to the internet blocks any personal or communal growth opportunities of these areas. Moreover, financial struggles put families in these regions into straight-jacket, not being able to spare additional expenses for electronic devices.

Activity/ Output/ Short-term Outcomes/ Long-term Outcomes/ Impact

Indicator

Activity

• Establishment of Thate Pan Hub Online Learning Platform containing courses of Computer Science, Coding and Artificial Intelligence for young burmese learners, promoting free accessibility, social inclusivity and digital literacy. 

• Completion of Thate Pan Hub Platform

Output

• Students gain access to computer science education in a localized context

• Students develop their own creative and innovative ideas in computer science

• Students improve their logical and analytical skills.

• Feedback from students

• Assessment of students

Short-term Outcomes

• Students gain foundation and advanced levels of coding and programming

• Students write their own programs upon their innovation and creativity 

• Students participate in hackathons and international competitions

• Students develop better technology intuition which serves as an integral layer for building future skills

• Students achieve better problem-solving skills and analytical skills to help them in their daily lives

• Student’s ability for continuous learning

• Achievements of students

Long-term Outcomes

• Students become well-versed in computer science education

• Students become mentors and manage and train other young learns in turn, creating like-minded groups to tackle the coding challenges, social problems with digital literate skills

• Students becoming full-fledge professionals in the young age

• Students adapting to future technology-driven and socio-economic lifestyles such as remote-working and freelancing

• Students’ contribution to the community in the future

• Emergence of distinguished individuals

Impact

• Technological and Digital Literate Youths

• Socio Economic development 

• Inclusive and free computer science education for all children in Myanmar

• Number of graduates

• Successful implementation of the platform

In Myanmar, it can be said that there is no public  inclusive basic technology education as the national education system was still in the process of reforming. At a micro level, most public highschools lack well-functioning computers and devices to be used for technology education. The technology awareness of teachers is also questionable as there was no adequate technology knowledge upskilling programs for teachers. Only a handful of children from affluent families can afford private computer science lessons due to the high class fees. There are financial barriers, language barriers as well as location barriers preventing Myanmar Children from accessing basic computer science education. Our solution serves to break down these three barriers, allowing children to effectively learn basic computer science education everywhere at zero cost. For financial barriers, our platform will be free of charge and any child from Myanmar can start learning after creating an account as long as there is an internet connection and a functioning device. As a platform which will completely be in burmese and other ethnic languages, cultures, the children will be able to learn faster in their mother-tongue. Moreover, as an online platform, any child from any region in Myanmar can access our solution, further empowering children from vulnerable regions and hard-to-reach areas. We understand that we are at level 1 of Nesta Standards of Evidence. As an organization which is currently operating in Myanmar's education landscape, we are confident about the potential impact of our solution on all Myanmar children and Myanmar’s future socio-economic development. 

In order to fully implement and monitor our project, we have divided it into 4 main phases throughout the project.

Phase1: Curriculum development

The content will be developed based on the guidelines from educational specialists and professionals from Microsoft and meets the six key criteria for professional development outlined in Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), also including the Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) standards and the strict standards from the U.S Department of Education. Through these contents, students will be able to develop computational thinking, problem solving and programming skills which can help promote creativity, critical thinking, natural curiosity, logics & analytics collaboration.

Phase2: Initial Establishment

The online platform will initially be developed as a small website where students can gain access to CS courses that can be completed in 5-10 hours. The content format will be interactive and gamified lessons, instructional videos and texts, mini-games and quizzes in the basics of computer science and computational thinking. In-house web development team, course development team, and media team will be working collaboratively to produce quality content with the focus of child-friendly lessons. After the development and internal testing, selective pilot testing with some of the classes from Thate Pan Hub will be performed. Subsequently, public beta testing with all major features will be carried out. Phase 1 will take 6 months. 

Phase3: Acceleration and outreach activity

In Phase 2, more 10-hour courses will be added to the platform. We will plan and implement 10 offline basic computer science enablement activities in the far-flung rural areas through partnership with informal schools of alternative education, run by local organizations. Each enablement activity will take 6 hours a day for 5 days. Each session will take 3 hours and is expected to host a minimum of 120 students. As such, we envision each enablement activity to have an impact on around 500 - 1000 students depending on the student count of each school, adding up to around 10,000 beneficiaries during phase 2. Trainers for each enablement activity will be chosen from each informal school and an intensive online TOT (training of trainers) will be provided for them. Low cost tablets will also be distributed so that students from schools without computers can access our platform. At the same time, we will raise awareness about our platform by collaborating together with several organizations in the education sector. Through this 6 months long phase, we aim to gain 50,000 unique users of our platform.

Phase4: Expansion

In Phase 3, more contents and courses will be created and uploaded so that students of different knowledge and competency levels can learn more about computer science and computational thinking through our platform. The platform will be introduced to schools and education institutions which have the interest to offer computer science as part of their extracurricular course and have the necessary equipment to bring our courses to their communities. We will develop strategic partnerships with more organizations including the Myanmar Computer Federation and the Myanmar Ministry of Education. At the end of Phase 3, our platform is expected to have a total of 100,000 unique users.

Inclusive, interactive and free computer science education for all Myanmar children

Along with the Thate Pan Hub Platform implementation, the help of industry experienced mentors and fellows are necessary. As the project itself is a first of its kind here in Myanmar, there will be various aspects to focus on. Specifically, proper instructions are needed in areas such as market research and effective implementation as Myanmar is a third world country and the majority of the citizens are still lacking in digital literacy and do not have sufficient resources to pursue computer science education. Moreover, in the area of the localized curriculum development, research into the development and the effectiveness of the course are also required. Despite the fact that we have layered out the plan from the start to the end, a third party view and evaluation is necessary so that the project is not implemented in a biased and incomplete way. 

The potential deliverables during the LEAP project would be developing an intensive research on the Thate Pan Hub Project Platform and successfully achieve the satisfiable results. It is of our main priority to find the areas that are currently lacking so that they can be improvised on in such a way that the project implementation is sound and effective. Moreover, the review of the curriculum of the courses is needed so that all of the courses are children-friendly yet challenging and making an impactful education. The Thate Pan Hub Platform Project itself is a first of its kind in Myanmar, providing free computer science education in a localized context specifically designed for the children and youths of Myanmar. Hosting a Leap Project will help fill in the gaps that might have missed out and strengthen our project in terms of research and overall demographics. If this project is successfully completed, it will be a great accomplishment. The awareness of computer science education will skyrocket, the platform for the localized context of computer science and artificial intelligence education will be developed and Myanmar young learners can inclusively learn cost-free computer science education, making them ready for the 21st century job market in the future.