It’s Not That I Hate, I Just Don’t Know
When I was still home in Vietnam, whenever people talked to me about doing something in the future related to either computer science or technology, I would visualize a person sitting all day in front of a computer, sorting out complicated and mundane “technical stuff”, though I barely had an idea of what this “technical stuff” was. The same image popped up if I got asked whether I was interested in technology or not, and I would typically respond: “No, I hate it”.
Things changed though.
By the end of my high school senior year, I was able to pack my stuff and carry a sense of excitement in my heart to leave Vietnam and study abroad in the States. I came to Babson College — a Boston-based business school in Massachusetts. One of the things that might seem so common and usual to people but was so new for me is how technology is strongly integrated and promoted to students here. My peers would use all these technical terms to talk about a trend in technology that I couldn’t actually understand. I first heard about some languages like HTML, Java, and CSS while I was in my freshman year at Babson and I thought, “What the heck is that? Is it edible?” What is important most, though, is the fact that people talk about it — technology — with an excitement and a rising glow clearly registered in their face. That is so opposed to the typical cluelessness and bewilderment that I normally see from my peers back home whenever we have any conversation related to (a career in) tech.
Later on, during the second semester of my freshman year, I found myself getting involved in tech little by little: hackathon events, a tech conference, and a tech club on campus. All of the sudden I felt like I was exposed to a completely different side of tech. These coding languages appeared to be so intriguely beautiful in a sense that there is a meaning, an order, and logic behind them. These languages are no longer boring to me but instead I view them as materials, and the idea of people using these given materials together with their creativity to build something from scratch is mesmerizing to me. Coding appears to me now as a way to train your critical thinking and problem solving skills, which is super essential for students, especially when they are at a young age.
I was even more mesmerized by the power of technology when I accidentally participated in a hackathon about IoT (Internet of Things) last year. The basic concept of IoT is that all the physical devices are connected with each other and can be controlled from a single smart device like your phone. Having no technical background, I was intimidated, of course. Yet, when my peers actually spent time teaching me some basic concept behind it, I was so fascinated as I saw everything falling into place. We ended up creating a prototype of a security device that could help prevent sexual assault for kids. Just as a catalyst, that event enlightened me about the power of tech and how we students can use it to build, to create, and to make a social impact. Now tech comes to me as a spectrum full of possibilities for innovations and changes.
In short, my curiosity was triggered.
I started to read some more on how technology is disrupting the old and outdated education system and, to be more specific, how IoT has gradually proven its role in making improvements for both students and teachers inside and outside classes. The most basic thing we can see now is that students and professors use more computers, laptops, and tablets in the classroom. In fact, as of 2015, 73% of all U.S. teenagers had access to a smartphone, according to Capterra. With accessibility to the internet, they are able to control and connect different devices. For example, according to Business Insider, the foremost example of a tech company that has invaded schools is SMART, which pioneered the world’s first interactive whiteboard in 1991. They used IoT to create a wireless interactive whiteboard, which could be controlled by the professor through their mobile phone or laptop connected to the internet. Apart from SMART, New Richmond schools in Tipp City, Ohio are saving approximately $128,000 each year by using a web-based system that controls all mechanical equipment inside the buildings. With some examples and figures, it is clear that IoT is changing the way schools operate and the way students learn in class.
I started to rethink why I and many peers and students around me back home were so indifferent to the power of tech and its presence in this day and age.
So, let’s get back to my education in Vietnam. I went to a traditional public high school from primary to secondary school (K-8 in American terms). We did have a “computer science” class, but all we learned about was how to use Paint, which, as its name already points out, is a drawing application for students. We would spend time learning how to draw traffic signs with Paint and how to draw our school. During my secondary and high school, we made some progress, though. We learned how to use Word and basic Excel. Although, we barely got exposed to the concept of coding or any other aspect of technology and how it could help foster the critical thinking and problem solving among youngsters. In other words, the computer science curriculum from the majority of the public schools in my country did not provide students with the practical tools and experiences that they were supposed to. Only students who were seriously oriented to a career in computer science (typically male students) would try to pursue it in college. But for us, high school students unsure what a career in tech was all about, we didn’t see any interest in computer science or tech in general, because we were simply not exposed enough to it.
As I am excited to learn more about how IoT is being applied to improve the education system around the world, I have thought about how IoT is being viewed in my home country, Vietnam. Last week, I got the chance to talk to Tri Nguyen, who is the CEO of Mimosa Technology — a company based in Vietnam that uses IoT to provide data, decision support, and remote control capabilities through sensors in agriculture. I was lucky to gain some insights from him on the topic and trend of the development of IoT in Vietnam, and what it means to students. Here is a quick recap of some insights that I think do not only exist in my country but in many other developing countries as well:
Q: “What do you think about the trend of IoT in Vietnam right now?”
A: “I think right now, IoT is a new trend that has been pretty well recognized in the ecosystem of tech startups in Vietnam. However, it has been only applied and understood in tech business. It needs to be incorporated more in our daily and practical application so that the society can grow more interest and awareness around it.”
Q: “How do you think we can use IoT to improve our education system?”
A: “IoT can be used as a tool to improve your critical thinking and problem solving skills, which are the most two important skills needed to be trained especially when you are at a young age. Teachers can teach students basic coding and programming skill behind IoT via practical projects, in which students actually use IoT to design a solution for a real issue. The second way to incorporate IoT in our schools is in building different applications from IoT that facilitate the process of learning. For example, a smart card that helps track students’ footprints for safety purposes on campus, or an application that helps navigate books in the library.”
Q: “How can we make people be more aware of the presence of IoT?”
A: “Actually we shouldn’t think of IoT as something so advanced because once we do so people will feel scared to approach it. Instead, we should focus on the benefit that IoT can bring about through practical applications. Similar to STEM, IoT will need more time in Vietnam to be more widely recognized and applied in our education system. We need to use it to create applications that can change the way students study in class. Once people realize the benefit that IoT can bring about, they will start to pay more attention to its presence.”
From the interview itself, I believe the biggest challenge right now is to grow students’ interest and awareness around IoT and technology, in general, through the implementation of practical projects. The main purpose is that by gaining hands-on experience, students will actually get to know what IoT and technology in general are capable of. In order to grow early interest in tech for students in Vietnam, schools should encourage a more creative and innovative learning environment. They can organize different small-scale talks about careers in tech for students and how they should not be afraid of tech. They can also encourage students to found or join any tech clubs. At the same time, the schools should incorporate a more practical computer science program so that students from a young age can develop their critical thinking and problem solving skill through coding.
If I could go back in time to answer the question of whether I am interested in technology, I would answer that at that time, it is not that I hate it, I just don’t know about it. It’s all about exposure.
Works cited:
Meola, Andrew. “How IoT in education is changing the way we learn”. Business Insider, 26 Dec. 2016. Web. 6 Oct. 2017.
<http://www.businessinsider.com/internet-of-things-education-2016-9>
