The Digital for Life (DfL) movement has achieved another milestone as the DfL Fund raised more money than its S$10 million goal this year thanks to contributions from partners in a variety of industries.
In addition to accepting donations, a community foundation is dedicated to helping seniors, kids, hawkers and people with special needs improve their computer literacy and abilities through a national programme.
These include e-payments, awareness of, and defence against, online frauds and scams. Through workshops, learning experiences, and classes, the programme intends to assist 100,000 beneficiaries over the course of two years.
“The Digital for Life national movement was established for all Singaporeans to play a part to help one another use digital technologies to benefit lives. Our corporate and community partners have been invaluable in advancing the movement through funding, co-creating outreach programmes and galvanising the community,” says Lew Chuen Hong, IMDA Chief Executive and Digital for Life Fund Steering Committee Chairman.
He continued by saying that they are hopeful that more partners will step forward to support them in realising their goal of a future that is even more digitally inclusive. Additionally, IMDA is preparing young people for the digital age by teaching them fundamental abilities like computational thinking and coding and exposing them to cutting-edge technology. Currently, a 10-hour enrichment programme called Code for Fun is offered to all upper primary school children.
Youth in Singapore have also worked on initiatives to use computer solutions to solve issues from the real world. For instance, because of a collaboration between IMDA and the Infocomm Media Clubs, over 300 junior college and secondary school students had the chance to learn about cutting-edge technologies like AI from companies like AWS and Intel. Students then used what they had learned to tackle tasks and obstacles from the actual world.
Through this collaboration, students from Admiralty Secondary School created the PosteoPilot prototype, an AI telehealth solution that uses AI to analyse a patient’s pose during a remote check-up to speed up and lower the cost of diagnosing sports injuries and neurological conditions like Parkinson’s.
Students from Maris Stella High School and Raffles Girls’ School also developed the web application Requartech, which uses artificial intelligence to classify images of objects taken using mobile devices to promote appropriate recycling.
These initiatives were displayed during the Infocomm Media Club Youth Awards ceremony earlier in the day, which honoured young people for their efforts in giving back to the community.
Additionally, more young people have stepped up to offer their services and time to the Digital for Life campaign. To increase seniors’ fundamental digital literacy abilities and knowledge of cyber safety, for instance, youth volunteers from the Youth Corps Singapore performed digital learning sessions at senior activity centres starting in July 2020. Over 3,600 hours have been invested by Youth Corps volunteers to provide over 1,800 seniors with basic digital skills.
The DfL movement is looking for more people and organisations to apply for the DfL Fund if they are eager to spearhead digital inclusion projects and activities.
Meanwhile, IMDA will provide up to 300 job opportunities for Singaporeans to obtain practical experience and understanding of payments through a partnership with a private company supported by Digital Industry Singapore (DISG).
This will be accomplished using a technology traineeship programme, funded by IMDA’s TechSkills Accelerator (TeSA), which will provide new hires with a 12-month work and study programme where they will train as system analysts, test engineers, or cybersecurity analysts.
