Skype and DonorsChoose.org Partner to Bring Technology to Classrooms
Last September, I announced Skype’s goal of connecting one million classrooms across the globe through Skype in the classroom, a free online community that helps teachers use Skype to enrich educational experiences for students. In pursuit of this goal, we are thrilled to announce a new partnership with DonorsChoose.org, an innovative online charity that makes it easy for anyone to help teachers and students in need. Together, we aim to remove barriers to communication and enable teachers and students to experience the world outside their classroom by connecting them with organizations and classrooms, both domestic and abroad, through video calling.
Through our partnership, we are putting $250,000 in the hands of teachers to help them open up their classrooms to wonderful learning experiences. We are excited to see that there are dozens of classroom projects on DonorsChoose.org seeking funding for technology – including requests for laptops, netbooks, webcams and more – and this partnership allows us to have a very direct and very positive impact in the classroom.
To celebrate this partnership, Skype has already funded a number of projects including:
- Visual Music: Seeing the Big Picture
- The NASA Experience
- “Mom, We had 25 Chileans in our Class Today!”
- Bring Science and Technology Together in the Classroom
- Leaping into 2012 with a Laptop for Learning!
We hope that through this partnership, which supports Microsoft’s commitment to create opportunities for youth through technology, training, and experiences, more students will have the chance to connect with and learn from other students and teachers around the globe, face-to-face, through video calling. More details on Skype and DonorsChoose.org’s partnership can be viewed here. To see how you can make a difference with DonorsChoose.org, or to register for Skype in the classroom, please visit education.skype.com or donorschoose.org.
