On May 13, the "Sharing Hope for the Future" public welfare project initiated by the China Poverty Alleviation Foundation and the 100 Education Foundation was officially launched.

The project aims to provide free high-quality educational resources to impoverished areas through the "Hope Online" education public welfare platform, to promote the balanced development of education. The first batch of project counties includes 10 national-level poverty-stricken counties such as Pengshui County in Chongqing and Weining County in Guizhou.

Zheng Wenkai, Chairman of the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation, and Chen Hongtao, Executive Deputy Secretary-General of the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation, Wan Yiting , Chairman of the TAL Charitable Foundation, and Qin Luxiao ofthe TAL Charitable Foundation, as well as representatives from the first batch of project counties, attended the launching ceremony. The ceremony was presided over by Zhao Xihua, head of the Poverty Alleviation Cooperation Department of theChina Foundation for Poverty Alleviation.

Launch ceremony of the " Sharing a Better Future" public welfare project

Currently, China's educational reform has made breakthrough progress. However, in rural areas, due to issues such as insufficient number of teachers, low quality, aging, and relatively weak teaching resources, the teacher team lags behind the national educational reform. Enhancing the level of school operation in rural areas, reducing the gap in education between schools, urban and rural areas, and regions, addressing the shortage of high-quality educational resources in impoverished areas, and achieving balanced development of education are important tasks in the field of education and precise poverty alleviation.

Speech by Chairman Zheng Wenkai of the China Poverty Alleviation Foundation

In his speech, Zheng Wenkai proposed that educational equity is an important foundation for social equity. Achieving high-quality and equitable education requires not only the assistance of technology, but also the active participation of various social forces. The "Sharing a Better Future" public welfare project leverages the unique advantages of educational informatization in educational poverty alleviation, and is an innovation in the mode of education poverty alleviation.

Speech by Executive Wan Yiting,  Chairman of TAL Charitable Foundation

Wan Yiting stated that this year is the final year of poverty alleviation efforts, and the sudden outbreak of the epidemic has brought new challenges to winning the battle against poverty on schedule. TAL Charitable Foundation hopes to provide high-quality educational resources to impoverished areas through the "Hope Online" platform, and make a contribution to winning the battle against poverty through education and cutting off intergenerational poverty transmission.

Speech by Tan Yili, Deputy County Mayor of Pengshui County, Chongqing

As a representative of the first batch of project counties, Tan Yili, Deputy County Mayor of Pengshui County, Chongqing, expressed gratitude for the support and assistance of the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation and TAL Charitable Foundation. He also proposed to further strengthen cooperation with both parties, so that the "Sharing a Better Future" public welfare project can play a greater role. This allows teachers to continuously improve their level and capabilities of modern education and teaching through the "Hope Online" platform, and allows more students in mountainous areas to embrace the concept of modern technological education.

It is understood that the "Hope Online" public welfare platform was initiated by TAL Charitable Foundation, starting from the needs of impoverished areas, organizing volunteers, and forming a research and development team, teacher team, and educational research team. The platform introduces educational and technological resources from the 100 Education Foundation to help improve the education level of impoverished areas. Since its launch in 2017, the "Hope Online" platform has covered 13 counties in 7 provinces including Shaanxi, Hebei, Guizhou, Xinjiang, and Yunnan, and has helped more than 65,000 impoverished teachers and students.

In recent years, TAL Charitable Foundation has been actively promoting education poverty alleviation. In the remote Daliangshan area, nearly 80,000 Yi children are learning Mandarin through the 100 Education Foundation's "AI Mandarin Teaching System". In Jimunai, Xinjiang, teachers from the 100 Education Foundation are collaborating with local teachers to teach students in a "dual-teacher classroom" model. In Bijie, Guizhou, children in rural kindergartens are learning the science literacy curriculum designed by the TAL Charitable Foundation. In the first batch of project counties under the "Sharing a Better Future" project, there are also education poverty alleviation projects of the 100 Education Foundation in Linxia Zhou in Gansu, Weining in Guizhou, and Qinglong in Hebei.

Not long ago, the 100 Education Foundation's "AI Mandarin Teaching System" used for education poverty alleviation was recognized by the UNESCO and awarded the 2020 Mobile Learning Week "AI and Inclusion" Innovative Demonstration Project.

Image: UNESCO presenting certificate to the TAL Charitable Foundation

The education poverty alleviation initiatives of the TAL Charitable Foundation are gradually showing their effect of being "useful, good, long-lasting, and accurate". Wan Yiting said that looking ahead, they hope to achieve three "large-scale" aspects of the education poverty alleviation project through 17 years of accumulation in the field of teaching and research, as well as independently developed artificial intelligence and live broadcast technology. The three "large-scales" are large-scale high quality, large-scale warmth, and large-scale customization.

In 2019, TAL Charitable Foundation, as a strategic partnerfor the "Beautiful Schools" project of China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation, supported the joint construction of beautiful schools for 25 primary schools in Mabian, Sichuan, by conducting information literacy training and providing the "Hope Online" platform.

The "Sharing a Better Future" public welfare project is another collaboration between the China Foundation for Poverty Alleviation and TAL Charitable Foundation, which will open the "Hope Online" platform to more impoverished areas, and accelerate the improvement of teaching quality, teacher's level, and information literacy in impoverished areas through sharing high-quality educational content and software applications, so that "children in mountainous areas can also receive high-quality education".