The Barefoot Foundation, as part of the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Barefoot Foundation Educational Institution La Playa de Barranquilla, will announce an alliance with the technology company Lenovo, in order to integrate technological solutions to the pedagogical initiatives of the Foundation, which will transform the quality of teaching-learning spaces for children in a collaborative work with teachers, administrators and students.

According to a United Nations report entitled 'The Global Learning Crisis', there is a problem of quality in learning and it is necessary to "change the environment, work with teachers, have better quality pedagogical resources and evaluate the processes".

And this is precisely what this alliance will develop within the framework of the "One question - Lenovo" project , an initiative of Pies Descalzos that aims to promote, based on a question, inquiry, information search, conversation and collaborative work supported by Lenovo solutions for education and digital educational content developed and donated by Editorial Santillana. 

This is so that students assume a central role in their learning process and develop the foundations of scientific thinking, while teachers also redefine their role as mediators or managers of a meaningful learning environment.

This will allow the development of collaborative strategies that enhance the teaching-learning processes, delivering different experiences to students, through, for example, virtual reality tools that improve the way in which they interact with the knowledge that is built while they are in the classroom.

For Patricia Sierra, Executive Director of the Barefoot Foundation "Education is an urgency of the present in Barranquilla, Colombia and the world. We need to educate for the present and for change and that requires us to reinvent ourselves and work together to be able to meet the transformations we are living".

Students and teachers must be updated and the classroom must also be transformed so that technology, as a medium, becomes a truly valuable tool when used appropriately in education at any level.

"Our purpose is to deliver a transformative experience in the classrooms of educational institutions. Education requires a transformation beyond the technology itself, taking into account the learning methodology to be implemented, the design and even the colors of the classroom, the technological skills of the teacher and students to subsequently know what type of hardware, software and service is required, as well as the so-called soft skills".

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Samir Estefan, Lenovo Education Manager for Latin America.

The truth is that it is urgent to transform current didactics and methodologies to models that allow students to build knowledge, know how to acquire it, validate it by themselves and, mainly, how to develop in a changing society where, in addition to technology, soft skills and emotional intelligence will also be factors of success in the labor market.

For this reason, during the celebration, the Educational Institution Pies Descalzos La Playa Foundation will go beyond its anniversary and will activate in the educational community of the city a conversation about technology and innovation in the classrooms of public schools.

The event will be attended by teachers, educational leaders, experts and students who will discuss the challenges of integrating technology and innovation to the learning processes in public education, as well as the challenges of the last ten years and the challenges of the next decade, as its evolution in Barranquilla, has shown that the commitment and joint work of the public sector, the private sector and the educational community plays a key role in establishing education as a path of change and transformation of the city.