Page 61 - EducationWorld October 2020

Coding education demic era. With NEP 2020 mandat-

ing computational thinking for all
missionary schools, the future of LLI is bright,”
says Ranjan.
Way to go!
AHUL RANJAN is co-founder Dipta Joshi (Mumbai)
and CEO of LeapLearner
RIndia (LLI, estb.2020)
— the India partner of the Israel- National Teachers
based coding education company
LeapLearner Inc, which has 1 Award winner
million subscribers in 20 countries
worldwide. Under a recently
signed agreement, LLI will offer YOTI ARORA is the founder-
computational thinking programmes principal of Mount Abu Public
through courses in coding, robotics, JSchool, Rohini, Delhi (MAPS-R,
apps development and logic for estb.1998). In the latest Education-
children in the five-14 age group. Ranjan: great leap forward World India School Rankings 2019-
A serial edupreneur, Ranjan is 20, MAPS-R is ranked #55 (out of
also founder of edtech company in Kochi, Karnal and Gurugram. 300) schools in Delhi NCR and was
Alphabyte, and two affordable The same year, he went solo and conferred a Grand Jury Award for
Sunshine schools in Delhi NCR for registered the Sunshine Education campus architecture and design.
underprivileged children which Foundation, a philanthropic venture Newspeg. On Teachers Day
have 1,000 students mentored by 40 for urban underprivileged children, (September 5), Arora received the
teachers on their muster rolls. and edtech company Alphabyte, an National Teachers Award 2020
Newspeg. LeapLearner is currently online learning platform to deliver in the CBSE (Central Board of
working in six schools in Delhi NCR computational thinking courses Secondary Education) category from
and Gujarat to design new cur- for primary school children. The President Ram Nath Kovind through
riculums that include coding and joint venture with LeapLearner the online digital delivery mode. She
robotics. By the end of this year, Inc enables Ranjan to offer was adjudged winner of the award
LLI will also launch its self-learning contemporary curriculums on a by an independent national jury
gamified mobile app to make coding globally tested platform. constituted by the Union education
education affordable and acces- Direct talk. “Coding education is not ministry. The jury reviewed
sible to everyone, including children just about children being able to cre- applications and presentations
from underprivileged households ate apps and games. It’s about build- made by 153 teachers across the
who don’t have access to high speed ing strong computational thinking country who were shortlisted by 36
Internet and laptops. and algorithmic intelligence — CTAI
History. A graduate of the Maulana — skills. A decade into the future Arora: wider curriculum priority
Azad National Institute of Technol- and almost all tools used by industry
ogy (NIT), Bhopal, and America’s will need foundational CTAI skills,”
top-ranked Booth School of Business predicts Ranjan.
of the University of Chicago, Ranjan Future plans. Given that India hosts
began his career as a Java program- the world’s largest child and youth
mer with Cognizant Technologies population, Ranjan believes that in
in 2007 before taking on an assign- the fullness of time, teaching of CTAI
ment as a full-time primary school skills will be accorded as much im-
teacher under the Teach for India portance as numeracy and literacy.
programme. In 2011, he set up KLAY “My goal is to democratise access to
Prep Schools & Day Care’s North coding education. We are witnessing
India business as founding director. strong demand for coding education
Four years later in 2015, he from periurban and rural markets.
signed up with the Dubai-based With the launch of our self-learning
Varkey Group’s GEMS Education tool focussed on tier-II and III cit-
as head of business operations and ies, we are expecting a surge in the
established the group’s K-12 schools number of sign-ups in the post-pan-

OCTOBER 2020 EDUCATIONWORLD 61