SPECIAL INTERVIEW. Cherpa: Changing the Way of Learning
The other day I visited the IE venture lab. It was my first time there I did not know what to expect. They introduced 3 great startups but one of them called up my attention.
At the end of the presentations, I had the chance to speak with Ibrahim the co-founder of Cherpa. Cherpa is an online platform whose objective is to teach students about robotics and coding. Cherpa comes from the word Sherpa, they do not guide climbers through the mountains, instead, they offer guidance to students in the robotics world. The particularity of Cherpa is that you do not have to read books or watch videos to learn, students have to interact online to code a rocket and send it to Mars!
Cherpa is an e-learning platform for teenagers. We offer courses to prepare students for future jobs. We teach them tactical skills that they are gonna need after they graduate. We offer the different type of courses that go from learning how to code a smart city to launch rockets or controlling Mars rovers.
We don´t do videos or teach the classes. Every lesson we offer is a challenge where students have to solve issues like detecting obstacles in a self-driving car.
Was this the right time to start your business?
We realized of the demand of this skills in Governments and companies which meant that school would be hungry to offer this type of courses as an extra curriculum activity.
We are experiencing that a lot of schools are approaching us in our region instead of us approaching them.
What (factors) led you to believe that the education market is ready for change?
Schools don’t want to change their way of teaching, but they found that the traditional way of teaching students is evolving into something more interactive and related to new technologies. Schools then start looking for solutions and there is where they find us.
What are the largest obstacles that you will have to overcome to grow your idea?
Our sales approach is based on the good quality of our product. We are in the middle of overcoming challenges to develop new ideas. Once we solve this we will be selling more services to our students and schools.
We do have enough investors at the moment. What we need to do is to grow and reach more schools and markets.
This is a really nice approach and a necessary change that has to be made in how we teach the youth at our institutions. Given the advance in technology and the nearly endless opportunities that come along with it, I find it quite strange that most classes are still being taught using a teacher-centered approach. Let's give our children a chance to think for themselves, find real and practical solutions to real issues, and have them understand how to learn by cooperating with others. Given that Cherpa is operating out of Beirut, Lebanon, I wonder if schools all around the globe are eligible to take part in the program, or are there certain limitations?
ReplyDeleteHello! Education is definitely obsolete. There is a need for a change. This is why Cherpa is receiving a lot of requests from schools. I find it hard for European schools to offer this type of service due to the high number of government regulations and the mandatory subjects. However, it would be great for schools to offer Cherpa education platform as an elective or extracurricular activity.
DeleteThis seems like a great idea. However, students have to have access to electronics and those types of classroom things. A lot of schools in the U.S.A. are lacking appropriate funding. I think if there is a way to help get all the resources to do this with minimal finances it will be hugely successful.
ReplyDeleteHello! Yes, I agree. For this technology to be implemented worldwide the students need to have access to a computer. At first Cherpa was targeting single students but they received better response from teachers that wanted to add this educational service to their schools. I believe that medium-large schools already have computers room or have enough budget to acquire one. There is no need to work on the Cherpa platform everyday, instead students could use it once or twice a week.
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