Unesco awards Jaago Foundation for innovation in education

Jaago Foundation, a Bangladeshi non-government organisation (NGO), and a German NGO are scheduled to receive the Unesco King Hamad Bin Isa Al-Khalifa Prize for innovation in Education on Tuesday. The prize, recognising the innovative use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in education for the benefit of disadvantaged groups, was awarded to the Online School Project, operated by Jaago Foundation in rural Bangladesh. It also acknowledged harnessing the power of ICTs in higher education by the German NGO Kiron which assists displaced people.

জাগোর হাত ধরে ইউনেস্কো পুরষ্কার বাংলাদেশে।#JAAGO #InvestInEducation #SDG #Education #Children #UNESCO #ICT #Bangladesh #DigitalBangladesh pic.twitter.com/UMTGTvOC1I

— JAAGO Foundation (@JAAGOFoundation) February 21, 2017

The eponymous king of Bahrain and Unesco Director General Irina Bokova presented the winners with a prize certificate and $25,000 in a ceremony at Unesco headquarters in Paris. The theme for this year's prize recognises the urgent need to respond to major obstacles for the most vulnerable populations with regard to equitable and inclusive access to quality education. Jaago Foundation reaches underprivileged children in rural areas of Bangladesh through the Online School programme that provides learners with high-quality courses through interactive video-conferencing. Instruction, covering English, Bangla, and mathematics, as well as natural and social sciences, is delivered by highly trained teachers based in the capital. With 1,061 annual beneficiaries, Jaago Foundation aims to help bridge the educational quality gap between urban and rural students in Bangladesh, reports UNB. The other awardee is Kiron, a German-based NGO committed to ensuring equitable access to quality education for refugees, asylum seekers and internally displaced people. It carries out this work through its Massive Open Online Courses (Mooc) project. Kiron's 500 Moocs are provided free of charge and can be accessed anywhere, even in periods of crisis and at all stages of displacement and resettlement.