Get excited.. because the VIDYA Tech Fest is here!

4,600 Students, 30 Teachers, 5 Schools & 4 Community Centres in Mumbai will participate in this Tech Fest. You can Volunteer now at shorturl.at/hX135

And a massive festival like this needs your help. Please donate using our United Way page HERE: https://www.unitedwaymumbai.org/ngo-69

Pan-VIDYA Technology Fest 2020

Introduction

VIDYA is a not for profit organisation working with children, adolescents and youth in the urban slum communities of Delhi, Gurgaon, Mumbai, Bangalore and Pune. This is our 34th year and we continue to strive and provide the best educational opportunities to lesser privileged communities. VIDYA has impacted the lives of more than 3,75,000 beneficiaries through various projects. We have a holistic approach to education with a focus on academics, Life Skills and Digital Empowerment. Information Communication Technology (ICT) has emerged as a powerful tool to transform society. It plays a key role in each of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), providing the infrastructure needed to achieve them and address poverty reduction and Equality. VIDYA’s Digital Empowerment Program (DEP) works with the aim of making ICT accessible and affordable to the beneficiaries of VIDYA and to the local community. It enables them to break barriers and explore new horizons empowered with technology.

Digital Empowerment Program (DEP)

Digital Literacy to School Children

The four important C’s of 21st century learners are Creativity, Critical Thinking, Collaboration and Communication. VIDYA DEP uses the project-based learning approach to introduce the new technological concepts to our young students. Our Digital Literacy Framework is aligned to the guidelines of UNESCO’s Sustainable Developmental Goal 4.2.2. VIDYA DEP’s Digital Literacy curriculum focuses on:

  • Data and Information Literacy
  • Collaboration and Communication
  • Digital Content Creation
  • Safety of devices, data, health and environment
  • Problem Solving
  • Career related competencies

Project based learning plays a key role in achieving these objectives, as it helps distributing the topics among the children, makes them collaborate with each other and translate the concept in various academic or industrial models. Periodic Technical Festivals (Tech Fest) provide a competitive environment to exhibit their competencies and skills.

Digital Empowerment to Youth and Women

Youth and women from the communities enroll at VIDYA DEP centres for various employability courses like Basic IT, Hardware Networking, DTP, Web Design, Data Entry and Advanced Word & Excel certified by NIIT Foundation and Basic & Advanced Tally certified by Tally Academy.

To create the linkage to Job opportunities, interested students are directed to partner organizations for Career-ready Programs and specialized IT skillsets. Tech Fests and Hackathons are proving to be a practical platform to apply these skills on industrial problems. These not only help students apply their technical skills but also make them to go through the entire developmental life cycle, which involves important aspects of logical thinking, communication and presentation. This prepares them for job interviews and competitions.

PAN VIDYA Tech Fest

“We want every kid in the world to be excited about many possibilities coding can unlock for themselves, for their communities and for society. Everyone should have the opportunity to learn computer science at school and beyond”

– Sundar Pichai CEO of Google & Alphabet

  • Our annual Tech Fest was started at VIDYA Mumbai in 2015. This is the sixth year and from this year, the event will be hosted as Pan-VIDYA Tech Fest, across all VIDYA centers in India. This Tech Fest will identify ‘Super 50’ Tech Talents who can be Tech Leaders like the Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Sundar Pichais, and Tim Cooks of tomorrow.
  • The majority of the students in VIDYA’s DEP program are from lesser privileged background where parents aspire for their children to get the best possible education and become an enabler of prosperity for their families. Our Tech Fest provides a multi-round, multi-school competitive platform to these students to present their projects and compete for the top slot. VIDYA and School teachers coach these students at various levels. This experience is very powerful for these children to prepare them for various future competitions. Tech Fest Super 50 is a talent search of best minds across various institutions with whom VIDYA is working. Tapping these talents early in their lives can help us coach them better, or find programs, coaches and mentors who can take them to the next level.

Objectives

  • To identify Super 50 Tech Talents from 4659 students
  • To kindle the minds of children, youth, women and staff of VIDYA to think “how technology can be included in their immediate work and lives” to make it more powerful and accessible to others
  • To showcase the talents and skills of VIDYA students
  • To give exposure to the power of Information Technology and emerging technologies.

Target Beneficiaries

  • Digital Literacy students from class 1 to 10 of VIDYA School Partnership and Beyond School Programs
  • Students from the employability courses of the DEP community computer centers and the NIOS Program.
  • NON-DEP staff of VIDYA Mumbai

Expected Outcomes

At least 50% of the total students from Class 6 to 10 (2296 students) will participate in the first round of competition. 140 students will participate in the finale.

  • At least 50% of the total students from Class 1 to 5 (800 students) will participate in the project-building activities in the regular classroom. The best projects will be presented during the Tech Fest Finale.
  • Due to competitive environment of the Tech Fest, only 3% students will reach in Finale round. Eventually only 1% of the total participants will be declared as the winner. This helps students to hone their competitive nature and prepare for the various competitions and interviews they will face throughout their lives.
  • At least 45 youth from the employability courses will participate in the first round of Hackathon on Excel.
  • The competition rounds in the Tech Fest Event:
    • Teach students to take risks
    • Builds self-esteem and makes them understand that it is learned and earned
    • Teaches commitment
    • Causes better academic performance

Key Indicators

  • No. of students participating in the assigned project works
  • No. of students participating in the competition
  • No. of winners
  • No. of Display projects
  • No. of visitors from schools, colleges and communities
  • % of winners compared to initial participants (indicating the rigorousness of the evaluation)
  • Average 4C scores at each level, in each school.

Highlights

  • Competition rounds for Level 3 (class 6 & 7) and Level 4 (Class 8 & 9) on different projects using the software tools taught. Evaluation based on the 4C’s of 21st century learning skills (Creativity, Critical Thinking, Collaboration and Communication)
  • Level 5 (Class 10) competition has 3 rounds with a Power Point Presentation on ‘Important Apps useful for Mumbaikar’s in their daily life’, a debate on ‘Social Media Impact on Student’s Life’ and a Group Discussion on ‘Digital Ethics’ for round 1 to 3 respectively
  • Hackathon on MS Excel for the youth of Employability courses using the fixed datasets.
  • Essay Writing Competition for Non DEP teachers of VIDYA on “Benefits of using Technology in the Classroom” with examples and cases from their practical experiences.
  • Stalls to showcase the latest Technologies (Tinkerer’s Lab, IIT Bombay)
  • Finale competition rounds judged by juries from IIT-Bombay, VIDYA Donor partners
  • Session on ‘Power of Excel’ by VIDYA’s donor partner
  • Session on ‘IOT & AI’ by distinguished Guest Speaker Prof. Vivek Varshney, IITBombay
  • Display of Student’s project works

Event Dates

Glimpses of Tech Fest 2019

The Path Ahead

The Super 50 Tech Talents identified from Tech Fest 2019-20 are the 1% of the total participants who can be groomed and supported by VIDYA stakeholders. These are the most talented students who can aspire to get into prestigious institutes like IIT, MIT.. and become the great Tech Leaders of tomorrow!

These Super 50 need your support and guidance!



VIDYA Tech Fest 2020 – ScheduleDownload