| Izah Azahari |
BANK Islam Brunei Darussalam (BIBD) launched the BIBD ALAF Digital Hub at the BIBD ALAF Headquarters at the PGGMB Building in the capital yesterday.
BIBD Deputy Managing Director Hajah Noraini binti Haji Sulaiman officiated the launch, which began with the recitation of Surah Al-Fatihah and Doa Selamat.
BIBD Head of Government Relations and Special Projects Haji Mohd Yusri bin Haji Wahsalfelah highlighted that the BIBD ALAF Digital Hub was established as a learning centre to expose Advocating Life-long Learning for an Aspiring Future (ALAF) students to the use of technologies as part of their learning and development. It also provides these students equal opportunity to access these technologies.
Haji Mohd Yusri also spoke of the formation of the ALAF Young Innovators Club, which was also launched yesterday. Twenty-four ALAF students of different ages and academic streams have been selected to become members. The club was formed in conjunction with the establishment of the ALAF Digital Hub for students to apply their creativity with the use of advanced tools, including the use of Micro:Bit, as a learning and development platform.
Micro:Bit is an ARM-based embedded system designed by the BBC for use in computer education, with most of the activities in the Micro:Bit syllabus focussing on know-how and creativity.
“All programs are created to solve a problem or serve a purpose. By starting with interesting problems the students want to solve, this will encourage them to be much more engaged in learning,” Haji Mohd Yusri said, adding, “Along the way, they will realise coding skills as an important part of building creative solutions. The curriculum also aims to cover the field of Robotics.”
BIBD hopes all these efforts will help students to grow and perform their best, in line with the core objectives set in the BIBD ALAF programme.
Meanwhile, the BIBD Deputy Managing Director noted that “the launch marks another milestone for the BIBD ALAF programme, which is similar to their own efforts via the BIBD NEXGEN platform.”
“We look to better prepare our youth for the digital age with IT-centric platforms that allow them to be digitally innovative and globally competitive, in line with the Brunei Vision 2035 which is to create well-educated and highly skilled individuals to support a dynamic and sustainable economy,” she added.
The BIBD ALAF Digital Hub aims to better equip BIBD ALAF students in their learning development with access to the latest technologies to generate creativity and develop core competencies in science, technology and engineering.
The hub will cater to developing students’ digital prowess and creativity in terms of learning basic Microsoft Office skills, other design software such as Paint and Canva, general skills for website development, and also to run hackathons. The hub will also host several projects for the BIBD ALAF students to learn specific tools such as Micro:Bit, a handheld, fully programmable computer that teaches how to code using features such as its LEDs, light, temperature and motion sensors along with wireless communication via radio and Bluetooth.