The Tech Academy (TTA) is currently an after-school program offering extracurricular
learning activities for approximately one hundred students. With collaborations including the
Scholastica, Sir John Wilson, its founder consulting for International School of Dhaka (ISD), and more in the works,
hundreds of more students from institutions across the capital will join the Tech Academy
community.
Since TTA is the only institution in Bangladesh offering gamified robotics, animation, and
game development to children, they can provide a unique educational offering to approximately
fifty international schools in Dhaka. With this potential in mind, TTA may grow to become the
largest educational institution in the country. Most students will rotate through the program for 6-
12 months at a time to learn skills that cultivate an alternative way of thinking. However, a small
subset of the children will become full-time students and continue to form the core of TTA.
The core students are the focus of TTA’s vision to become established research and
development center, built for and by the students. TTA already has a long history of creating
products and tools for and alongside industry partners, including an interactive art installation for
Britto on display at the Bengal Art Lounge, an immersive light experience for the Coca-Cola
headquarters, and an animated marketing video for Crimson Cup. Additionally, their success at
the FIRST Global Robotics Competition and contribution to the local tech scene have garnered
them attention on several international media platforms including the CGTN America, Central
Chinese TV Beijing, and Ajala Project, Dubai.
TTA envisions a future where the students are not just learning about but also producing
solutions to local problems. A school that takes the needs of the community as their own
research topics and integrates these challenges into their lesson plans. Given that social
problems are intersectional in nature, TTA will have to take a multidisciplinary approach to
find appropriate solutions. These may include diversifying their technological skills offering to
include merging behavioral studies with computing, also known as the field of cognitive
science. Software development may be taught alongside entrepreneurship and business
development. Animation may be taught alongside visual art and graphic design.
By harnessing the talent of these kids at a young age and investing in their long-term
education, TTA can nurture the development of Bangladesh’s future entrepreneurs, with the
goal of incubating founders of positive-impact technology ventures. Think of it as TTA serving as
a social venture capital firm, whereby providing both financial and in-kind funding for growing
native start-ups, they earn a return on the success of such ventures that gets reinvested in
TTA’s learning programs for future students. Not only does this reduce the cost of in-house
research and development, but students will learn more hands-on and real-life skills by tackling
existing challenges in the Dhaka and greater Bangladesh community.