Who We Are

Changing the Future of STEM

Dwengo builds international networks and organises teaching activities in the world. By international activities we achieve worldwide collaboration between students and teachers in the field of computer science and robotics. Through experience we found that education in social-disadvantaged countries has other needs and different challenges than those in Western countries. By working together with local partners, we are able overcome these challenges to achieve our goals. Our goal is to plant seeds and provide the necessary nutrients by working locally to make the growth of a global network viable.

Our History

Dwengo is a young and dynamic non-profit organization founded in 2009 by six Belgian engineers who support everyone who starts with micro-controllers. By means of online tutorials, support and hands-on workshops, Dwengo started to reach out for schools in Belgium. Nowadays, Dwengo has internationally expanded its activities and wants to reach out for everyone on the globe, in particular to social-economical disadvantaged regions where technology cannot be accessed easily. To do this, Dwengo tries to help already existing local communities by offering them knowledge and expertise.

Our Commitments

1

Knowledge sharing and collaboration

2

International focus with projects on 4 continents

3

For children from the age of 8 to university students

4

All our software and documentation is open source

We Use the Support of Industries, Governments and Volunteers to Help Children All Over the World

Demystifying the wonders of robotics and AI

4

CONTINENTS

15,000

CHILDREN REACHED EVERY YEAR

1000+

VOLUNTEERS

100%

VOLUNTARY

Our Vision

Demystifying the wonders of robotics and AI

We collaborate with teachers and volunteers around the globe and via train-the-trainer sessions we enable them to bring our hands-on workshops to the students. Our main goals are:

  • Measuring the impact: tracking # participants and project sustainability
  • Identifying the challenges with STEM education and how to overcome them
  • Knowledge transfer to socially-economically disadvantaged students
  • Establishing a new global sustainable community of teachers and volunteers
  • Bringing multiple cultures together by organizing a yearly robot week




Spotlight on Projects

WeGoSTEM

With WeGoSTEM, we inspire students in the third grade of primary education for technology and computer science. We challenge the children to build and program a creative art robot that can draw independently. In this way, they learn various STEM skills from technology to computational thinking. Over the past years, more than 20,000 children across Belgium have built their first robot during the WeGoSTEM project. You can also get involved with your school thanks to the free educational material distributed through libraries across Belgium.

Questions? Contact us at wegostem@dwengo.org. For libraries with logistical questions, there is a separate address: bib@dwengo.org. Press can contact Peter Bertels at 0474 87 40 95 or peter@dwengo.org.

AI in School

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a prominent topic in the media. Popular themes include chatbots, self-driving cars, virtual assistants, and job loss. AI systems are increasingly penetrating our world. AI in School is a project that originated from the concern that students should understand artificial intelligence (AI) and the realization that there is a gap in the curriculum of secondary education to address this. We create educational material for secondary education related to AI, linked to the final objectives and existing curriculum goals. All this educational material is available on our website.

Questions? Contact us at team@aiopschool.be. Press can contact Francis Wyffels at 0473 300 729 or Francis@dwengo.org.

International Projects

Description of international project

Interested in starting an international project? Contact Francis Wyffels at Francis@dwengo.org

Dwenguino

Building a robot with students or introducing another application of physical computing in the classroom is not so simple. To make it as accessible as possible for teachers, Dwengo developed its own microcontroller platform, Dwenguino, and a graphical programming environment, DwenguinoBlockly. Even without physical material, you can work with it. Dwenguino is an Arduino-based microcontroller platform that contains many elements for quickly building your own device, such as a social robot, weather station, musical instrument, or autonomous car. Dwenguino has buttons, an LCD screen, a buzzer, LEDs, and connectors to connect motors. Dwenguino is open source. The platform is currently used for students from 10 years old to higher education. A curriculum can be built from the first to the third grade of secondary education, from graphical to textual programming, and with an increasing level of difficulty in applications.

Questions? Contact us at natacha@dwengo.org.

Computational Thinking

Problems are often easier, more accurate, and faster to solve with the help of a computer. When you think computationally, you think about the steps needed to solve a particular problem, then use your technical knowledge to set the computer to work through those steps and solve the problem. Computational thinking strongly focuses on problem-solving skills and can be addressed in any subject in regular education. Many concepts of computational thinking can be practically approached in programming lessons. However, you can also learn a lot about computational thinking without a computer. Dwengo helps teachers with plugged and unplugged activities to teach their students computational thinking and aims to make teachers proficient in recognizing the concepts of computational thinking in their own teaching materials. Plugged activities focus on physical computing (with graphical and textual programming) and STEM (with Python).

Questions? Contact us at natacha@dwengo.org.