Recognizing the importance of digital technologies in the classroom, educators from Bangladesh and across Asia attended the Bett (British Educational Training and Technology) Asia Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia recently, to discuss the digital transformation of education and share cutting-edge innovations that will prepare students for a digital future. As a worldwide partner of Bett, Microsoft delivered an informative and engaging educational experience through hands-on sessions that aimed to equip students in Asia with future-ready skills.
High-quality education is critical for the growth of Bangladesh’s economy because it is well known that access to education lifts productivity and competitiveness in developing markets. Better education can provide students with high-level skills demanded by the labor market, including technical, behavioral and thinking skills.
In response, leaders in Asia Pacific’s education sector are showing urgency in embracing the 4th Industrial Revolution to improve students’ educational outcomes. Microsoft Asia’s Digital Transformation survey found that 87% of educators know they need to transform to a digital institution to enable future growth, yet only 23% said that they have a full digital strategy in place today. But with the right technology, educators can access the best tools to better engage students with digital, interactive and personalized content, and non-teaching staff can feel empowered and ensure compliance requirements are met.
Don Carlson, Director, Education, Microsoft Asia Pacific said: “Digital disruption has resulted in a shift in how work is being approached and conducted, and it is important that education institutions transform in order to equip students with future-ready skills, such as honing their creativity and critical thinking capabilities. At Microsoft, we have a specific and nuanced approach to digital transformation in education. We believe this involves the transformation in four key pillars – empowering faculty and non-teaching employees, engaging students, optimizing institutions and transforming learning, with data and the cloud being the key enablers.”
Sonia Bashir Kabir, Managing Director Microsoft Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, and Laos said, “We need to prioritize the issues and eliminate the barriers found in this study for taking a leap towards true digitalization in the education sector of Bangladesh. It is a prime time to embrace and facilitate the emerging technologies for staying ahead of the future to come”.
Microsoft is empowering students and teachers to achieve more by investing in the education sector. Recently announced, Microsoft 365 Education includes Office 365 for Education, Windows 10, Enterprise Mobility + Security, and Minecraft: Education Edition. It gives students, faculties, and staff everything they need to create and collaborate, securely.
By providing educators with free access to world-standard collaboration and productivity tools, Microsoft is ensuring the future leaders of Asia receive training in the same software that powers businesses and governments around the world.
Microsoft believes that digital transformation is not simply about technology, it requires education leaders to re-envision existing business models and embrace a different way of gathering data and processes to create value for their students through systems of intelligence. Through the transformation journey, Microsoft has been supporting Bangladesh’s education leaders to empower the youth with the key skills for success in the digital age.
