In Latin America, IBM together with astronomical organizations and institutions in the region announced an agreement to train young people on astronomy, astrophysics and related sciences in Spanish and Portuguese.
Through the Astronomy channel in Open P-TECH, high school students and teachers will be able to access scientific content from 14 organizations from 5 countries, including the Geophysical Institute of Peru (IGP). In addition, the channel has available a holographic scheme and a 360º augmented reality experience on the stars developed by the startup UXart, which is part of Startup with IBM.
Now students will be able to access content organized in different modules -one for each participating astronomical institution in Latin America- with courses, conferences, videos, podcasts, experiments and outreach materials on general astronomy, black holes, asteroids, physics and astrophysics, among others.
Danny Scipión Castillo, scientific director of the Geophysical Institute of Peru (IGP) highlighted the importance of having a unified platform that centralizes astronomical information: “In this way, young people can access educational material not only produced locally, but also it is produced throughout Latin America. This resource is essential to promote remote education, which has become vitally important in times of pandemic. This initiative must be replicated at all levels with quality material prepared by research institutes with scientific support and at the IGP we are proud to be part of it ”.
Educators, volunteers or students who are interested in learning more about the programs and the skills to be successful, can access the following link. https://www.ptech.org/open-p-tech/
These efforts are part of the free education platform Open P-TECH, which has collaborations from various institutions and includes access to content on technologies such as AI, cloud and blockchain, with the aim of fostering knowledge and applying these cutting-edge technologies to featured topics such as: sustainability, science, astronomy and astrophysics, laying the foundation for the job market of the future.
“The collaborations that we are establishing seek to attract the interest of young students to train them on sustainability, science, such as astronomy, and cutting-edge technologies,” explained Flavia Roberta Silva, head of Corporate Social Responsibility for IBM Latin America.
Environmental education
In addition, the new Sustainability Resources Channel for Educators offers support to high school teachers on how to identify the reality of electronic waste, how it is connected with waste management, the risk it brings to the environment, among others, and was developed along with recognized organizations such as the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, The Nature Conservancy, and the World Wide Fund for Nature.
Environmental sustainability is a business imperative related to how the environment is challenging the strategies and operating models of organizations in all sectors. A recent IBM study found that almost 80% of consumers indicate that sustainability is important to them and 60% are willing to change their shopping habits to reduce their environmental impact.
Through this alliance, the Open P-TECH platform will offer lessons, sustainability education activities, virtual career fair and career planning experiences. As sustainability drives a company’s success in today’s competitive marketplace, Open P-TECH’s new channel resources will support educators in leading productive discussions on climate change, e-waste management, to address real-world issues and plan sustainable supply chains, energy and waste operations.
