The Sri Lankan project presented under the ‘Education’ category emerged on top of the 145 outstanding Information and Communications Technology (ICT) projects submitted for the Stockholm Challenge Award 2008.
The final ICT projects were selected under six different categories and the winning Sri Lankan ICT project in the “Education” category was presented under the theme of Shilpa Sayura (Sea of Knowledge).
Neranjan Meegammana was the leader of the ‘Shilpa Sayura’ project.
“The standard of the projects in the Stockholm Challenge Award this year was better than ever before,” said project manager Ulla Skidn and added that the criteria for participation have been set to a higher level compared to earlier years.
Participants needed to more clearly demonstrate social impacts and sustainability with their projects in 2008. This resulted in 145 exceptional projects from more than 50 countries.
Shilpa Sayura was earlier the winner of the “i4D” award at e India 2007 and the Stockholm Challenge GKP Award at GK3, Malaysia in 2007.
The Shilpa Sayura System is an interactive digital self-learning programme based on the National curriculum of Sri Lanka for students in the remote and rural areas who do not have adequate resources and teachers for their education. It is a local language digital learning system.
The aim of Shilpa Sayura is to improve self-learning capacity of the handicapped students in remote areas and rural communities to prepare for National examinations.
The Shilpa Sayura project was commended by the business community in Sweden after the presentation made by Meegammana at the Sweden-Sri Lanka Business Council meeting at the Sri Lanka Embassy in Stockholm, foreign media reported.
Courtesy: Government Information Department
