 What kind of world do I want to live in? I think about this question a lot For our generation and for specifically my group of people, which is refugees The circumstances might dismantle any vision of the future that we have You're trying to rebuild, you're trying to make a future for yourself and then the climate's related disaster come and you start again It's not about how it's affecting you now. It's about how it's affecting you your entire life The first step to understand is that we're all a part of it. None of us are going to be left out by the crisis We're at a stage where if we don't act now, we there won't be very much left There are generations that will never see certain things that we grew up seeing in real life We have to start treating this like the emergency it is To achieve the 17 sustainable development goals, we have to go from an intention to a serious commitment Business leaders really need to rethink how they conduct their business and invest in creating systems that are climate friendly The action I would like to see is accountability Structures being put in place where countries aren't just asked to do something But they're kept accountable to the decisions that they make There has to be that strong collaboration between government, between corporations, between youth activists to drive change forward The world I would want to live in is a world where imagining the future is not a privilege I want to live in a world where people do not give up on hope Hope that a positive change is possible The fact that you're listening today means that you are willing to make a change Welcome to the uplink daily I'm your host Emanuela Rossini joining you from the sustainable development impact summit here at the world economic forum in Geneva In this session, we're excited to announce the top innovations from the world class education challenge A global call for solutions that will widen access to education and ensure students have the skills They need to thrive in the jobs of the future The COVID-19 pandemic dramatically disrupted the education of students all over the world But it also gave us a glimpse into what learning in the future could look like With so much experimentation, we must now uncover what worked Which schools and teachers were best equipped to deliver virtual learning equitably? How did educators reach those without access to technology? What new skills became a priority for learning and how are those skills taught? This uplink challenge launched in partnership with Deloitte was a search for the solutions that can answer these urgent questions Let's watch a video to find out more This education challenge was launched with Deloitte as part of its ambition to help 100 million individuals access quality education skills and opportunities by 2030 To help make this goal a reality, Deloitte will be investing up to 1 million In the form of pro bono support and financial grants to support the top innovations that we're going to announce today To tell us more we're now going to hear from Deloitte CEO punit renjan Thanks for speaking with us today punit. Hello, emanuella. It's an honor to be part of the forum's sti summit Today is an exciting day for Deloitte as we announce the top innovators for the Deloitte world class education challenge This is a unique opportunity for the winning cohort to work alongside Deloitte professionals To help address the global education crisis In may we reached out to educators entrepreneurs and innovators across Africa India and southeast asia Asking them to share their ideas to address education inequity and they answered the call We received many ideas from individuals and organizations who are passionate about disrupting the status quo And we thank all those who put such time and energy into their submissions We've invited the winning cohort to participate in a year-long program led by Deloitte and supported by the forum That will give visibility to their solutions and scale their impact The top innovators are an impressive group with the potential to create lasting impact in their regions Their passion and creativity give me great hope for the future We are a critical juncture as a society and now is the time to take urgent action to address growing education inequity This is why Deloitte doubled its original world class goal from 50 million to 100 million lives impacted We understand that we can't leave anyone behind That we must continue to connect innovators with expertise resources and networks that can help scale their ventures and accelerate their impact And uplink is an incredible tool to do this There is no one person organization or government that can solve today's challenges We must all act boldly together and inspire others to do the same in pursuit of the future We want to see and those we recognize today are doing exactly that. So congratulations to our top innovators And thank you for leading the way. Thank you so much for sharing those inspiring thoughts with us punit We're also joined today by Michelle Parmalie Deloitte's deputy CEO and chief people and purpose officer Welcome Michelle. Thank you, Emanuella for having me here today Could you tell us why closing the education gap is so important in terms of global development and why it's so crucial That businesses like Deloitte play an active role in finding solutions When we launched the world class education challenge back in may I spoke about how education is fundamental to progress. It empowers it uplifts Here we are a few months later and the challenges of COVID-19 are still disrupting students education world life And unfortunately it will continue to do so for the foreseeable future Educational inequity is growing and the difference between the privileged and those being left behind is widening every day Younger generations are demanding accountability from businesses like ours They are persistent and vocal they question and they upset the status quo And they remind us there is still a lot we can do Our education challenge is an example of what is possible We received 370 solutions from innovators in Africa India and Southeast Asia This reflects the deep desire of innovators to tackle the education crisis And the real need in these regions These innovators are delivering real results for students and teachers Against all odds. They are addressing inequalities the digital divide and the empowerment of educators Among other issues. We are excited to work alongside the selected innovators to bring their ideas to life And scale their solutions. These collaborations will build on Deloitte's world class initiative We are seeking to support 100 million individuals by 2030 and accessing the quality education skills and opportunities required for the future of work We doubled our original goal recognizing the pandemic's significant impact on education globally And challenging ourselves to do more We have reached 20 million people to date a big congratulation to the winning cohort of innovators I'm excited to see the impact we can make together Thank you, Michelle for joining us today and for your perspective there Now as Michelle just said, we had an amazing response to this challenge Almost 400 solutions were submitted through the uplink platform And now the moment of truth It's time to announce which of these solutions were chosen by an expert panel to become top uplink innovators And to receive the support that Poonit and Michelle just spoke about Here are the names of the top uplink innovators for the world class education challenge Congratulations to all of you Joining me in the studio now to discuss this exciting list of innovators is Audrey Chittoway from Deloitte, South Africa Welcome, Audrey. Thank you for having me. Now 370 innovators answered the call to address education inequality. That's an incredible response So what do you think that tells us about the critical need to close the education gap? Especially in the developing world It speaks to the educational crisis that we're seeing across the continent Which has been further exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic We find ourselves in a peculiar position trying to solve for basic educational needs While also trying to compete in a global market in the midst of a fort industrial revolution So a number of our african countries have reported low literacy and numeracy levels And yet we still need to be competing a global market The other aspect that I'd like to sort of bring to your attention as well Is there's a very popular problem in african continent that goes it takes a village to raise a child And we believe a similar approach would actually work in terms of solving for the merit of educational challenges that we're seeing across our african continent And building an ecosystem of different innovators that are coming together to solve for common educational challenge goals Now 12 finalists were chosen from africa, india and asia Which of the innovations announced here today really stood out to you and why? So from the africa A continent we actually selected five innovators And I'll speak to a few of my favorite ones Stan lab released it out for me. It's a 3d virtual lab experience That actually takes up a virtual construct of a physical science lab Why this is particularly important in our african continent is the fact that we've seen a low uptake of stem subjects across the continent And I perhaps this could offer an opportunity for students across The african continent even those in underserved communities to begin to explore Science objects if the lab costs could then be reduced and I think this particular innovation offers a compelling proposition And if I had to incorporate another one would be it's learnable learnable offers an interactive platform for both teachers students And also importantly the parents where the parents can actually track their learner outcomes of their children By accessing the different materials and tools that they've actually accessed on their particular platform But I think the other important thing is in most cases is we often tend to focus on the delivery of education and not necessarily the learner outcomes And I think learnable address is that and that it keeps a track record of how the child is actually progressing Versus the content that they're actually receiving If I had to squeeze one more in and I must say it has been extremely difficult narrowing it down Park would come in for me as one of the solutions that also stood out It focuses on upscaling children and students across the african continent in robotics programming and coding And then actually equipping them to solve for some of the societal challenges that they're seeing By encouraging them to actually build solutions that solve for community challenges And I think that is a game changer as well within our african continent Now, what do you hope these innovators will be able to achieve through their engagement with uplink and deloitte? I'm hoping they will be able to achieve a sustainable real impact within the communities and solving for the educational challenges that we see within our communities That is the first aspect I think more aligned closely to our world class Ambitions here at deloitte globally. We seek to impact 100 million lives and locally in africa 20 million lives by 2030 And if the cohort would be able to solve for some of those challenges and really make a meaningful impact I believe that that would be success for them Thanks for joining us audrey And now for our final interview of this uplink daily We're going to talk to one of the outstanding innovations that was selected from all of those submissions as one of the top innovators for uplink and deloitte's education challenge Congratulations. Can you introduce yourself and your innovation? My name is Bayu the founder and CEO of commerce So commerce is a platform that connects between SMEs in indonesia To the field too that have been trained in e-commerce field So we train the youths in e-commerce field like digital marketing customer service How to manage social media marketplace and et cetera So with this innovation, we hope to contribute the unemployment and reduce the urbanization from the rural to urban area We focus on educating the youth in e-commerce field And then after the youth can be added from our training, we focus to the SME that Want to hire the youth so that the youth Can get a job opportunity That hire Bayu the agency across the nation What inspired you to start the company? My hometown my district that I live in the village Is still in the top 10 lowest income district in central java, indonesia So that I decide to resign from my previous works in a big city and come back to my hometown To elevate unemployment and urbanization, you know in indonesia The unemployment was rising up almost around 20 hundred the composition of Urban people coming from the rural people so that inspired me to build a commerce What support or resources do you need to take your innovation to the next level? The number of SMEs in indonesia is 16 million SMEs and We started in four years ago, and I hope with the eloid and uplink program They can help us to scale more impact more youth that hire by SMEs And also we plan to expand another country that have a similar segment of SMEs Well, thanks for taking part in this edition of uplink daily We wish you and your team all the very best for the future and we're excited to start working with you I want to thank our audience for joining us today It's been a pleasure to have you all with us for more on the future of education at the sustainable development impact summit You can tune in to the session closing the pandemic education gap later today We'll be back later today to bring you more exciting announcements from uplink and its partners. We'll see you then