Chromebooks in Cambodia
Over the past 50 years, Bob Gregory has been a school teacher, a church pastor, a school principal and an education resource supplier in Australia and around the South Pacific region. He officially retired in 2015 and in 2016 became the education manager for Transform Cambodia, an NGO dedicated to helping the children of Cambodia escape poverty.
Helping children escape poverty through education
Transform was founded in 2006 helping some 85 children escape poverty. Today they serve more than 3,000 children in 33 locations around Phnom Penh by providing food, clothing, and educational support.
The education centers scattered around the country serve to support and supplement the state school that students receive.
“We have a mission to reach out the poorest kids of cambodia and give them hope…”
Technology is one component of the educational program at Transform, and Chromebooks have shown to be an effective platform to get more tech into the hands of the students.
From teacher to principal to CEO
Bob has experienced education from many different perspectives starting as a classroom teacher and founding a Christian school in the late 1990s. Toward the end of his career Bob became the direct of Accelerated Christian Education, a provider of curriculum for schools around the world.
These experiences in education and business prepared Bob for his current role as education director for Transform Cambodia where he oversees the educational program of the 33 Transform centers around the country of Cambodia.
The Transform learning centers support and supplement the traditional schooling received by students in Cambodia and also provide, food, clothing, and the development of life skills such as the use of technology. The ultimate goal of the Transform center is to prepare children to be the future of Cambodia. The successes and transformation of these marvelous students is readily apparent in the videos available on the transform YouTube channel.
Chromebooks in Cambodia
The Transform centers use digital curriculum from Future Schools to run their education program. Bob and his team tested many devices to determine which option would be best for the students and ultimately settled on Chromebooks because of their cost, flexibility, and easy of maintenance.
After some initial testing in a few centers, Bob and his team decided to purchase a more durable device after some initial issues with the first device they selected. Initial budget projections suggest that these more expensive devices will have a lower operating cost than the cheaper devices that were originally purchased
Interested in learning more about repairing and protecting Chromebooks? Check out this episode from season 1 of the Chromebook Classroom Podcast!
Chromebooks will soon be deployed in all 30+ Transform centers around the country serving important curricular functions and giving students exposure to technology in ways that would be impossible in their normal lives.
