Innovation Lab Schools – Worlds of Learning
First Innovation Lab School is launched in Tanzania
HASSELT, BELGIUM, March 1, 2019 – The Innovation Lab Schools Project is proud to announce the launch of its first Innovation Lab School in Pugu, Tanzania. This lab is the first of several schools to be launched across African countries and possibly other continents. Offering free quality education to local children in remote areas, the project will educate and change the lives of hundreds of thousands of students giving them hope for the future.
The Innovation Lab Schools Project is an exciting collaboration between world renowned teacher and author Koen Timmers, and with Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots programme. This first lab will be at the Jane Goodall Institute’s lodge in Pugu which will be transformed into a place in which children will receive free education about sustainability in line with the three pillars of the Roots & Shoots methodology (Animals, People and the Environment, or APE). Dr. Jane Goodall: “The labs provides a curriculum developed in collaboration with local educators that offers more than simply knowledge gained from text books, it brings empathy and passion into the classroom.” Hear more from Dr. Goodall on the project in this video:
The lab schools aim to innovate education by equipping the labs with Internet connection, interactive whiteboards, dynamic chairs and educational resources that promote collaboration and learning by doing in spaces. In addition to a local teacher, a teacher from a global community of 1000 educators across more than 90 countries, teaches the students via Skype.
In just 10 lessons the students are at the centre of their learning process while focussing, brainstorming, discussing, creating, presenting, connecting and sharing global issues like climate change, gender equality, poverty, sustainability and innovation. They will also solve problems and take action.
“Our mission is to offer free education to African students focusing on a new curriculum based on the UN Sustainable Development Goals and STEAM (Science Technology Engineering Arts Math) in an environment which stimulates authentic, technology enhanced and project based learning,” says Koen Timmers, Director Innovation Lab Schools Project.
Koen plans to develop innovation lab schools in Nigeria, Uganda, Tanzania, South Africa, Kenya, Morocco, Palestine, Argentina, Brazil and Arctic Canada by 2020, offering a free quality education to 1 Million students.
It is my honor to have been named a Global Goals Schools Ambassador, and as a result, i will help to represent the project in the United States.
PXL University College will do research by collecting quantitative and qualitative data to discover how the project is making impact on the students and teachers involved. Each lab is priced $10,000 USD and is funded by sponsors including Skype in the Classroom (USA), Lego Education (Denmark) , Empatico (USA) and Participate (USA), Microsoft Education (USA), I3 Technologies (Belgium), PXL (Belgium) and Edukans (Netherlands),
The Innovation Lab Schools Project is endorsed by Charlize Theron, actress and founder of the Charlize Theron Africa Outreach Project; Helen Clark, former Prime Minister of New Zealand and former UNDP Administrator; and Dr. Don Thomas, astronaut.
About the Innovation Lab Schools Project
The innovation lab schools HQ is located in Belgium, represented by Koen Timmers. It is a registered non-profit.
Phone Koen: +32 486 874 005
More information on the Innovation Lab Schools Project, please contact Koen Timmers [email protected] or visit www.innovationsdglab.com.
About Koen Timmers
Koen is a Belgian lecturer, researcher and author. In 2018 he was announced as one of the best teachers globally by Bill Gates as part of the Global Teacher Prize. In 2015 he launched the Kakuma project in which 350 educators across 6 continents offer free education to African refugees via Skype. Koen is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, TeachSDGs founding ambassador, Microsoft Expert Educator Fellow, winner of the HundrED award and National Geographic Certified Educator. He’s co-author of the book “Teaching in the Fourth Industrial Revolution”.