Page 28 - Education World July 2020

Young Achievers

engaging a private coach is donations page, with a separate chat
very expensive, I learned the feature for users to communicate
techniques and nuances of with each other in these challenging
pistol shooting from watch- times.
ing You-Tube videos, attend- Started in 2012, the MIT App
ing shooting championships Inventor platform enables teenage
and doing extensive read- children and adults to develop apps
ing on marksmanship,” he for smart devices. Over the past eight
recalls. In 2018, he won his years, the platform has attracted 6
first gold medal at an inter- million registered visitors — and
national shooting champion- 400,000 active users every month
ship in Bangladesh, and his — who have designed 22 million
extraordinary shooting skills apps to date. MIT conducts monthly
prompted sports foundations app inventor challenges on various
in 17 countries worldwide themes in three age categories —
to connect with him. This young, teen and adult.
SHIVAM THAKUR publicity won him several advertis- director of steam turbines company
The elder child of Tyrone Lemos,
ing contracts and corporate sponsor-
ships, notably from the Bangalore- Rotycan Turbotech Pvt. Ltd, and his
ithin three years of taking based Shiv Naresh Sport Apparel and wife Karen, a homemaker, Nikhil has
to the shooting range, Indigo Airlines. His rise to the top been a digital technologies enthu-
WKulesara village (Uttar in the 10m pistol shooting event is siast since he started attending the
Pradesh)-based teenage sharp- an extraordinary narrative of spirit, Lego Robotics Institute, Vadodara
shooter Shivam Thakur (17) bagged determination and ability to seize the in his after-school hours over a year
gold and silver medals in individual moment. ago. “I love to take cars apart and
and group categories of the men’s Right now this young, socially rebuild them. So when I heard about
10m air pistol shooting event at committed shooting star is train- MIT’s Coronavirus Challenge, I
the Indo-Malaysia International ing for the European Youth Games signed up at the insistence of our ro-
Championship 2020 organised by in September and the World Youth botics teacher Mukesh Ganga Sagar
the Malaysia School Games and Ac- Games in Portugal in October 2021. Bind, who provided me with valuable
tivity Development Foundation in “I also intend to send at least ten support and guidance to develop the
Kuala Lumpur in early February. In athletes from SGADF to represent app,” recalls Nikhil.
March, Shivam pledged 60 percent India in international tournaments. Enthused by his success in the
of his annual earnings for the next My ultimate dream is to win a medal highly competitive monthly MIT
three years to sportspersons in the for India at the 2025 Olympics,” says Coronavirus App Challenge 2020,
grip of financial loss during the pan- this gritty teenager with his heart in Nikhil is brainstorming ideas to up-
demic induced lockdown. the right place. grade his app. “I believe such global
The younger child of grocery Autar Nehru (Delhi) competitions encourage innovation
store proprietor, Arun Kumar and improve one’s technology man-
Thakur, and his homemaker wife agement skills regardless of winning
Mamta, Shivam quit a promising and losing considerations. This win
career in cricket after suffering NIKHIL LEMOS has stimulated me to develop more
a knee injury at a U-19 national innovative apps for the benefit of
camp in Kochi in 2014. This life humanity,” says Nikhil, also an avid
changing event prompted the ikhil Lemos (12), a class VII reader and table tennis player.
young sports aficionado and his student of the Navrachna Way to go, Bro!
father to co-promote the non-profit NSama School, Vadodara is one Akhila Damodaran (Bangalore)
SGADF (School Games and Activity of eight winners from an estimated 2
Development Foundation) in 2016. lakh school children around
Formally registered with interna- the world who submitted
tional sports federations (TAFISA, entries for the May 2020 edi-
IAKS, ICSSPE) and recognised by tion of the Coronavirus App
the International Olympic Commit- Challenge of Massachusetts
tee in 2017, the foundation which Institute of Technology, USA.
enables budding athletes to realise Nikhil’s ‘Know the Corona’
their dreams, has thus far been app — designed with the help
represented by 600,000 athletes in of a block coding tool — is a
multiple tournaments countrywide. one-stop application provid-
Simultaneously, this then class ing users critical information
IX student of the DVM Public including the number of posi-
School, Greater Noida took to the tive cases in all countries, Co-
sport of pistol shooting as he “had vid-19 symptoms, preventive
to play competitive sport”. “Since measures, helplines, neigh-
bouring grocery stores, WHO

28 EDUCATIONWORLD JULY 2020