Panaji: The Coding and Robotics Education in Schools (CARES) scheme was announced in the budget by Chief Minister on March 24, 2021. It aims to introduce an interactive pedagogy sparking an interest in Coding and Robotics. Students in class 6th to 8th will have this program as part of their curriculum.
Over the next 2 academic years the program will introduce more detailed and advanced topics. Advanced sections of the course will be conducted after school hours, thereby integrating with the current academic system instead of disrupting it.
It is envisioned that this program will ‘Develop computational, design thinking and programming skills’.
The Directorate of Technical Education is leading this program. The Project management unit has been constituted to execute the scheme statewide. Thus far over 520 teachers have been trained on this new program and it covers 367 aided/ Govt schools in the State of Goa.
PMU head Dr. Vijay Borges introduced the program during the Startup Summit Antha Prerna held recently. “As the pedagogy executes a ‘Hands on’ interactive style, it will encourage ideation, improve problem solving skills and develop metacognitive awareness” said Dr. Borges.
Under the scheme, the PMU has planned hackathons and competitions to be rolled for the academic year 2021-22. The first phase begins with the Logo design and Tagline competition. In an effort to engage and excite the community, PMU decided to crowdsource the Logo design in the form of a competition.
The competition is open to all ages and the participants will have to Design a logo, provide a tagline with a 150 word description that requires to be part of the submission. Further details and submissions need to be made on https://goa.mygov.in The last date for entries is 05th October 2021.
