Here, you’ll find the 2020/21 (2021) Reimagine Education Award winners – those who were selected by an extended panel of over 200 international judges as achieving outstanding standards for innovation, scalability, efficacy, and uniqueness. The winners were awarded on 9th-11th December 2020, and their win pertains to an application submitted during the 2020/21 academic year.

Overall

OVERALL AWARDS

OVERALL REIMAGINE EDUCATION AWARD WINNER

JOB SMART GAINS THE EDGE: INNOVATING AUTHENTIC EMPLOYABILITY AT SCALE – UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY BUSINESS SCHOOL

Kindly sponsored by QS Quacquarelli Symonds

Job Smart (JS) is the University of Sydney Business School’s flagship student experience and employability skill program for our cohort of over 9400 international students. Job Smart is a 3 phased program of scaffolded employability skill building activities, corporate networking and genuine workplace projects with Australian employers. Job Smart is delivered on a customised, mobile first and gamified education technology platform provided by our partner Practera. Over 5 years, Job Smart has improved student engagement 700% and improved student employability by 300%. The reimagined Job Smart Edge is partnering with our WIL Hub, tracking at 123% on previous top rate.

University of Sydney Business School

OVERALL REIMAGINE EdTECH WINNER

PRECISION OS

Kindly sponsored by Google Cloud

In the absence of an effective and cost-effective training model, varied experiences have led to a wide disparity in global health care delivery. PrecisionOS addresses this problem through the development of an immersive education software platform powered by a portable virtual reality solution. Our MultiUser project permits remote collaboration from anywhere in the world permitting experts to educate users. It is the most comprehensive software platform covering areas including trauma, pediatrics, arthroplasty (hip, knee and shoulder replacements), spine surgery and arthroscopic procedures.

Precision+Logo+
Category

CATEGORY AWARDS

Gold Award Winner

GULF MEDICAL UNIVERSITY

The Project Virtual patient learning (VPL) is an online simulation system, based on artificial intelligence and pre-recorded movies, in which the learner plays the role of a physician, pharmacist, nurse etc. who confronts a virtual patient. The interaction takes place in real-time and each decision taken by the learner instantly affects the reactions and emotions of the patient, just as it would in real life. The patient in the scenario is played by a professional actor who is trained to simulate variable moods, attitudes, and emotional responses through verbal and non-verbal communication. Feedback is given through the simulated patient’s comments.

Silver Award Winner

AJMAN UNIVERSITY

echoV is a project targeting deaf and hearing-impaired students who are aiming to continue their education outside special centers and communicate normally with the societies who are not sign language educated. Common universities and colleges worldwide are not equipped with technological techniques that can assist them in their education, while few specialized universities are built for deaf students, sign language tutors or in-class television captioning are included for few majors only. echoV it will allow students to study in any educational institution without the need for any sign language tutors in the classroom and adapt easily with their colleagues.

Bronze Award Winner

SQUIRREL AI LEARNING

Squirrel Ai Learning applies AI-powered adaptive learning technology to K12 education. It developed the first AI adaptive learning engine with independent intellectual property rights and advanced algorithms. With 70% AI system teaching + 30% human tutor-assisted mixed mode, it provides a student-centered intelligent and personalized education. The system applies AI technology in the process of assessment, teaching, learning, evaluation. The product is cost-effective, with the artificial intelligence + human teacher model, to teach students in accordance with their aptitude, effectively solves the problems of the high cost of traditional education, the lack of resources for teachers, and low learning efficiency.

Gold Award Winner

UMUZI.ORG

The African Coding Network links coding schools across the continent to deliver shared services to them through our Open Source edtech platform. We create a simulated work environment that facilitates remote, asynchronous, project-based learning that allows peer-to-peer supported learning across the continent. This helps coding schools to focus on solving local challenges including computer, internet, and data access, as well as learner management. This approach reduces the costs of training professional developers, increases their chances of employment, and will allow more coding schools to scale to meet the growing demand for tech skills in Africa.

Silver Award Winner

IMPERIAL COLLEGE BUSINESS SCHOOL

Imperial’s GMBA is now ranked no.1 in the UK, and no.2 in the world by the 2020 QS Online MBA rankings. The School remains attuned to the needs of today’s experienced business students, with an emphasis on innovation, student and faculty feedback, and enrichment. Challenges of online learning are addressed through new technologies such as holographic events and the integration of ‘on the ground’ modules such as Glocal electives, which allow students to immerse themselves in a global challenge from a local perspective, whilst applying their MBA course skills. Since launching in 2015 it has won a few prestigious awards.

Bronze Award Winner

EDINBURGH BUSINESS SCHOOL, HERIOT-WATT UNIVERSITY

Heriot-Watt University’s online MBA is defined by a commitment to flexibility and equality of access that permeates every aspect of the student experience. In July 2020 a £2 million, 3-year project to realign the programme with the 21st-century business world was delivered. This involved holistic curriculum design drawing on extensive research with students and employers, creative pedagogical design and technological innovation. Five thousand online students in 158 countries are transitioning to a new, bespoke online-learning platform and newly created online modules. Students have praised the new MBA’s relevance to 21st-century business practice and the impact of enhanced feedback on learning.

Gold Award Winner

STUDYSMARTER

StudySmarter is an intelligent learning platform transforming any text into an interactive learning course, making any content more efficient and engaging to learn. Our platform makes learning more fun, intelligent and globally accessible. We founded StudySmarter following our own experiences at university and our platform is now used by more than 1 million pupils and students in Germany, 89% of whom receive better grades. Our platform received special attention for our technical solution as a response to the COVID-19 crisis. For our work to decrease dropout rates, we’ve been named both the best EdTech startup in Germany and in Europe.

Silver Award Winner

TALEEMABAD LEARNING APP

The Taleemabad Primary Grades App is a Ministry of Education approved Android App that teaches the National Curriculum of Pakistan by synergising the concept of Knowledge Inertia – using redundant or stagnant past knowledge and experiences to learn new concepts and create new knowledge – and animation, leading to 70% decreased dropouts from schools and a 31% improvement in test scores. The app also assesses each user’s learning levels through the thousands of gamified assessments. The responses are collected and mapped on Standard Learning Outcomes to calculate Student Progress. This allows the app to help users overcome their shortcomings.

Bronze Award Winner

PLETHORA

Plethora uses gamification to teach youth of all ages to solve complex problems using Computational Thinking. Our mission is to teach students the foundations of Computational Thinking so they can use them in every aspect of their life. At Plethora, students plan algorithms in their own mother tongue language, solve challenges while learning computer science concepts, and focus on pure cognitive processes, as our true gender-neutral platform encourages creativity over technical syntax.

Gold Award Winner

UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY

Educators care about their students and their learning experiences, but they are struggling to better engage and relate with their students in the face of burgeoning workloads. The Student Relationship Engagement System (SRES) is cloud-based software that helps teachers provide students with individualised care, support, and learning experiences at scale. Melding the power of learning analytics with the pastoral and educational prowess of educators teaching in varied contexts, SRES is like a ‘CRM for educators’. Built by educators, for educators, with educators, it puts them in the driver’s seat of a flexible platform to build ‘person’-alised learning support for students.

Silver Award Winner

TECNOLOGICO DE MONTERREY

Hologram professors enable quality education through an innovative, captivating and low-cost experience. The professor is represented in a life-size and anatomically correct hologram. The student perceives a high social presence of his teacher recreating the natural dynamics of a face-to-face class interacting in real time. The remote learning experience becomes more human, generating positive emotions in the student. Engagement is fostered through interaction where technology is not a barrier. This design of an immersive educational experience enhances focus and attention during the teaching-learning process.

Bronze Award Winner

PIXTON COMICS INC.

Pixton EDU is a web-app that gives teachers and students a unique way to create stories, demonstrate learning, and enhance writing assignments – in any subject – through digital comics. Users can explore topics in Math, Science, Social Studies, History, English, Art or any other subject. Choose images from popular content, books and movies like The Hunger Games or The Outsiders, plus other topics like the solar system, black history or the environment – all Common Core aligned.

Gold Award Winner

GULF MEDICAL UNIVERSITY

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed many aspects of our life. Distance Learning became a common mode of learning in all disciplines of higher education. The Virtual Patient Learning (VPL) is an online simulation system, based on artificial intelligence (AI) and pre-recorded movies, in which the learner plays the role of a physician who confronts a (simulated) patient. It has been developed by the medical education experts at Gulf Medical University. VPL was used for the first time to conduct PBL sessions and assess clinical competencies of health professionals from a distance.

Silver Award Winner

RAREJOB INC.

Rarejob developed an automated evaluation system for business English speaking test called PROGOS. We launched its beta version on June 17, 2020. The system uses a speech recognition API (Application Programming Interface) and machine learning technology. The test is taken online anytime and anywhere for only US$5, and you can get the results in a few minutes. Unlike human evaluation, there is no limit of evaluator capacity. The system evaluates answers to open-ended questions, which has been thought to be impossible with automated systems. It is based on the CEFR (Common European Framework of Reference) levels, a global standard.

Bronze Award Winner

TECNOLOGICO DE MONTERREY

Semana 18 is part of the new competency-based learning model, Modelo Educativo Tec21, that Tecnológico de Monterrey launched in August 2019. As part of the curricular plan, students take a final one weeklong course called Semana 18; it involves a critical review of the results obtained during the ending semester, detection of possible areas for improvement, identification of alternatives to reinforce knowledge/skills, commitment establishment, academic orientation, and community integration. During Semana 18, students are sought to integrate their state of progress concerning the development of their sub-competencies, they also clarify the development perspective in their curricular training.

Gold Award Winner

BOND UNIVERSITY

Many students studying health sciences or medicine commonly find the disciplines of physiology and anatomy to be difficult, challenging components of their curricula. These present the predominant disciplines implemented in lower-than-expected results or student failures, impacting progressions to postgraduate courses and future careers in health. Dr Christian Moro has: developed virtual, augmented and mixed reality applications; utilized Instagram, YouTube, and other social media; produced animated videos; created computer games; and worked with international collaborations to enhance the in-class experience when learning physiology and anatomy and worked to share these resources at no cost to millions of students worldwide.

Silver Award Winner

COSTRUYENDO Y CRECIENDO

Construyendo y Creciendo (CyC; Building and Growing) has provided second-hand, comprehensive, and formal education to construction workers and their communities. We are aimed to provide personal and professional, development opportunities. Classrooms are installed on construction sites and in public spaces. By so doing, beneficiaries do not have to commute long distances or spend on transportation to have education. In CyC, “school goes to students”. More than 25,000 have been benefited, from which 7,000 have graduated. As well, 120 classrooms have been installed and operated in 16 States of Mexico.

Bronze Award Winner

ASANTE AFRICA FOUNDATION

We are reimagining education in rural East Africa with a youth-driven pedagogy. Youth are being taught to participate in the design of the curriculum with the goal of providing necessary skills and practical experience to address local needs and opportunities. This inclusive Learn-Do-Teach methodology, combined with a systemic Pay-it-Forward model, puts new ideas into the hands of students and challenges them to put lessons into practice. Our model, now deployed in more than 350 schools in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda is transforming young people and enabling them to find opportunity, start businesses, and share their skills with others.

Gold Award Winner

VICTORIA UNIVERSITY OF WELLINGTON

We have developed a new concept that embraces situated experiential education by using Virtual Reality technology (Schott&Marshall, 2018) to link sustainability theory with the real world and to connect students emotionally to communities in distant places. ‘Situated experiential education’ is a well-established educational philosophy that makes active learning (Hanson&Moser, 2003), for instance about sustainability and climate change, meaningful to the learner by situating the learning in the appropriate social and cultural context ((Brown,Collins,& Duguid, 1989). Our teaching innovation achieves this without the need to travel, or even to leave your house during COVID19 lockdown, by using Unity 3D gaming software to immerse students both visually and auditory in places and connect them with communities where sustainability/climate change are even more pressing issues than in New Zealand. To provide diverse perspectives on a range of sustainability challenges we have developed two learning tools so far: a remote island in Fiji and a town in the Peruvian Andes. Both learning tools can be experienced using the latest HTC Vive headsets or mid-range laptop/desktop computers.

Silver Award Winner

COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY

For 13 years, Impact MBA students have learned to merge their business goals with their desire to nourish, empower and protect people. In this program, students gain hands-on experience and the business skills necessary to identify and create opportunities where the market falls short. The Impact MBA teaches students how to build and manage global ventures that achieve sustainability with results focused on the triple bottom line (economic, social, and environmental) performance. Our unique summer practicum requirement, embedded social and sustainable enterprise curriculum , and diverse cohort model enables students to enter the business world as leaders in their fields.

Bronze Award Winner

SILAS EDUCATION

SiLAS, a research based program, weaves differentiated instruction, interventions and Evidence Based Practices to provide Social Emotional Learning to ALL students. SiLAS’ curriculum instruction aligns with CASEL’s five SEL Competencies. SiLAS features over 60 SEL topics at three levels; basic, foundational and continued growth. Lessons can be presented to whole and small groups or individually. Learners have the opportunity to collaborate through the sharing of ideas, thoughts and questions. To wrap up the lesson, students complete scripts as partners or in a group. These scripts are then turned into dialogue used to create animations showcasing what they have learned.

Gold Award Winner

THE INSTITUTE OF CODING & FUTURELEARN

In February 2019, the Institute of Coding announced its initiative to build a suite of digital skills courses in partnership with FutureLearn and a cohort of academic institutions including the University of Leeds, University of Lancaster and the Creative Computing Institute (CCI) at the University of Arts London (UAL). The resulting ‘Digital Skills for the Workplace’ and ‘Creative Technologies’ programs are a set of accessible, practically focussed courses designed to help learners all over the world access the digital and soft skills they need to either enter the world of work or boost their careers.

Silver Award Winner

CENTRE FOR HOLISTIC TEACHING & LEARNING, HONG KONG BAPTIST UNIVERSITY

CCGame Project is a technology-facilitated learning and teaching project led by Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) in collaboration with 3 universities in Hong Kong, with an Australian university as partner. It aims to increase university students’ capacity to address global challenges by working in diverse teams in online settings. The project’s short name implies its approach – Cross-cultural, Cross-disciplinary; Challenge-based, Collaborative in Gamified ways. UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted as the theme of the global challenges. The project was funded by the University Grants Committee (UGC) of Hong Kong SAR, and more project details are available at http://ccgame.hkbu.edu.hk.

Bronze Award Winner

MATHIGON

Mathigon is building the “Textbook of the Future” for mathematics: an online environment that makes learning more interactive and personalised than ever before. Rather than just memorising facts and procedures, it allows students to explore and discover, be creative, and learn problem-solving. Every course has a captivating narrative, and is filled with games, simulations, manipulatives, animations, and real-life applications. If you are stuck, a virtual tutor provides personalised hints and help in real-time. Mathigon is completely free to use, has been translated into 18 different languages, and has now over 250k monthly active users,

Gold Award Winner

MOSCOW SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT SKOLKOVO

Old and new problems in higher education call for transformational change. At the same time, even the best decisions can backfire. University Transformation Challenge (UTC), our training programs for university leaders, prepares for high-risk decision-making. We have created a unique gamified environment (University Transformation Simulator, UTS) specifically tailored to develop competence in transformational governance. At the heart of the UTС lies a computer simulator, modelling the structure, processes, and norms of a higher education institution. Participants team up, develop strategies for virtual universities, and make managerial decisions. Afterwards, they analyze the consequences and their performance.

Silver Award Winner

SIMBI FOUNDATION

Simbi Foundation’s (previously The Walking School Bus) ‘Brighter Future Initiative’ enhances access to education in the world’s most underprivileged and resource-poor learning contexts. We do this through two solar-powered innovations: the BrightBox Macro classroom and the BrightBox Micro classroom-in-a-suitcase, stocked with educational hardware, offline curriculum content, and our award winning Simbi software, proven in Randomized Control Trials to double literacy rates in three months. Successfully collaborating with school communities across remote Uganda and Uttarakhand, India to install BrightBoxes, we are also partnered with the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to support access to education in five of Uganda’s refugee settlements.

Bronze Award Winner

OPERATION OUTBREAK

Operation Outbreak (OO) is a novel educational platform on infectious diseases. OO includes an academic curriculum, textbook, and video series on pathogen biology, epidemiology, public health, and governance during health emergencies, an “outbreak simulation” experiential learning activity that synthesizes the classroom contents by leveraging widely-available mobile communication technologies, and a computational practicum that uses data generated during the outbreak simulation for informed reflection and skill development in epidemiology, genetics, and quantitative data analysis. This platform could be adopted by educational institutions from middle-school to college levels to complement their existing curricula in areas.

Gold Award Winner

MIT OPEN LEARNING

MIT Full STEAM Ahead is a collection of online teaching and learning activities, tools, and tutorials, gathered as a rapid response to the need for online resources during the drastic disruption to education caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A second phase of the project, Full STEAM Ahead into Summer, began at the close of the academic year, consisting of a virtual summer program for middle schoolers.

Silver Award Winner

DESIGN FOR CHANGE

Design For Change is a global movement initiated in 2009, that uses ‘Design Thinking’ to cultivate the ‘I Can’ mindset in every child. The founder Kiran Bir Sethi curated a framework of ‘Feel-Imagine-Do-Share (FIDS) with children to find creative solutions to improve their ecosystems and make the world a better place. Children get an opportunity to be recognised not only for their academic achievements but also for being socially aware and proactive change agents in their community. Globally DFC has so far impacted about 2 million children, scripting 31,000 stories of change from approximately 21,000 schools in over 65+ countries.

Bronze Award Winner

IMAGINE SCHOLAR

Imagine Scholar catalyzes untapped human potential. Positioned as a test-kitchen for what education could be, we have developed a world-class, process-oriented curriculum that cultivates curiosity and robust critical thinking skills among youth in rural South Africa, where quality education is scarce. Instead of conforming to current academic paradigms, Imagine Scholar strips away outdated intellectual infrastructure, preparing students to retool the broken societal systems that stymie progress, joy, and vibrancy in their communities. Imagine Scholar students explore how their lifestyle habits inhibit or enable their learning processes and sense of self-worth through four cyclical journeys from age 14 through 30.

Gold Award Winner

UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY BUSINESS SCHOOL

Job Smart (JS) is the University of Sydney Business School’s flagship student experience and employability skill program for our cohort of over 9400 international students. Job Smart is a 3 phased program of scaffolded employability skill building activities, corporate networking and genuine workplace projects with Australian employers. Job Smart is delivered on a customised, mobile first and gamified education technology platform provided by our partner Practera. Over 5 years, Job Smart has improved student engagement 700% and improved student employability by 300%. The reimagined Job Smart Edge is partnering with our WIL Hub, tracking at 123% on previous top rate.

Silver Award Winner

KAMILIMU

KamiLimu is an 8-month structured mentorship program whose mission is to bridge the skills gap between classroom learning and global competitiveness among university students pursuing technology-aligned courses. KamiLimu achieves its objectives through hands-on workshops and one-to-one peer and professional mentorship to equip students with 21st-century skills in five areas: (1) Personal Development; (2) Professional Development; (3) Scholarship Application; (4) Innovation; (5)Community Engagement. So far, KamiLimu has served 170 students from 19 Kenyan universities, and worked with 76 professionals and 16 organizations to meet its goal. Throughout the project, the impact is measured by students’ achievement and feedback from industry stakeholders.

Bronze Award Winner

RIIPEN

Work-integrated experiential learning (WIEL) is a proven method of enhancing students’ skills, career clarity, networks, and employability, but traditional methods (e.g. coops, internships) are costly to scale and often challenging for underserved students to access. Online WIEL solves these challenges. To date, Riipen has engaged with over 220 post-secondary institutions, to deliver over 2.5 million hours of experiential learning hours to students partnering with over 10,000 employers.

Gold Award Winner

AIM ACADEMY/AIM INSTITUTE FOR LEARNING AND RESEARCH

AIM Institute for Learning & Research is dedicated to identifying and disseminating evidence- based best practices in the field of literacy. AIM Pathways is designed to deliver AIM’s proven research and content in an affordable, scaleable, on demand, highly interactive and innovative digital platform that uses simulations, case studies and interactive practice technology with content approved by top neuroscience and literacy researchers. The platform content is aligned with the International Dyslexia Association’s Knowledge of Practice Standards for Teachers of Reading and is designed to improve teacher and administrator knowledge of the science of reading and improved practice in the classroom.

Silver Award Winner

ADAM SMITH BUSINESS SCHOOL, UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW

Internal feedback is the catalyst for all learning and crucial for students’ self-regulation of learning. Students generate internal feedback by comparing their current knowledge against some reference information. That information might come from teachers as comments, or from textbooks, online resources, videos, performance observations, sharing work with peers or from discussions with them etc. Educators have completely neglected these natural feedback comparisons. This project provides evidence that when teachers help students turn some natural comparisons into formal comparisons and to explicate the internal feedback that results, students’ learning is accelerated without increasing teacher workload.

Bronze Award Winner

DEPARTMENT OF APPLIED MATHEMATICS, HONG KONG POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY

According to extensive evidenced-based research, active learning strategies significantly improve STEM education students’ achievement, understanding and application of concepts. There is also evidence that mobile applications for education enable teachers to improve their teaching practices and engage and highly motivate students by providing them with new opportunities to participate and construct their own learning, individually or collaboratively. Therefore, the main objectives of our project are to explore and develop new active learning and teaching pedagogies to increase active learning in STEM education and to cultivate innovative mobile applications to enhance the efficacy of said active pedagogies.

Gold Award Winner

PRECISION OS

In the absence of an effective and cost-effective training model, varied experiences have led to a wide disparity in global health care delivery. PrecisionOS addresses this problem through the development of an immersive education software platform powered by a portable virtual reality solution. Our MultiUser project permits remote collaboration from anywhere in the world permitting experts to educate users. It is the most comprehensive software platform covering areas including trauma, pediatrics, arthroplasty (hip, knee and shoulder replacements), spine surgery and arthroscopic procedures.

Silver Award Winner

CHEMCAVE VR

The ChemCaveVR project emerged from the ‘Keeping it Local’ partnership between Mountain Creek State High School(MCSHS) and the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC), to encourage students to pursue their higher education locally. As part of the experience, MCSHS teachers and creative developers at USC collaborated to produce an immersive virtual reality (iVR) resource for the CAVE2TM visualisation studio. The ChemCave VR has since been developed into an Oculus Rift S HMD version to allow equity of access to the resource for chemistry education globally. ChemCaveVR has transformed the senior chemistry educational experience and reimagined VR teacher pedagogy.

Bronze Award Winner

ETH ZURICH

In FactoryVR, we use virtual reality (VR) to teach operations management. Students virtually visit factories to solve realistic tasks aimed at improving productivity. We use VR apps with virtual environments of real factories around the world that provide students an immersive and inquiry-based learning experience. This teaching innovation is cost-efficient and scalable, using students’ own smartphones with simple VR viewers. We give the students an effective learning experience of exploring real factory environments, while, at the same time, circumventing the many logistical and financial limitations of field visits.

 

Regional

REGIONAL AWARDS & DISCIPLINE AWARDS

REGIONAL AWARDS

Winners of the Reimagine Education Regional Awards will receive official certification in recognition of their achievement.

Gold Award Winner

KAMILIMU

KamiLimu is an 8-month structured mentorship program whose mission is to bridge the skills gap between classroom learning and global competitiveness among university students pursuing technology-aligned courses. KamiLimu achieves its objectives through hands-on workshops and one-to-one peer and professional mentorship to equip students with 21st-century skills in five areas: (1) Personal Development; (2) Professional Development; (3) Scholarship Application; (4) Innovation; (5)Community Engagement. So far, KamiLimu has served 170 students from 19 Kenyan universities, and worked with 76 professionals and 16 organizations to meet its goal. Throughout the project, the impact is measured by students’ achievement and feedback from industry stakeholders.

Silver Award Winner

IMAGINE SCHOLAR

Imagine Scholar catalyzes untapped human potential. Positioned as a test-kitchen for what education could be, we have developed a world-class, process-oriented curriculum that cultivates curiosity and robust critical thinking skills among youth in rural South Africa, where quality education is scarce. Instead of conforming to current academic paradigms, Imagine Scholar strips away outdated intellectual infrastructure, preparing students to retool the broken societal systems that stymie progress, joy, and vibrancy in their communities. Imagine Scholar students explore how their lifestyle habits inhibit or enable their learning processes and sense of self-worth through four cyclical journeys from age 14 through 30.

Bronze Award Winner

ASANTE AFRICA FOUNDATION

We are reimagining education in rural East Africa with a youth-driven pedagogy. Youth are being taught to participate in the design of the curriculum with the goal of providing necessary skills and practical experience to address local needs and opportunities. This inclusive Learn-Do-Teach methodology, combined with a systemic Pay-it-Forward model, puts new ideas into the hands of students and challenges them to put lessons into practice. Our model, now deployed in more than 350 schools in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda is transforming young people and enabling them to find opportunity, start businesses, and share their skills with others.

Gold Award Winner

THE EDUCATION UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG

The project “3Es: Early Prevention, Early Identification, and Early Intervention: A School-Based Support Model of Social-Emotional Development for Kindergarten Children” (the 3Es project) is funded by the Simon K.Y. Lee Foundation in Hong Kong. It aims to develop an evidence-based, tiered intervention programme that promotes the socioemotional competence of kindergarten children in Hong Kong, to improve their school readiness and cognitive development. Since implementation in October 2015, the project has developed a locally-derived and -normed assessment tool, and produced numerous training materials which were proved to be effective in the local context. The project will be completed in September 2021.

Silver Award Winner

HONG KONG BAPTIST UNIVERSITY

CCGame Project is a technology-facilitated learning and teaching project led by Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) in collaboration with 3 universities in Hong Kong, with an Australian university as partner. It aims to increase university students’ capacity to address global challenges by working in diverse teams in online settings. The project’s short name implies its approach – Cross-cultural, Cross-disciplinary; Challenge-based, Collaborative in Gamified ways. UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted as the theme of the global challenges. The project was funded by the University Grants Committee (UGC) of Hong Kong SAR, and more project details are available at http://ccgame.hkbu.edu.hk.

Bronze Award Winner

SQUIRREL AI LEARNING

Squirrel Ai Learning applies AI-powered adaptive learning technology to K12 education. It developed the first AI adaptive learning engine with independent intellectual property rights and advanced algorithms. With 70% AI system teaching + 30% human tutor-assisted mixed mode, it provides a student-centered intelligent and personalized education. The system applies AI technology in the process of assessment, teaching, learning, evaluation. The product is cost-effective, with the artificial intelligence + human teacher model, to teach students in accordance with their aptitude, effectively solves the problems of the high cost of traditional education, the lack of resources for teachers, and low learning efficiency.

Gold Award Winner

FICTION EXPRESS

Fiction Express is an award-winning literacy resource designed to improve all areas of literacy: reading, grammar, speaking & listening, and writing. The resource improves poor reading habits by getting children excited about reading, through the power of a deeply engaging experience of co-creation between students and authors. Fiction Express has established a new category of literacy resources, called “Co-creative reading”, offering teachers a unique and complete literacy solution: • Covering all four aspects of language learning • Guaranteeing the monitoring of learning outcomes • Facilitating class preparation and assessment

Silver Award Winner

SKATEISTAN

Skateistan is an award-winning international development organization and the first to empower children through education and skateboarding. Founded in 2008 on the streets of Kabul, Skateistan now reaches over 3,000 children in Afghanistan, Cambodia, and South Africa. Through skateboarding and arts-based education, Skateistan programs provide opportunities to children ages 5-17, especially girls, children from low-income backgrounds, children living with disabilities, and children from 24 unique ethnicities and nationalities, providing valuable life skills that go beyond the skatepark and classroom. Since 2008, Skateistan has reached over 13,400 globally, achieving an average of 45% girls participation from 2008-2019.

Bronze Award Winner

STUDYSMARTER

StudySmarter is an intelligent learning platform transforming any text into an interactive learning course, making any content more efficient and engaging to learn. Our platform makes learning more fun, intelligent and globally accessible. We founded StudySmarter following our own experiences at university and our platform is now used by more than 1 million pupils and students in Germany, 89% of whom receive better grades. Our platform received special attention for our technical solution as a response to the COVID-19 crisis. For our work to decrease dropout rates, we’ve been named both the best EdTech startup in Germany and in Europe.

Gold Award Winner

VARKEY FOUNDATION

Comunidad Atenea, an initiative from the Varkey Foundation, is a free social network for collaborative learning where LATAM teachers can connect, share best practices, take inspiration from peers, access to cutting edge MOOCs, and create together. It was launched in March 2020 and has reached 28,000 unique visitors from 93countries, +11,000community members, +120,000YouTube views, and +260teaching best practices. As an engagement strategy, we developed #AteneaExperience: a one-week learning journey. Teachers are invited to join a 5-days experience focused on a different theme and based on the method of learning-by-doing. +2,200 educational initiatives have been implemented, and they reached +88,000 students.

Silver Award Winner

COSTRUYENDO Y CRECIENDO

 

Construyendo y Creciendo (CyC; Building and Growing) has provided second-hand, comprehensive, and formal education to construction workers and their communities. We are aimed to provide personal and professional, development opportunities. Classrooms are installed on construction sites and in public spaces. By so doing, beneficiaries do not have to commute long distances or spend on transportation to have education. In CyC, “school goes to students”. More than 25,000 have been benefited, from which 7,000 have graduated. As well, 120 classrooms have been installed and operated in 16 States of Mexico.

Bronze Award Winner

TECNOLOGICO DE MONTERREY

Hologram professors enable quality education through an innovative, captivating and low-cost experience. The professor is represented in a life-size and anatomically correct hologram. The student perceives a high social presence of his teacher recreating the natural dynamics of a face-to-face class interacting in real time. The remote learning experience becomes more human, generating positive emotions in the student. Engagement is fostered through interaction where technology is not a barrier. This design of an immersive educational experience enhances focus and attention during the teaching-learning process.

Gold Award Winner

GULF MEDICAL UNIVERSITY

The Project Virtual patient learning (VPL) is an online simulation system, based on artificial intelligence and pre-recorded movies, in which the learner plays the role of a physician, pharmacist, nurse etc. who confronts a virtual patient. The interaction takes place in real-time and each decision taken by the learner instantly affects the reactions and emotions of the patient, just as it would in real life. The patient in the scenario is played by a professional actor who is trained to simulate variable moods, attitudes, and emotional responses through verbal and non-verbal communication. Feedback is given through the simulated patient’s comments.

Silver Award Winner

AJMAN UNIVERSITY

echoV is a project targeting deaf and hearing-impaired students who are aiming to continue their education outside special centers and communicate normally with the societies who are not sign language educated. Common universities and colleges worldwide are not equipped with technological techniques that can assist them in their education, while few specialized universities are built for deaf students, sign language tutors or in-class television captioning are included for few majors only. echoV it will allow students to study in any educational institution without the need for any sign language tutors in the classroom and adapt easily with their colleagues.

Bronze Award Winner

PLETHORA

Plethora uses gamification to teach youth of all ages to solve complex problems using Computational Thinking. Our mission is to teach students the foundations of Computational Thinking so they can use them in every aspect of their life. At Plethora, students plan algorithms in their own mother tongue language, solve challenges while learning computer science concepts, and focus on pure cognitive processes, as our true gender-neutral platform encourages creativity over technical syntax.

Gold Award Winner

MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY OPEN LEARNING

MIT Full STEAM Ahead is a collection of online teaching and learning activities, tools, and tutorials, gathered as a rapid response to the need for online resources during the drastic disruption to education caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A second phase of the project, Full STEAM Ahead into Summer, began at the close of the academic year, consisting of a virtual summer program for middle schoolers.

Silver Award Winner

PIXTON COMICS INC.

Pixton EDU is a web-app that gives teachers and students a unique way to create stories, demonstrate learning, and enhance writing assignments – in any subject – through digital comics. Users can explore topics in Math, Science, Social Studies, History, English, Art or any other subject. Choose images from popular content, books and movies like The Hunger Games or The Outsiders, plus other topics like the solar system, black history or the environment – all Common Core aligned.

Bronze Award Winner

PRECISION OS

In the absence of an effective and cost-effective training model, varied experiences have led to a wide disparity in global health care delivery. PrecisionOS addresses this problem through the development of an immersive education software platform powered by a portable virtual reality solution. Our MultiUser project permits remote collaboration from anywhere in the world permitting experts to educate users. It is the most comprehensive software platform covering areas including trauma, pediatrics, arthroplasty (hip, knee and shoulder replacements), spine surgery and arthroscopic procedures.

Gold Award Winner

BOND UNIVERSITY

Many students studying health sciences or medicine commonly find the disciplines of physiology and anatomy to be difficult, challenging components of their curricula. These present the predominant disciplines implemented in lower-than-expected results or student failures, impacting progressions to postgraduate courses and future careers in health. Dr Christian Moro has: developed virtual, augmented and mixed reality applications; utilized Instagram, YouTube, and other social media; produced animated videos; created computer games; and worked with international collaborations to enhance the in-class experience when learning physiology and anatomy and worked to share these resources at no cost to millions of students worldwide.

Silver Award Winner

UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY BUSINESS SCHOOL

Job Smart (JS) is the University of Sydney Business School’s flagship student experience and employability skill program for our cohort of over 9400 international students. Job Smart is a 3 phased program of scaffolded employability skill building activities, corporate networking and genuine workplace projects with Australian employers. Job Smart is delivered on a customised, mobile first and gamified education technology platform provided by our partner Practera. Over 5 years, Job Smart has improved student engagement 700% and improved student employability by 300%. The reimagined Job Smart Edge is partnering with our WIL Hub, tracking at 123% on previous top rate.

Bronze Award Winner

CHEMCAVE VR

The ChemCaveVR project emerged from the ‘Keeping it Local’ partnership between Mountain Creek State High School(MCSHS) and the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC), to encourage students to pursue their higher education locally. As part of the experience, MCSHS teachers and creative developers at USC collaborated to produce an immersive virtual reality (iVR) resource for the CAVE2TM visualisation studio. The ChemCave VR has since been developed into an Oculus Rift S HMD version to allow equity of access to the resource for chemistry education globally. ChemCaveVR has transformed the senior chemistry educational experience and reimagined VR teacher pedagogy.

DISCIPLINE AWARDS

Winners of the Reimagine Education Discipline Awards will receive official certification in recognition of their achievement.

Gold Award Winner

FICTION EXPRESS

Fiction Express is an award-winning literacy resource designed to improve all areas of literacy: reading, grammar, speaking & listening, and writing. The resource improves poor reading habits by getting children excited about reading, through the power of a deeply engaging experience of co-creation between students and authors. Fiction Express has established a new category of literacy resources, called “Co-creative reading”, offering teachers a unique and complete literacy solution: • Covering all four aspects of language learning • Guaranteeing the monitoring of learning outcomes • Facilitating class preparation and assessment.

Silver Award Winner

CURIOUS TECHNOLOGIES LTD.

The only way to learn languages is to speak. Elias Robot is a language learning app based on a voice user interface and AI. The gamified app can be used with robots or smart phones. It encourages students to speak without the fear of making mistakes. In addition to the ready-made curriculum, teachers can create their own interactive learning material and share them with each other. Elias Robot gives instant and individual feedback on progress and users can easily notice what they should practice more. You can’t clone teachers, but with Elias App you can clone teacher’s expertise!

Bronze Award Winner

DEEPER LEARNING INNOVATIONS PVT. LTD

Dabung Girl is a social impact superhero that through comic books inspires girls to find the hero within and boys to perceive the superhero in girls around them. Dabung Girl always comes forward to help her friends. Her superpower is nano-elasticity and can extend her body to reach far and wide in a jiffy. The target is children in the age group 8 – 14 years. Dabung Girl is on a mission to build powerful educational medium that focuses on breaking gender biases and at the same provide constructive stories, entertainment, and fun through digital means.

Gold Award Winner

PLETHORA

Plethora uses gamification to teach youth of all ages to solve complex problems using Computational Thinking. Our mission is to teach students the foundations of Computational Thinking so they can use them in every aspect of their life. At Plethora, students plan algorithms in their own mother tongue language, solve challenges while learning computer science concepts, and focus on pure cognitive processes, as our true gender-neutral platform encourages creativity over technical syntax.

Silver Award Winner

THE STEAM CONNECTION

Advancement in technology is a pivotal element of our ever-evolving society. Improvements that raise the capabilities of what we can achieve are made each day; however, these come with the cost of creating an accessibility gap, education-wise, between those of different socioeconomic statuses. Learning technical skills is necessary, and can seriously inhibit the growth of those left behind. When not exposed to quintessential programming focused on robotics, digital design, and coding, it is near impossible to break into, arguably, the most influential fields and also to progress as a professional in nearly every industry. This is where Every Kid Gets a Robot (EKGAR) comes in, bridging the void for children through affordable, scalable, and, most importantly, accessible means to target key academic, cognitive thinking, and motor skills. The STEM pipeline showcases the importance of targeting children with these skills at a young age. Our robot is adaptable for children of all ages but is best utilized with middle school aged children.

Bronze Award Winner

UMUZI.ORG

The African Coding Network links coding schools across the continent to deliver shared services to them through our Open Source edtech platform. We create a simulated work environment that facilitates remote, asynchronous, project-based learning that allows peer-to-peer supported learning across the continent. This helps coding schools to focus on solving local challenges including computer, internet, and data access, as well as learner management. This approach reduces the costs of training professional developers, increases their chances of employment, and will allow more coding schools to scale to meet the growing demand for tech skills in Africa.

Gold Award Winner

BOND UNIVERSITY

Many students studying health sciences or medicine commonly find the disciplines of physiology and anatomy to be difficult, challenging components of their curricula. These present the predominant disciplines implemented in lower-than-expected results or student failures, impacting progressions to postgraduate courses and future careers in health. Dr Christian Moro has: developed virtual, augmented and mixed reality applications; utilized Instagram, YouTube, and other social media; produced animated videos; created computer games; and worked with international collaborations to enhance the in-class experience when learning physiology and anatomy and worked to share these resources at no cost to millions of students worldwide.

Silver Award Winner

GULF MEDICAL UNIVERSITY

The Project Virtual patient learning (VPL) is an online simulation system, based on artificial intelligence and pre-recorded movies, in which the learner plays the role of a physician, pharmacist, nurse etc. who confronts a virtual patient. The interaction takes place in real-time and each decision taken by the learner instantly affects the reactions and emotions of the patient, just as it would in real life. The patient in the scenario is played by a professional actor who is trained to simulate variable moods, attitudes, and emotional responses through verbal and non-verbal communication. Feedback is given through the simulated patient’s comments.

Bronze Award Winner

PRECISION OS

In the absence of an effective and cost-effective training model, varied experiences have led to a wide disparity in global health care delivery. PrecisionOS addresses this problem through the development of an immersive education software platform powered by a portable virtual reality solution. Our MultiUser project permits remote collaboration from anywhere in the world permitting experts to educate users. It is the most comprehensive software platform covering areas including trauma, pediatrics, arthroplasty (hip, knee and shoulder replacements), spine surgery and arthroscopic procedures.

 

Gold Award Winner

CHEMCAVE VR

The ChemCaveVR project emerged from the ‘Keeping it Local’ partnership between Mountain Creek State High School(MCSHS) and the University of the Sunshine Coast (USC), to encourage students to pursue their higher education locally. As part of the experience, MCSHS teachers and creative developers at USC collaborated to produce an immersive virtual reality (iVR) resource for the CAVE2TM visualisation studio. The ChemCave VR has since been developed into an Oculus Rift S HMD version to allow equity of access to the resource for chemistry education globally. ChemCaveVR has transformed the senior chemistry educational experience and reimagined VR teacher pedagogy.

Silver Award Winner

HONG KONG POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY

 

Have you ever asked the question “do you have any questions or comments?” to your students in class? Do you just hear silence and crickets in the background 95% of the time after you ask this question? More precisely, have you ever had trouble engaging your students in a simple “question and answer” active teaching method? If you’re answer is yes, then YoTeach! is your solution! YoTeach! is an educational backchannel chatroom app that enhances engagement and discussions in class with text, drawing, picture uploading, annotating and machine learning hand-writing math/symbol recognition functionality. Please visit https://yoteachapp.com/ for more details.

Bronze Award Winner

NEW MEXICO STATE UNIVERSITY

Math Snacks are games and animations that convey math in creative, visual, and applied ways. Players explore imaginative worlds where they build skill with ratios, number groups, expressions, place value, order of operations, and graphing relationships. Mathematics educators, mathematicians, learning specialists and game developers collaborate to develop and test materials and conduct integrated research activities, professional development of teachers, and investigation into impact on learners. Accompanying teacher and learner tools support an inquiry-based approach grounded in theory-based pedagogy and the construction, not just transmission, of knowledge. Math Snacks is funded by the National Science Foundation (0918794 and 1503507).

Gold Award Winner

THE EDUCATION UNIVERSITY OF HONG KONG

The project “3Es: Early Prevention, Early Identification, and Early Intervention: A School-Based Support Model of Social-Emotional Development for Kindergarten Children” (the 3Es project) is funded by the Simon K.Y. Lee Foundation in Hong Kong. It aims to develop an evidence-based, tiered intervention programme that promotes the socioemotional competence of kindergarten children in Hong Kong, to improve their school readiness and cognitive development. Since implementation in October 2015, the project has developed a locally-derived and -normed assessment tool, and produced numerous training materials which were proved to be effective in the local context. The project will be completed in September 2021.

Silver Award Winner

COSTRUYENDO Y CRECIENDO

Construyendo y Creciendo (CyC; Building and Growing) has provided second-hand, comprehensive, and formal education to construction workers and their communities. We are aimed to provide personal and professional, development opportunities. Classrooms are installed on construction sites and in public spaces. By so doing, beneficiaries do not have to commute long distances or spend on transportation to have education. In CyC, “school goes to students”. More than 25,000 have been benefited, from which 7,000 have graduated. As well, 120 classrooms have been installed and operated in 16 States of Mexico.

Bronze Award Winner

ANCIENT HISTORY ENCYCLOPEDIA FOUNDATION

Ancient History Encyclopedia is a non-profit organization publishing the world’s most-read history encyclopedia. Our mission is to engage people with cultural heritage and to improve history education worldwide. The website is an open education resource used by thousands of students and teachers worldwide to learn about history, both for encyclopedic information and teaching materials. The website is recommended by the School Library Journal, Oxford University and many other institutions. It has received the .eu Web Award (education category) in 2016.

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