ISLAMABAD: A Saudi social learning platform Noon Academy is offering free online classes to thousands of Pakistani students to help them make up the time lost to coronavirus school closures.
Noon Academy is one of the largest edtech companies in the Middle East and North Africa region and has 6.5 million students and 34,000 teachers in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Oman, Kuwait, Jordan, India and Iraq. Launched in Pakistan in mid-September, within two months it got over 22,000 students registered on its platform.
"We are offering free classes to students from grade one to twelve with an aim to help them make up their learning losses during closure of schools due to coronavirus," Umair Babar Chishti, the company’s head for Pakistan, told Arab News on Saturday.
#LISTEN: @UmairBabarChis1 country head of @NoonEdu in #Pakistan sheds light on largest social learning platform in Middle East, that is now helping students in Pakistan || @NoonPakistan #SaudiArabia #Education #Technology
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Read special by @AamirSaeed_ : https://t.co/OeD77YbvUl pic.twitter.com/Qrh3QXFcxH— Arab News Pakistan (@arabnewspk) November 8, 2020
“Since most of our offerings are free, anyone, anywhere can learn, but this won’t be by compromising our quality. We have very strict quality standards ... We have the best teachers from across the country teaching the local as well as international curriculum,” he said.
Access to education in Pakistan has always been a problem due to numerous factors, including poor teaching and information technology infrastructure. Out of over 70 million Pakistani children, 22.8 million do not attend school.
The coronavirus outbreak in February and the subsequent closure of educational institutions have further aggravated the situation. Some schools turned to online classes but with home broadband connections being expensive or often unavailable outside big cities, many children in remote areas are finding it difficult to catch up.
While Noon classes also require internet access, learning materials can be downloaded and used later.
"Students can download the content and watch it at their convenience even in remote areas where they lack the internet access," Chishti said. “Anyone can watch live classes through 3G connection at Noon Academy’s app."
However, according to Hassan bin Rizwan, chief executive of learning app Muse SABAQ, very few children have devices to participate in online education.
"It is estimated that only one million kids have access to independent tablet or mobile phone at home," he told Arab News.
"The government has failed to bring schools to all kids across all parts of the country," Rizwan said, adding that although there is "plenty of room for growth" in Pakistan, e-learning initiatives have been struggling to bridge the gap left by the government.
Noon Academy's Chishti says he is aware of the constraints and to address them the Saudi edtech company is going to partner with leading IT and telecom companies in Pakistan.
"For those who don't have access to the internet or a mobile device, we are trying to partner with some leading telecom firms and through this partnership we'll be distributing the devices across Pakistan," he said.
"In Pakistan as of now there are very few opportunities for students to learn online, and with Noon, the technology we have, the support we have and the team we have, we would be able to reach the masses, democratize education, make it extremely affordable to everyone."
