Creative Leap
Empowering Children As Innovators In Developing Countries
With Creative Thinking and Technology
A Blueprint For The New Strategic Thrust of the Keio-NUS CUTE Center
Professor Adrian David Cheok
October 2010
Background
New Media and Technology are bringing about radical change in the world today. It is affecting the way we work, live and play, and is opening up new potential for economic, social and cultural development. The rapid evolution of New Media and Technology is also accelerating the rate of globalization and increasing communication, trade and exchange between people from all over the world.
Developing countries are increasingly leveraging on the tools of New Media and Technology to overcome challenges, and to seize opportunities in the liberalized global landscape. As New Media and Technology are getting increasingly ubiquitous, they have transformed the way people live in regions where resources are still scarce. For example, cell phones are helping farmers in Kenya market their crops. The Internet is helping slum-dwellers in India find Jobs. Radio soap operas are educating the tribal communities in Afghanistan. Online social networking is supporting a student drive to distribute school supplies in rural China. New Media and Technology has woven into the fabric of their everyday life.