Story by Wellington Makonese
THE 65th edition of the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF) Scholastica proved to be a dynamic and inspiring platform, with primary and secondary school learners engaging directly with local and international industry stakeholders.
The discussions focused on integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into Zimbabwe’s heritage-based Education 5.0 model.
This year’s theme, “Heritage-Based Education 5.0 as a Catalyst for Industrialisation”, set the tone for thought-provoking interactions between students, educators, and professionals.
“As much as we talk of industrialisation young people are the capital and this platform is helping them understand what the future is,” a teacher said.
“This year was quite interesting in that winning in AI-related competitions marks a big improvement,” a student said.
“It was something of an eye opener, in catering for our different strengths and guiding us to have more opportunities,” a participant said.
This year’s edition was punctuated by the presence of local and regional partners.
“People are the capital and this platform is helping them understand what the future is,” a representative of the Non-State Actors, Rumbidzai Takawira said.
“We want to widen the breadth and scope of discussions, the idea is to marry the idea of heritage and development in the model first world countries have,” the Permanent Secretary Ministry of Higher and Tertiary Education Innovation Science and Technology Development, Professor Fanuel Tagwira said.
From the government side, this edition is quite impressive in that it is all-encompassing.
“We are coming all the way from primary to university which brings us better results. Graduates will be able to think, create and formulate money-making moves,” Professor Tagwira said.
Scholastica is one of the many interventions that the government and its partners have initiated for our education to be productive in line with the national development aspirations.
