Arc Light Foundation Academy says it targets to train 21,600 students in Robotic Science before the end of this year with 600 every week from two schools across 36 states of the federation and Abuja benefitting from the curriculum.
The foundation’s Managing Director, Mrs Abisola Obasanya, made the disclosure in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) at the 2018 World Robot Olympiad (WRO) Nigeria held on Saturday in Lagos.
NAN reports that WRO Nigeria took place at the Lagos City Hall, Lagos Island, where 35 schools and 140 students from across Nigeria participated.
The winners of each category will represent Nigeria at WRO, Chiang Mai, Thailand later in November.
The students at this year’s competition, tagged: “Food Matters’’ seek to proffer solutions to the way we grow, share and consume food with the aid of robots as a means of providing scientific supports.
The task was to create robots that will solve both simple and complex tasks of providing agricultural challenges, such as pest monitoring, watering and simple farm works.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Arc Light Foundation, Obasanya, said the 21st century innovations took their roots in robotic science, adding that Nigeria would be better educationally if robotic science would be appreciated.
“The world is going digital now and it is all about robotic science. We need to be at par with the knowledge of robots all over the world.
“In our own contribution, we want to make sure that the knowledge of robots is popularised all over the country and not Lagos alone because we already have other states appreciating the subject.
“As part of the effort, we want to train about 600 students every week from two schools across the 36 states of the federation and Abuja, this will give the country an edge technologically,’’ she said.
Obasanya said that the programme to train the students in robotic science, tagged “School on Wheel’’ across the country was in partnerships with a private organisation, HIS.
“We are in partnerships with IHS in the programme tagged “School on Wheel’’, they will provide the technical support for the robotic training.
“We are sure that the students will do well because judging from the past experience, those that are being taught are now good at the practical side of it.
“Robotic science provides the platform for students to be engaged in problem solving skills through the use of robots which are easy to operate.
“We are excited about the prospect of training the students in robots for the advancement of technology in our country and many will have a lot to benefit from it too,’’ she said.
