When education tastes sweeter than winning the lottery

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[Applause]

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so

last week i shared with my students that

i never want to win the lottery

earning my salary by giving them new

insights gives me a certain satisfaction

i may have found another way which gives

me even a feeling which goes beyond

that satisfaction and maybe that will

work for you as well

five years ago i was invited to a

conference by microsoft

about education and technology usually

those conferences take three days they

have multiple speakers

and they tend to be pretty bad for your

diet

but one of those sessions was atypical i

had a very strange name which was

kakuma during that session

we had a skype call with moses who is a

consultant at the kakuma refugee camp

the kakuma refugee camp is based in

kenya houses 200

000 refugees who fled from war and

hunger

in sudan somalia burundi to name a few

55 percent of all refugees are children

this year only 5 000 young people

arrived in a camp with

no relatives at all in 2015

the camp had 50 different schools with

classrooms typically housing up to 200

refugees

with no access to textbooks nor

any other educational resources

only one in three teachers is certified

to teach

and while many people are born in the

camp most people will be living

in the camp for the rest of their lives

some people

those who are really highly educated

they may have the best shot to be sent

to another continent

to live a new life and for them it’s

like winning

the lottery now being a teacher myself

for 15 years during that session

i promised moses to help him to increase

the level of education in the camp

by teaching the refugees through skype

back home i started to read about the

camp

and i started to realize i was quite

naive because the kakuma schools don’t

have

skype computers

not even electricity but i made a

certain promise

and i decided to make it happen and so i

shipped my own laptop to the camp

and the local ngo was kind enough to

share their internet connection

i started to teach the refugees in my

own kitchen science

english math and i really loved it

but one teacher one single teacher

trying to reach

thousands of refugees that really

doesn’t make any sense

so why he invited other people through

social media

to join the project and many people

responded positively we had our first

community after a few months

with more than 100 teachers across

45 different countries willing to do

more

than teaching their own students

then the laptop disappeared and

mysteriously enough the local ngo lost

interest to share internet as well i

had a very important decision to make

and

leaving it like that or starting all

over again from scratch

at that time belgian architects picked

up the story in a newspaper

they reached out to me and together we

decided to build a school our own school

in the kakuma camp

after chasing some funding we were able

to equip that school with solar panels

we had laptops even two refugees

dedicated to the project

this was last year we now had our

own learning hub and we were able to

scale up to reach more people

more teachers and students

united nations became an official

partner the world economic forum called

it

one of the top schools in the world

pioneering

the future of education a hollywood crew

even came over to cover the project

by creating a netflix documentary

now many people love this story

because we are offering a free education

to some of the poorest people on earth

but there was an unexpected side effect

turned out we were doing more than

teaching refugees

allow me to explain through this model

at the left side we have the kakuma

students

at the other side we have students from

every corner of the world let’s call

them

the global students and the idea was

offering

knowledge through a virtual interaction

but kakuma students turned out to give

something back

which was potentially even more valuable

they talk about their dreadful lives and

still they smile from ear to ear

they share their passion for football

and don’t complain while mentioning that

they only have food once a day

they share an authentic view into their

lives

and through those intercultural

exchanges

we noticed that the mindset

of the global students began to change

because during those calls they began to

appreciate each other

and this became our unique way to fight

a global threat called polarization

turned out that this blue arrow was the

cherry on the top

now i have a question for you

what if this model can be replicated can

be used to scale

up to tackle other global issues

an issue i personally feel is affecting

all of us something what’s urgent

everybody’s speaking about it especially

young people

climate change i decided to launch a new

project this time with

groups of students in every continent we

ask

them to focus on the causes and effects

of climate change we ask them to create

small videos

with their findings to be uploaded to

the website

by their teachers this way students were

able to learn from each other in very

authentic ways

in australia students reported that

their country is suffering from

bushfires

in ireland the students mentioned that

their schools were closed for the very

first time in history due to hurricanes

in sierra leone a teacher’s house was

partly destroyed due to mud flows

we also asked those students to have

live virtual interactions

to share their concerns those findings

and we had our first arrow

knowledge but

we soon discovered that the students

were willing to do more

american students they developed a solar

suitcase which has a battery

and solar panels they shipped to the

kakuma refugee camp

where now one school has free

electricity

irish students they focused on the waste

management symbols

they noticed that they were inconsistent

they invited

their minister for climate change to

come to their school

and requested a new symbol

this way they brought national change

and even later received a letter from

their president

congratulating on what they did

portuguese students created a waste

machine something what recycles plastic

waste they shipped this machine to

mozambique

where now people are able to recycle

nine

tons of plastic waste and turn it into

new objects

barrels and cutlery bricks tiles

providing four people of a salary

and this teacher from malawi his name is

andrews i know him personally i met him

at that conference in dubai

though and we started to chat and he

told me like

my students planted trees

to save a lake in malawi

now the thing with those conferences is

that you get to speak with people from

the uk

from ireland india africa

and they all have different accents so

when i asked him like how many trees did

they plant i thought he was saying

60 000 trees i was already impressed you

know

but turned out that he was saying 60

million trees

how about that it’s not extraordinary we

have

hundreds of those kind of stories

we noticed that the students went beyond

learning about climate change

they didn’t go on a street start yelling

no

they came with solutions

they enjoyed going the extra mile

by finding meaningful ways to take

action

for a green planet

after watching their videos with their

findings we noticed

that their behavior started to change

their mindset

again we had our blue arrow

the project started to grow became more

structured those teachers who have been

there from the very beginning they

were called ambassadors they were the

ones

who helped the project to grow they

reached out to press

and presidents

last year we had two and a half million

participants

our community reached out to ministries

of education

in 15 different countries

we co-authored a book with wwf

translated this and made it available in

15 different languages in one single

week

rick davis from nasa you reached out to

me and offered to send our students

messages of hope

to mars the project was endorsed

by jane goodall queen elizabeth and

dalai lama

but the true heroes are

the students they prove that they have

the capacity to do

more than learning about climate change

they have the potential to come up with

solutions and take action

now great story but

why would you care right

what if what if this

model would work for you in your

personal life

let me share an example from my life

last month my son mogul came to me

and he was like that what you’re doing

and then i told him like i’m reading a

book about plastic and

did you know that 80 of old tap

water on a global scale has

small tiny little plastic fibers

micro plastics he was instantly

interested

he took his own laptop and started to

read about it

now he is nine and at his school they

have to do three presentations this year

and he did one on plastics

and how to create your own bio plastic

with milk

and vinegar now

because of him not me his

friends mindset and behavior may have

started to change

this model can be applied to your life

too

even in a broader context in your own

environment

and not necessarily with young people

you can be one of those dots too

to do so you start interacting with

people like friends

family neighbors even ceos

or government leaders you can be the

change too

let’s take a closer look at some common

things which may happen in your

life maybe

you’ve been watching a netflix series

about poverty

lately or maybe you read an article

about deforestation in brazil

or maybe you’ve been really really

irritated about

spotting fake news on social media

it doesn’t have to end there

let’s take a closer look at how a mutual

exchange of mindset and

knowledge can lead to a greater whole

maybe you can try to find out

how to support the local food bank

or maybe you can reach out to your boss

and ultimately decide to start a tree

planting

with the whole office or

you can explain to your niece and your

nephew the importance of critical

thinking

and how fake news can be a threat

to democracy so that they feel

sensitized

to check their resources at all times

and are not inclined to share

polarizing messages on social media in

the future

you can be the first brick

of a series of falling dominoes which

ultimately

can lead to people taking action

for a better planet for a good cause

this model clearly leads to a win-win

good for you good for the planet

all you have to do is open up your

mindset

to those people and those issues

do believe you have the potential

to inspire other people

it will be the start of your fully

rewarding journey

ladies and gentlemen it will be

your winning lottery ticket

thank you