Rwanda to set up a fund to support students with good projects
The Government of Rwanda, through the Rwanda TVET Board, is going to set up a fund that will support students’ projects that can help to solve some problems in society.
This was revealed during the closing ceremony of the Rwanda Coding Academy (RCA) Hackathon 2024 in Kigali on October 09, 2024.
The purposes of RCA Hackathon 2024 include the enhancement and evaluation of students’ problem solving capabilities by experiencing project execution and management.
Moreover, it provides a proper venue for exhibition and presentation of projects driven by students, allowing their interactive communication with experts of different fields in a form of coaching and mentorship for students to be evaluated on their planning and execution capabilities.
At this stage, 75 contestants participated in RCA Hackathon with different projects aimed at solving existing problems with the help of technology in the fields of education, health, finance, transportation, agriculture, disaster prevention and others.
“Students are doing different projects and that is what we encourage them to do. After they have done it, the next thing is to see how these projects can go from ideas to business”, Eng. Paul Umukunzi, Director General of Rwanda TVET Board, said.
“We are looking how to establish a fund that will support young people with good ideas to turn them into businesses. The documents and all the laws related to it, have been prepared, the next stage is for the competent authorities to be bless it”, Eng. Umukunzi noted.
The first award went to LabSync, a desktop and web-based software that revolutionalizes science education with user-friendly interfaces and lab simulation tools. It enables students to conduct experiments virtually.
The second award was scooped by Agrinexa, an agricultural AI and IOT tech solution that empowers farmers with real-time data and smart remote irrigation solutions while the third went to Etix. This is an AI based ticketing and tracking system that allows digital payent for transport services via USSD and receive a unique code for boarding.
“Such hackatons are important for students to apply what they have learned; they should continue to be held but also include other students apart from these from Rwanda Coding Academy”, Joseph Nsengimana, Minister of Education said.
Rwanda Coding Academy was established in 2019 as a response to the recommendations of the ‘Rwanda Digital Talent Policy”. The mission of Rwanda Coding Academy is to train young talented and gifted Rwandans in software programming and to promote quality and excellence in coding skills to position Rwanda as a ICT hub in the East Africa Region. To accomplish such a goal, the Government of Republic of Rwanda and Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) of Republic of Korea (KOICA) signed a bilateral agreement for initiation of a collaborative partnership to carry out a four-year project in September 2021 entitled “RCA Capacity Development Project”.
