Samsung Colombia Launches NOMADA Smart School

Samsung Electronics Colombia today unveiled the NOMADA Smart School, a portable learning environment which gives the opportunity to Colombian children to use Samsung technology to create, innovate and have fun in different regions of the country in their learning process.

The Samsung Smart School program, in its third year of operation in Colombia, enhances the learning process of students enrolled in public schools by providing new technologies and equipment while making the educational environment more intuitive, interactive and efficient. Its goal is to use technology to influence the learning environment by creating a different dynamic in which teachers and students retain a horizontal relationship rather than a hierarchical one.

“The next step in this experience is to replicate the Smart School environment around the country – in both rural and urban areas,” says César Muñoz, Corporate Citizenship manager at Samsung Electronics Colombia. “If it’s difficult for some children to get to their classrooms, why can’t the classrooms just go and find them?”

NOMADA was created to be a mobile learning environment that is fun, flexible and playful. “With Samsung’s technology,” Muñoz added, “the traditional classroom becomes a two-way learning environment that includes everything that we, in the last three years of research with Smart School, have learned about how to positively develop different learning processes through innovative technology”.

Transporting Knowledge through ‘Maloca’

The portable ‘Maloca’ (hut) classroom, designed by Samsung Electronics, replicates the experience of learning in an established Smart School. It is equipped with a 32″ monitor, tablet PCs, tables, rugs and cushions designed for collaborative work. Emulating the interactions of Colombian nomadic tribe culture, children and young people can gather around in a circle to share knowledge.

The NOMADA structure is transportable in order to share the experience with learners in different locations. The classroom can also record memorable stories from learners that it has previously encountered, allowing students to explore different communities and cultures and have new experiences.

Meeting the Needs of Each Community

Samsung has worked with local partners to identify the communities where the classroom can have a positive impact and developed a strategy and curriculum that will allow NOMADA to adapt to the educational objectives of each community with a touch of fun. Samsung is currently collaborating with the Medellin Public Utilities Company Foundation (EPM Foundation), the Ministry of Science and Innovation (Colciencias) and the Colombian Institute of Family Welfare (ICBF).

Each NOMADA unit travels with a teaching facilitator, who is trained by Samsung.  By the end of 2016, the company plans to have eight NOMADA units traveling to different communities around Colombia.