Khan Academy India Talent Search 2016

Hi, I'm Sal Khan, founder of the Khan Academy, and I just want to let you know about our India Talent search. As you might know, Khan Academy is a not-for-profit with a mission of providing a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere. To us, that means that if you are a villager somewhere and you don't have access to a formal school, then you might be able to access a low-cost smartphone, and then be able to self-educate yourself. One day, you could prove what you know so that you could get a job or go to higher education.

But ideally, you're using Khan Academy in conjunction with a classroom, where the classroom can allow students to learn and work at their own pace, give data to teachers, and free up class time for more open-ended projects, peer-to-peer learning, or Socratic dialogue. We have a call out for the teaching talent in India to work with us by being part of this Talent search. You'll get a chance to practice making videos yourself, and we're looking for folks in math and science initially, but eventually in all subjects.

It's a way for us to find talent that can help us create content that will educate tens of millions of learners throughout India. The opportunity here is, I think, pretty exciting. There will be prizes, but maybe the biggest prize of all is the opportunity to contribute and to help your fellow citizens. If you want to participate, please do so by December 12th.

Now, I'm going to hand it off to Anand, who is our head of content in India.

Anand: I had a great math teacher when I grew up, and I used to keep wondering what it would be like if way more students could learn from someone like him. It also got me thinking about how many other such great teachers exist whom I'm not able to learn from, just because they're not able to reach me. I know that as a teacher, what's the biggest dream? It's to be able to reach as many learners as possible. In India, it could be like tens of millions, maybe hundreds of millions of learners who could learn directly from us.

So, it's been a dream to conduct a talent search that would bring together these great content creators and create content for math and science, and maybe many more subjects. This year, we're finally able to do it. In this Talent search, we're looking for math and science to begin with, for standards 6 to 12, in English and Hindi, again to begin with. Who knows? Next year, we might do a much larger project than this, so send your entries.

Here's Grant, who won last year's U.S. Talent search and who's currently a fellow, to say a few words.

Grant: Hey everyone, my name is Grant Sanderson. I had the good fortune of last year being one of the United States Talent search winners. After that, there was kind of a whirlwind of experiences. I ended up being a content fellow here, working on multivariable content and a little bit in other math areas. Probably this goes without saying, but one of the biggest benefits of being here is the reach—and I mean the global reach. Knowing that the stuff that you're going to make actually influences a lot of students' lives out there.

For example, in India, I'm really excited that they're doing an India Talent search for India-specific content. This means people can create math content or whatever else much better than I ever could or much better than anyone here ever could, just because it is localized in that sense. So, I'm excited to see what you have to make and have fun!

One thing to keep in mind when you make your submissions is we care a lot more about the content and the substance of your video than the production value. You should also let everyone you know about this Talent search. I'm sure you might know some really good teachers out there, so try to get your submissions in by December 12th.