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Even though data, information and general solutions to this information that has the power to change people's lives at different levels are freely available, more than a billion people still do not have access to them. A reason for this is that education isn't democratized. People are not able to access the information that is available online and this is why perennial issues like financial struggles, climate change, energy issues etc continue to fester. The poor access to information could be caused by a lack of or inadequate technology or poorly trained experts. To understand how much this (lack of democratization in education) has affected people, we need to understand what democratization of education means.
Democratization of education
This simply means opening up access to exercising the right to education to certain areas in the world where this education is previously considered the exclusive right to people at a certain level. Democratization of education has many positives. It improves social influence in politics, planning and even financing. To achieve this, decentralization comes in. Decision-making at different levels is distributed and this means there would be the inclusion of different important players in the system. There would be the educator, the learners, representatives of various social structures and direct management.
Learning is important and creating a conducive environment for that purpose is a vital ingredient that aids the learning process of students all over the world. In many countries across the world (especially third world countries), students are stuck with educational systems that are archaic with outdated syllabuses and this limits their access to the knowledge they need to progress at the same pace their counterparts in other countries are moving with. This is made worse with the large number of poorly trained teachers who are not motivated to give their best. As the world continues to get exposure to valuable content that are changing the lives of people every day, there have been some platforms that are offering to expose people to important information available out there. And one platform that is hoping to solve these issues is Forward Protocol.
Forward Protocol
Forward Protocol is a platform that aims to democratize education. The platform aims to change how the world learns by redefining and reforming the current learning model by introducing blockchain technology into the mix. The plan is to provide an underlying framework with an incentive; the “earn as you learn” model. Organizations around the world can take advantage of this protocol to connect learners from countries where there are inadequate educational systems to some of the best educators in the world.
Forward Protocol provides a blockchain solution that is connected with the Educational Technology (EdTech) sector. With the protocol's fully customizable smart contracts, the platform is designed for any learning outfit to be able to adopt blockchain technology. This leads to Decentralized Education (DeEd) which creates infinite possibilities and is changing how the world learns.
Problems in the EdTech Space
There are several problems with the current state of learning and education worldwide, some of which are:
- Inaccessibility
- There's a disconnection between experts and learners
- There's a lack of motivation
- There's little or no incentive for quality
- Experts/Teachers are underpaid
- Learners/Students overpay to gain access to learning materials
- There are political, institutional and geographical limitations
- The rate at which learners dropout is high
- One size fits all approach to teaching
- Underprivileged groups with low-quality resources
The Solutions Forward Protocol Proposes
- An equal opportunity for all
- Connecting the best global experts to enthusiastic learners
- An earn-as-you-learn model
- A motivation-friendly reward systems
- Connection to the job market
- Active and passive income for experts
- Community-governed open economy
- Democratized and decentralized platform
- A transparent where everyone is welcome
- Focus on quality and completion
- The modular and open-source platform
- Sponsorship model
Forward Protocol’s Product Viability
The EdTech space is one of the world's fastest-growing sectors. The sector is estimated to have its expenditure increased from $227 billion to $405 billion by 2025. At the moment, the current education marketplace is made up of centralized markets with most of them exploring the option of adopting blockchain for their needs.
Forward Protocol is open-source and this negates the need for a competitor to develop another protocol just like it. Smart contracts built with the protocol are fully customizable and can be tailored to any organization's needs. This implies that instead of getting into a competition with legacy entities, Forward Protocol can instead partner with them. Finally, Forward Protocol is the only known protocol/blockchain that serves as an educational protocol with an ecosystem that can thrive within it.
Forward's Incentive and Reward System
When users use the $FORWARD token reward system, they get to enjoy rewards as they advance in their studies on the platform. This encourages them to complete the course. These token rewards can be converted into fiat or other cryptocurrencies and they can be used to purchase new courses and other services on the platform.
Fiat On/Off Ramp
An On/Off fiat ramp will be provided on the platform to ensure easier adoption. People who are not very familiar with blockchain technology can use this ramp to carry out transactions — just like they will normally do with their credit cards to pay for courses or services — which will then get converted to $FUSD for further transactions.
This integration of a fiat ramp into the applications on forwarding Protocol will also provide payment gateways that will accept multiple debit and credit cards.
Roadmap
Q4 2021
- Forward Protocol Initial DEX Offering (IDO)
- Staking & LP contracts
- Listing on Uniswap
- Additional liquidity creation
- English Forward main platform launch
- Governance
- Proof of Value-Delivered (PoVD)
- Initial Knowledge Offering (IKO)
- Integrate with English Forward
- Open source Q&A application
Q1 2022
- Distributed Reward and Revenue Sharing (DRRS)
- Proof of Ownership (PoO)
- Forward Factory Deployment
- Forward pay
- Course Marketplace
- Freelancing Marketplace
- 3 New partners signup
Q2-Q4 2022
- Forward Chain
- Forward Explorer
- Forward Bridge
- Polygon validators integration
- Forward SDK
- Forward ID
- Crowdsourced—Freelancing Marketplace
- 10 New partner signups