The atmosphere was so lively after the training of the first ASEAN Digital Innovative Program (ADIP) Training of Trainers at Pancasila University, Jakarta was completed. The participants, comprising education staff and trainers from various NGOs, mingled, waited for time to go home.
Among these colorful participants, one person made lasting impression. His name is Irfan Priyadi, a visually impaired middle-aged man with unbelievable energy. “My love of technology was one of my reasons to join Future Ready ASEAN training,” Irfan said.
Irfan is one of the trainers from the Kartunet, a community that serves as a platform for disability community to learn about technology and creativity. Assuming the role of volunteer manager, he regularly advocates people to increase their awareness about inclusive society. Apart from volunteering at Kartunet, he also holds a regular job as an officer at the education and training center of the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture. “This training resonates with my work because at the office I am the one who is responsible to input data, operating the website, and manage the content on the website,” he shared about his work. “I truly believe the coding session will help me at my work and I want to apply what I learn in my daily work life.”. He told us that learning about technology has helped him pass the test for Indonesian civil servant and become a teach non-disable student at school.
He believes that by embracing opportunities to learn more about technological development, just like what he did through Future Ready ASEAN training, it will open more doors of opportunities especially for the disability community. He has high hope that there will be more people with disability who will be interested to learn about technology. "As a part of the disability community, I can say that technology has made our lives better and helped me to overcome the limitations that exist," he shared.
Following the workshop, he promised not to remain idle. As a matter of fact, he already has a big plan with all the knowledge he received from Future Ready ASEAN training. "After this training activity, I will share the knowledge that I have got, first and foremost to the internal team in our community in Kartunet and after that, we will design activities related to technology for youth from the disability community," Irfan said.
Future Ready ASEAN training of ADIP is expected to equip 8,000 underserved youths in Indonesia with digital skills and Irfan will play key role in achieving this number by improving the digital capabilities of underserved youth, specifically youth with disability. "After the disability community has better literation in technology, we will continue to teach our non-disabled friends," he concluded. ***
Future Ready ASEAN is an online platform developed in partnership between the ASEAN Foundation and Microsoft, as part of ADIP. Launched in March 2019, this program aims to train 520 teachers and 46,000 underserved youth aged 15 to 35 on digital skills, in particular computer science education, to enable them to thrive in the fourth industrial revolution. The trainings will leverage the Future Ready ASEAN platform and be conducted by Empire Code as master trainer in seven ASEAN countries (Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam).
