A 28-year-old Gambian-born STEM educator and the executive director of MCJSupport Org (Mentorship and Community Joint Support Org), Muhammed Chuka Joof has been appointed along with 31 PhET fellows across Africa and Latin America to accelerate the adoption of engaging and research-based teaching and learning practices in STEM education.
Muhammed is one of the youngest and with the least of qualifications has made it through the critical selection process.
PhET Interactive Simulations, a University of Colorado, Boulder project, announced today the launch of its inaugural PhET Fellowship program, welcoming 32 Fellows to support the promotion of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) subjects in schools and universities across Africa and Latin America.
This program is part of the PhET Global initiative, supported by the Yidan Prize Foundation as part of the prize project activities of 2020 Laureate Carl Wieman.
Reacting to his selection, the excited Mr. Joof told Alkamba:
” I am more than pleased and appreciative of this award; given the experience and qualifications of the applicants, this is not a start but the continuation of the activities we have with the government of The Gambia concerning STEM education and its impact on the critical mass of science and engineering.
This has given me more motivation to keep driving the engine for national development through STEM education. I will do all my best to keep the name of Gambia up and high as always.”
To support STEM education in these regions, PhET has recruited 32 Fellows—15 from Africa, and 17 from Latin America—who are teacher leaders in secondary or tertiary education.
These Fellows will promote robust teacher communities and advance students’ access to quality STEM education, reaching at least 1,600 teachers across the two continents. Together, they will accelerate the uptake of research-based math and science teaching and learning approaches through PhET simulations; build a community of local STEM experts, and reach thousands of students—giving rise to future generations of STEM professionals.
PhET Interactive Simulations provides free access to a collection of over 150 engaging, game-like computer simulations to support STEM learning. They are designed for students to learn through play and exploration—which is how they learn—emphasizing the connections between real-life phenomena and the underlying science. These simulations have proven to be effective for a wide range of students—even for those without access to physical laboratories. They can be run online or downloaded to play offline for learners and teachers worldwide. They are available in 101 languages, including Amharic, Arabic, Chichewa, Dutch, French, German, Hausa, Igbo, Kinyarwanda, Portuguese, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Tswana, Twi, and Yoruba.
Celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, the PhET project has delivered over 1.1 billion simulations worldwide, with more than 250 million online simulation sessions taking place on average per year. With the rise of remote learning due to COVID-19, PhET has more than doubled in usage since 2020. In Africa and Latin America, usage growth has been even larger, increasing 5 times across Africa and over 10 times across Latin America. Collectively, the regions have run PhET simulations online over 64 million times since March 2020, not including any offline use.
Professor Carl Wieman, founder of PhET Interactive Simulations, and a Yidan Prize and Nobel Prize laureate, said: “Education and the ability to think scientifically are fundamental for people to learn how to make better decisions and be more successful in all aspects of their lives. Through this Fellowship program, we are nurturing a pool of local talent to advocate for a scientific approach to teaching maths and science. We especially want the most marginalized students to benefit from high-quality STEM education so that they are better prepared to face the challenges of tomorrow.”
The PhET Fellowship will support each participating individual’s pedagogical and leadership growth for 18 months, as they continue in their full-time roles in education. The program will take place in two phases—with 80+ hours of professional learning to build skills and knowledge of PhET resources, and 70+ hours of professional leadership practice to support teachers’ use of PhET simulations across their regions.
Edward Ma, Secretary-General of the Yidan Prize Foundation, said: “Carl and the PhET team have been creating new possibilities through digital STEM education for two decades. They apply the science of learning to equip learners around the world with skills to think like a scientist. The Yidan Prize Foundation is very proud to support PhET s new Fellowship program. We hope that more schools and teachers will see the value of engaging learners through research-based STEM education, and accelerate its adoption across Africa and Latin America.”
Who is Muhammed Chuka Joof?
A 28-year-old Gambian-born STEM educator, The Executive Director of MCJSupport Org (Mentorship and Community Joint Support Org). Through his organization, Muhammed has implemented multiple projects with the US State Department; one being to improve STEM education for the hard of hearing by upgrading computer facilities and a learning center, at St John’s School for the Deaf.
The second grant provided a high-end braille printer that is used for printing education content, to enhance the smooth unification of the national syllabus to braille. This grant also provided capacity-building training for regional itinerary teachers to introduce visually impaired kids across the country to Information Technology.
He was one of the pioneers of digital content creation during the peak of the Pandemic, as an education emergency response strategy to curb the impact of COVID-19, on Gambian students.
Also, helped to train an average of about 100 teachers across The Gambia on Digital Pedagogy, using PhET simulations as the main educative tool, to alleviate the dogma attached to STEM education and for easy assimilation of STEM concepts critical to students’ understanding.
Currently, working with Human Ware Company in the UK to introduce the Blind School to braille one and victor readers to bridge the digital and communication gap between the blind and sighted, in this course Human Ware has donated devices worth about D200,000, to pilot this program.
Equally worked with National Youth Council over the years to build the capacities of youths and youth leaders across the country on various training programs.
These are just a few initiatives and programs Muhammed has been working on just to name a few, he aims at fully digitalizing education in The Gambia; also his longtime plan is to establish ‘’Gambia Scientific Center for Research and Development’’ (GSCRD). Which will be focused on building the capacity of Gambians on researched-based development strategies, connecting youth initiatives to markets and in a way create more employment, content creation for more information sharing and understanding cutting across all sectors, all these are to increase the Critical Mass of scientists and engineers to drive the engines of rapid and sustainable development across Africa.
