How To Prepare Students For 2040: With Arpit Dugar

We explore what a 2040 job market means for schools, teachers, and teens, and why AI will force a reinvention of curriculum, space, and pedagogy. Practical steps help educators shift from content delivery to coaching human judgment, collaboration, and focus.

• Why 2040 serves as a clear planning horizon
• AI ubiquity across roles and daily life
• gaps between industry needs and school delivery
• makerspaces over classrooms for hands-on work
• teacher role shifting to mentor and orchestrator
• jobs likely to fade and new roles emerging
• four habits for teens: reading, tech literacy, events, soft skills
• attention, wellbeing, and milestone-based motivation
• role modelling and personalised interventions
• how Lab of Future partners with schools and students

If you want to get in touch with Lab of Future , click this link: https://www.laboffuture.com/

Register now at www.aiineducationsummit.com

Chapters

• 0:51 Welcome And Purpose Of The Talk
• 2:09 The 2040 Benchmark Explained
• 5:47 AI’s Acceleration And School Readiness
• 9:43 From ChatGPT To Classrooms Of Makers
• 13:58 The Teacher’s Evolving Role
• 18:28 Jobs Vanishing And Jobs Emerging
• 22:53 What Teens Should Learn Now
• 27:29 Attention, Wellbeing, And Motivation
• 33:08 Role Modelling And Personalised Interventions
• 35:25 Inside Lab Of Future And How To Join
• 38:49 Closing Reflections And Next Steps

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:28

You are listening to the Teach Middle East Podcast. Connecting, developing, and empowering educators.

SPEAKER_01 0:41

Hey everyone, Lisa Grace here, welcoming you to the Teach Middle East podcast. Today we're talking all things future with Arpit Dagar, CEO of Lab of Future. And we're going to go into what potentially our students will be facing as they go into a world that we have not yet seen. Arpit, welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

Thank you, Lisa, for inviting me. It's a pleasure to be here.

SPEAKER_01 1:10

Thank you. This podcast is listened to by tens of thousands of listeners across the Middle East. I'm so happy for that. But they all have the same questions that we are going to discuss today. And that is, we are educators. We are preparing students for a world that we have not yet lived in, we have not yet experienced. I want to ask you though, what got you interested in this topic of looking at where jobs are going and what we need to be doing for the future?

SPEAKER_02 1:46

A very impressing and interesting question to ask, actually. Whenever we work with schools, schools are preparing students for the future. And when I get inside the details of how things are getting executed, I see a big gap in what industry is wanting versus what schools are teaching. And especially with the adventure of AI, all the industries have started to reshape themselves. So tomorrow is a world when there will be a high dependency on AI applications, AI tools around us. Whether it is a job of a chef or it's a job of a space scientist, we will see AI revolving around us just like the internet does today. Now, in that massive transformation, are the schools actually ready with that reinvention of the curriculum? And that's what I started to think that it will be a situation of a messaker in 15 years from now if we do not prepare the next generation for the world which is coming up. Because you will not have takers of the jobs, you will not have creators of the jobs. So 8.3 billion people today turns to 9.7 billion by 2040. How do we even sustain on this planet? That was the bigger question which I started to think myself, and then did research by reading a lot of documents, studies, hearing to people from the industry, and then getting to know that it's not superficial, it's not fancy, it's something which is really happening.

SPEAKER_01 3:09

I have a question for you. Why did you choose 2040? Because we're discussing preparing students for jobs in 2040. Why 2040?

SPEAKER_02 3:18

So 2040 actually came as a year which is like almost 15 years from now. It looks like it's 15 years. Practically, it's 4,500 days from today. Now, in this 4,500 days of transformation, the students who are in their primary grades in school will become the first takers of the jobs by 2040. And the ones who are passing out in this process from the school domain, they are getting into this workforce and this ecosystem. So it's really important for educators as well as for students to know what is coming up in 2037-2040. Now, why that has a benchmark here? There are multiple reasons for it. Number one, there is a great level of climatic shift that is going to happen by 2037-2040. There is a great level of food distribution problems that are going to happen during that time. And a great amount of investments in space exploration. So the perspective of the way industries are going to support these challenges and work around mitigation of these challenges will be huge. So that becomes one benchmark here. Second benchmarking happens because AI from AI to generative AI to agentic AI to superlative AI to super AI, that will happen in this 15 years of process. So when we are in 2037 and 2040, as educators or as a common man, I will be hugely dependent on AI applications. Just like today, if we remove internet from our lives, it's very difficult to imagine what we'll be doing. So we'll have to kind of restructure everything. So either we make it that process or we break ourselves. So similarly, in 2037-2040, there is going to be hyper-personalized learning. Each student will have a personalized AI tutor. Now I'm being a little specific around the education segment today. So for that particular world, which is just like, as I said, uh I quantified it in number of days, 4,500 days itself. So just from this time itself, this transition is happening. And that's where schools and education systems need to kind of reinvent themselves as quickly as possible. Otherwise, we are running too behind in the race.

SPEAKER_01 5:24

Wow. So I have a question for you when it comes to AI and how it will take shape in our lives. What should we be aware of in education when we're trying to now prepare our students? Because I know a lot of teachers, they really only know about Chat GPT or, you know, but what else should we be digging deeper to find out?

From ChatGPT To Classrooms Of Makers

SPEAKER_02 5:51

Absolutely. One thing is that as education systems, I think a lot of transformation is yet to happen. And now is not a time when we wait for decades for these transformations. Schools and readers will have to take that ownership to make it fast. Because as we speak, things are changing. A lawyer who used to have legal executives with him is now having a team of IT guys who can write algorithms for AI logics so that he can represent his cases much better the way he used to do it before. A chef has got integrated machines in his kitchen. So what we need to do is as educators, first is now schools, usually, if you see, the transformation from 1900s to now in the classrooms is still not much. A little of digital screens and you know some uh tools have come, but the way of delivery still remains the same. It's still more teacher-legg instructions. Now, with the advent of AI, when you have hyper-personalized AI tutors, you practically do not need a facilitator to deliver the knowledge. That is already there. It lies, it exists in every form. Today we only know Chat GPT. Tomorrow there are 1,000 tools like this, which will be used across. Teachers need to attend a lot of workshops on the latest AI tools and keep using them for the benefit of the students. It's not like being dependent on them, it is about utilizing the best effort from there. I saw a very beautiful application wherein a uh student just asked the question that if the speed of the bike is increased from 80 to 100, what will be the effect on the body? And you can just create that video by giving voice prompts itself. So instead of going into theoretical explanations and giving all the academics around it, give the visualization. The child understands straight off. Now that's a beautiful application of, let's say, one tool called Nagabanana. Similarly, you have what tools everywhere for video creation, for image creation, for story creation, for prompts creation, for lesson plan building, for creative idea preparation, for collaborative thinking. So you have what tools available. Teachers really need to upskill themselves in this game. That's one. Schools need to invest in that. See, uh, we really cannot expect teachers to be putting all their money to you know keep learning things, except a few who are passionate about it and who want to take it forward. But as a system, it should come from the school leaders. That every three months we are upskilling our trainers, our teachers to take it forward. That's number one, which I totally feel should happen. The second is even today, when schools like the new schools which are coming up and we are consulting them, mindset is still the same that you have a set of classrooms and then you build some laboratories around it. I would want to do it reverse way, because now that's the thing which is required for future schools. You build all laboratories, workspaces, makerspaces all around, and have some classrooms in between. That's how the live time zone learning will happen. Otherwise, it always becomes one segment, one period wherein students have to go and learn something and come back. Only for those academic portions, they should be going to the classroom and learning that rest, everything should happen in this makerspace zones. 2040, the study that I have done, sometimes it disturbs me because a lot of human skills have to develop. With more of AI and tech coming in, social skills and human skills are going down. And one of the topmost skills required by a human would be human skills only during that time. How do we even connect with each other with this kind of tech coming in? How do we optimally utilize this tech and not get over dependent on this? How do we collaborate with each other? So now is a time of collaboration, of teamwork, because cross-discipline things will happen. Each individual will have everything to offer. So this is the transformation that we are actually envisioning, and this is where this whole 2040 scenario comes up.

SPEAKER_01 9:55

I got a question for you because once I was listening to you, I was thinking, what then will be the role of the teacher in 2040?

SPEAKER_02 10:03

Role of teacher will still remain the same, but it is just that a teacher gets more empowered with these all tools coming in. So the teacher who's training today, you just imagine it teacher 20 years back versus teacher today. How much empowerment has happened because of these tools? Because of the internet, now because of AI. Teachers have become much smarter. Teachers now know the content in much depth. They are able to deliver it in more style, I would say in more theatrical styles, that transformation has started to happen. So the teacher of tomorrow definitely cannot be a teacher what the way they are teaching it today. It has to completely transform. So hyper-personalized AI tutors, as I am I've been mentioning again and again, similarly, a hyper-personalized mentor for a teacher will be there. Because these trainers, the teachers, not any individual will be able to have the information which will be required in these classrooms. So you require this help and support continuously. Yes, of course, technology, hardware, and software will play its role. However, the teacher of tomorrow will have to be very much updated with using this core ecosystem.

SPEAKER_01 11:08

It's interesting because when you think of a teacher, you think of a teacher as a fountain of knowledge and someone who knows the content and they know how to deliver the curriculum efficiently and effectively. But what you're saying is there will be hyper-personalized AI tutors. And so the teacher is now no longer the fountain of knowledge. They're going to be there just to guide the students on how to access this knowledge. So that means we're gonna need less teachers, more teachers. What's happening?

The Teacher’s Evolving Role

SPEAKER_02 11:40

Yes, absolutely. I think that's a very uh important point you have raised here. One is that the teachers, because of this hyper-personalized AI mentors and trainers, along with the students as well, teachers will reduce in numbers, no doubt about it, because there will be digital twins. There will be the required number of teachers for the new category of schools. Will always be less in number, but there will be more smarter ones to execute it. Yes, there will be a requirement of regular teachers because the whole world doesn't transform. We have got countries which are under dead lab, they will be coming to the stage that we are here today. But if you look at overall spectrum, the top 20 to 30 percent of the brass changes totally. And then the remaining workforce, and that's where the concern is, because the remaining ones, we are training them for nothing. So 12 years of school education will happen, three years of graduation will happen, and then they end up doing the jobs which are not existing anymore. So then they become, we are actually turning them into labor force. And labor force of future transforms into robotics and automation. So you will not have much requirements of labor force as well. I see this practically happening. I stay in Dubai, right in front of my building is a construction going on. Three years back, I saw another building getting structured, and now I am seeing it. I see a heavy dependency on machines now. There are very less number of people on the ground, and it's more automated, it's more of machines now working. Which means earlier, if 500 people were working to create the base for the building, today there are less than 30. So, where is this workforce going? Even labor force is getting into problems, and that is the root cause which will become a problem for all the countries and uh you know these uh migrations and issues related with that. So a lot of immigration is going to happen. Again, coming back and then circling it down to education as a teacher, when a teacher will not require to deliver information anymore, but a teacher will require to make them know how to think rather than what to think. So that will become the most important and crucial part. How you should think in this age, what kind of tools you should use, what are the facilities available with us, what kind of research we should be doing across this curriculum. And curriculum is going to see a massive transformation.

SPEAKER_01 14:04

What do you think is gonna happen to the curriculum? Uh, give me a little insight.

SPEAKER_02 14:10

I personally believe that when we were in the early ages, when we used to do agriculture, there was a lot of science being developed around agriculture, food production, food storage, right? And then industrialization came and we all started to learn about how industries would work, how to do mass manufacturing, and then we started to work around services. So the education system started having little transitions with the ages that was going on. And now, with the new transformation, the education system will be more system-based oriented. So we will have real-world problems. For example, there will be a theme around every age group, and around that theme, students will start learning. Just to take an example, a theme could be you know sustainability around your workplace. Now, with that as a concept, that will become the core of the curriculum. And then you will be learning, we will be learning mathematics and physics and all the basic concepts and conventional subjects around this with more of hands-on practice so that real-time solutions can be generated. See, one of the things, Deeita, which I have seen is home ever we speak about innovation in schools, it usually ends up by making a project and displaying it in a science exhibition and getting an award around it. Right. And the innovation ends there. This whole ecosystem itself will shift by then. Because now you need real innovators who are actually solving real-time problems. Give you an example. I went to a school just to see a robotics lab, how well it's working. Fantastically done, beautiful arrangement, a great level of products and inputs given. Students are working there, they're learning, coding, programming, languages, everything. And then there was a spillover in that lab. There was some water there. I just asked these students, can you create a robot which can auto-clean this uh whenever there is a spillover? And they were looking at me as an amusement because that problem was not there in their robotic text. So, how are they going to solve it? Which means this whole robotic lab has failed in its purpose. It has become one another subject because you're not solving any real-world problem. You're creating a problem and then solving it. So that's where I think that you know those more real-world connections would come. And uh, unfortunately, a planet is going through some real troublesome time. World Economic Forums uh reports and the videos that they have generated, it's it just disturbs. And it's all reality. So we can't just shy away from that as well. And we are preparing for the next generation a planet like that. So we need to kind of now come up with ways wherein they can sustain, wherein they can create solutions. So that is where I see that this transformation is going to happen. Plus, more of industrial connections will happen. Because till now we think that it takes 12 years to complete a journey for a child to, you know, mature. But ideally, it's not the case with technology. A child of nine-year-old can use technology better than you and me. So, in tech, it doesn't matter much. The difference of the age, you know, doesn't matter much. So things are going to squeeze. What we learn in 12 years, perhaps we come to eight years, seven and a half years, eight years like that. So that's the way I think human intelligence is moving forward.

SPEAKER_01 17:15

It's scary. I'm going through the options process with my two boys now in year nine. So they're in a British school and they're doing their options and they're thinking about careers. One son wants to do law, and I'm quite worried about that. My other son wants to be a neurosurgeon because he is very into his science. And now I don't know what to advise them. I just told them go ahead, choose the subjects, pursue the career, and let's see what the future holds. But what jobs do you think are going to disappear? And what jobs do you think are going to come on board that we don't know about right now?

Jobs Vanishing And Jobs Emerging

SPEAKER_02 17:55

I may not have a very short-short answer for this, but then there are certain areas where we think definitely the ship is going to happen. Any conventional jobs which have got repetitive tasks, for sure, they will vanish from the planet very soon. They have already started to and they will go off. Giving you an example. So let's say all the front desk operations, all the back-end management in any particular offices, uh, let's say legal executives, lawyers, the conventional lawyers, this will all vanish. I, in fact, saw a very nice case study, uh, not a case study, it was an experiment dum, wherein an AI lawyer was fighting a case and won the case against a professional lawyer with 20-30 years of experience. So, like this, a lot of experiments have started to happen by creating these agents, agent. And right now we're just talking about that 20% of AI which is in action. Because just now agents have started to develop. Agentic AI has come. There is a time where in Super Lative AI and Super AI is projected in the next 15 years. Super AI is a combination of one million brings together, right? So, all your experience, what you have gained in life for is all experience that I have, the super AI is going to work around it with creating all the predictions, all possible scenarios that can happen. So just imagine one million people's brain, working together with all their background and what they could act in the future. How powerful this solution and technology will become. It's scary, but if it is used properly, wisely, then it will be creating a lot of uh job opportunities as well. Because it's not just AI and usage of AI, you need the whole ecosystem. You need coders, you will require programmers, you will require logical thinkers, you will require people who can empathize with these problem statements, you require collaborators. So all the soft skill options will still be there. And that's where I say that more than technology, it will be more of social skills and human skills which will be required to manage the planet of those times. The new jobs, if you see, I can name a few which do not exist today, but there are you know openings coming up. AI ethicist, digital detoxifier, mental mapper, exoterraforming farmer, these do not exist right now. Uh, you know, AI logic builder, in the whole drone ecosystem, you have multiple jobs opening up. So this UAVs and drone Excel, UAE is actually adopting it. And now uh any developed city will have an ecosystem of flying uh machines. So for this flying machines, you need to have flight controllers, you need to have flight pilots, you need to uh have laws in place so there will be certain lawyers there, logistics, supply chain. A lot of jobs will happen. It's just that these are new categories of jobs. So people with conventional knowledge will not be able to fit into it.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

So, what knowledge do they need to get? Like, what should we be telling them to study now then? Because my boys are 13, and so 15 years from now is when they're in the prime of their working career, this is the start of a very long, hopefully productive career for them. So, what are we supposed to be telling them to study?

What Teens Should Learn Now

SPEAKER_02 21:07

Um, very difficult question to answer, but there are certain things which we can definitely start off. Lisa, this is, I think, one of the most disturbing questions educators are facing today. Because 15 years from now, exactly what happens, you and I cannot predict because of this AI coming in. Uh, things are moving much faster than we predict then. How we can prepare our students and the next generation is four things definitely they should be doing. Why? A good amount of reading should happen. Because reading gives you perspectives of the way the transitions happen across the world, the way our planet has transitioned from like millions of years back to now and the way it's going to forward. So that opens up our horizon, the way we think. So, all these good authors and books, there should be a fantastic level of reading happening every day. So, when I have to quantify it, it should be like 45 minutes to one hour per day. That level of reading has to happen for students to first stay grounded. A lot of attest issues are there, anxiety levels go high, you know, they feel secluded. So, with this reading, it will calm them down, it will bring them to reality. That's one. Second is a knowledge of some technology platforms. A student may not get interested in becoming a coder or a programmer or a person from science in the future, but should definitely. Learn what is AI? What is this language Python? What is machine learning? Basic programs should be done there. So at least I'm aware, okay, yeah, these are the possibilities in machine learning. These are the possibilities in AI. Yes, I know how Python works as a coding platform. Because it's a great level of interaction between humans and machines. What we used to fancy in some comic novels like 20 years back, now that is going to come to reality. So now machines and humans will interact. Intelligence between, you know, there will be cross-intelligence. So a human will have human intelligence plus backed by artificial intelligence, and that's called hybrid intelligence. So every human will have hybrid intelligence, which means I need to know about how it is coming to me so that I can decide what to take and what not to take. I don't become a consumer rather than an apt user. So that's the second thing that I need to learn these coding platforms, programming platforms, these languages. Third is I should be attending a lot of workshops. Workshops, exhibitions, and events. So as a student, I cannot just go away from the school at the moment. I have to attend my regular academics because the way the systems will change, and I'll have to, you know, somehow manage it accordingly. But at the same time, when I attend a good amount of workshops, exhibitions, events, even as a student, I get to know what industries are doing right now, where the world is moving forward. So while studying, while putting my thoughts to academics, I will always have a broader perspective of looking at things. And that's what prepares me as a future child. The fourth and the most important is the soft skills. Students, unfortunately, these days, average time on a screen is coming as two and a half hours for a teenager. Just imagine your schedule that two and a half hours, and of that, 30 minutes is the learning time. That's more surprising. That an average teenager is spending two and a half hours on screen every day. Of its 30 minutes is the learning time, and the remaining two hours is everything that they should not be uh spending their time. It could be social media, it could be some not age-appropriate content for them, uh, some games, likewise. But they're spending their time there. We need to take them out from there so that they know that there is a world around in which we have to live. It's not that digital world and that virtual world where life is going to sustain. So these four things, if we are able to arrive at, which is very difficult to do in this age group, because the concentration levels have gone down, the focus has gone down, it's really difficult for us to re make a child study for one hour, read for one hour, and make notes about what they have studied. But with this kind of inputs to a child, I think we are preparing them in the right direction for getting adapted to what's coming up.

SPEAKER_01 25:12

It's interesting when you talk about the concentration level going down. Um, I was listening to something and they were saying they're gonna be two types of people. They're gonna be the thinkers and the people who have no attention, so they're going to just be followers. They won't be able to create, they won't be able to do any higher level thinking because their attention has been completely destroyed by, you know, social media and scrolling and that type of thing. So basically, they are literally just consumers. They're not producers, they're not creators, they're not thinkers. I wanted to find out how we can pull that back. I know you said reading, but is there anything else that we can do?

Attention, Wellbeing, And Motivation

SPEAKER_02 25:56

Yeah, so it's it's uh more of you know, uh getting them involved into real-time things. So more of hands-on projects, more of uh, you know, internships, more of prototyping, more paper writing. You know, with this students they actually get connected to see that their academics is coming into action. They also get that acknowledgement. And very interestingly, I'll tell you one uh nice insight about this. If you look at the time of 1900s to 1930s, our great-grandfathers, uh, what problems were they trying to solve for the world? The world was going through World War I, industrialization was happening. So, broadly, if you see that generation was trying to solve the problem of basics, food, clothing, and shelter. That my family should at least have this. And they did it successfully. A lot of lives were lost, a lot of effort was put in for that. But those 30 years were spent structuring the basics. Then came the generation of grandfathers, 1930s to 1960s, when they were in action. Basics were sorted for them. So they added comfort on it. They brought electricity to home, they brought uh little comfort, not the comfort that we have, but on top of those basics. Then came the generation of fathers, 1960s to 1990s, when they were in action. They brought luxury on top of it. Luxury again, not the one which we have, but hey, they brought perhaps uh two-wheeler in a house, a four-wheeler in a house, an air conditioner, a refrigerator, uh sometimes going out for meals, you know, uh opening options to go and taste food outside. Like those things happened. Then came my generation, 1990s to 2020s, when we became the most active in our professions. So for us, basics, comfort, luxury was sorted. What was I supposed to do? So we started to add experiences on top of it. Experiences in terms of traveling more, experiencing food more, uh, getting more educated, uh, going outside in different universities, studying, understanding culture better. Like that, we started to add. But along with that, unfortunately, internet also came in. And with this, internet came in a lot of negative connotations in the societies. Intoxications happened, and you know, drug abuse started to happen because the internet came in all of a sudden. And we were not prepared to take that. So a lot of positives happened, but at the same time, a lot of negatives as well have happened during this time. But as a human, now is a question to think about. If as a human my basics, comfort, luxury, experiences are shorted, what am I supposed to do now? So, what are we expecting this new generation to do? Now, this is a generation which will not get excited to go to a new restaurant. You take them, you say today we are going to a new restaurant, okay. Yeah, okay. I mean, what's the big deal? Yeah, we will still get excited that we are going to a new case. You take them to a new country, they will not be excited. You give them a new project, they are still not excited. Because every 30 seconds, their eternity is being rushed with these social media rings. They're getting excited about everything and they need quick bites for excitement. So now is the time for us to think, literally. What are we expecting this generation to do? And that is where the World Health Organization poses that 37 to 40% of teenagers in 2027 will be either under depression or those suicidal conditions or those that loneliness. Practically, we are talking about every second child of the planet. Because they don't have opportunities to do anything. There, they, as I said, their basic summer luggage experiences have sorted. What will they fight for? What is that hope that they have to take things forward? And that's where I thought that it's more about now, since experiences are done, so now it's more about exploration. Unless and until we create exploration opportunities within whatever they are doing, they will not get interested. So we will have to create those milestones. A student who's playing football, I need to create three, three months milestone that you need to achieve this. Next year target should be this, next achievement is this. If we do not create those milestones, these students have got 1,000 things to get defocused. And sports not reach anywhere. So that that is something that we need to bring them together, and that's one of the most difficult tasks right now, I think, we as a generation are facing. Because one, we are not able to give the app time to our kids, the much that we should be doing. Second, schools have become too commercialized, so they also don't care beyond the school boundaries. This was not the setup sometime back. So these are the things that are changing, and we need to kind of have a sharper eye. And as educators, as leaders, we should be discussing more on this. Because it's really difficult for me to even think of a situation wherein every second child is undergoing a stage like this of depression or social seclusion or you know isolation. And instead of giving them a brighter future, we are actually taking them to these therapists and these hospitals and these clinics to get them back on track. That's where.

SPEAKER_01 30:58

Yeah, which is very sobering. Very, very sobering. And I know the educators who listen to this are the ones who really want to make a change. They want to be at the cutting edge, they want to know how they can move things forward, how they can become change makers along with their students. And I think as we kind of wrap up the podcast, I also want to give them a little bit of hope of the fact that things can change positively if we are very intentional about it. And also know that yes, things can look bleak, but we also have an opportunity at this point to really reshape and really direct things in the way that we want them to go. How do you see us doing that, Ape?

Role Modelling And Personalised Interventions

SPEAKER_02 31:48

I think we ourselves will have to become role models and school leaders, teachers, they have taken amazing efforts. Whatever we are doing today, it's because some teacher must have played some role in our lives somewhere. But now is the time when a teacher has to become more smart, also, because students will not see them as role models till the time they have the control of information. We were always dependent on that information to a person, and henceforth we kind of respected them as well because their knowledge levels were higher than us. But for a generation of today, they are more powerful because they have the knowledge bank with them. So now teachers need to be the role models for nurturing better humans. I'll give you one example, Lisa, and I think hundreds of teachers must be doing it already, but we need to kind of structure it more so that the overall impact is bigger. There was a child coming to our lab and was kind of bullying a girl for wearing pink color, and was saying that pink is the color for girls, and uh, you know, we boys we don't wear it, and you're uh, you know, uh and all those racist comments started. And this is an eight-year-old child. Right. Uh, I got to know about this, and then I went to a mall myself. I bought all pink clothes for myself. So I wanted a pink pajamas, pink t-shirt, and pink shoes. And the next day I went to the lab in that thing, you know, I was looking stupid, yes. But when I went there, and when this child was there, this child just looked at me because child was fond of me. So he used to say, you know, good morning, every day you will greet me and he'll come close whenever I was there. Saw me and he he just got stuck, and he's just looking at me for five, ten seconds without speaking anything. And then he says, Sir, you're looking funny. I said, uh, but does it look good at me? Does Am I looking good with pink? Ah, sir, you're looking funny, but you're looking nice. So I said, see, pink, pink also looks nice on boys as well, right? So and then he kind of realized, and I said, Will you also wear pink for me tomorrow so that we can take a picture together? And then this boy went home, urged his parents that I want to buy all pink for the next day. Right? So mother called me and said, Sir, something happened. What I want to know the background of uh the serving. And we kind of explained that this was a social experiment which we tried to do, and uh, you know, kind of transformed, gave the child a little perspective. So, this is one small example. What happens is for each child we will have to, and that is where, you know, again, AI is going to help us. We can practically create the uh you know personalized interventions for each child. How we have to kind of shape that child, what are the strengths of the child, weaknesses of the child, those life moments, those you know, life passions, and then work around that to give all the required interventions to the child. These children will come out beautifully, you know. They they have got much wider scope to uh look at. There is great co-paction with these kids. It's all about us, how we channelize that.

Inside Lab Of Future And How To Join

SPEAKER_01 34:50

I love that example. I absolutely love that example, which leads me into my final question. Lab of Future, can you tell me about what you guys do there, the work that you're doing, and how people can get involved in that?

SPEAKER_02 35:05

So, Lab of Future practically is kind of a mission wherein, again, uh we want students to come and understand what real world problems are and come up with their own solutions. So, if you have got an electric oven broken in your house, you should know how to repair it, or at least understand what are the components inside it. You know, that level of curiosity should happen uh amongst the kids. So, as Lab of Future, practically we work around 17 uh different technology domains, starting from space research, astronomical research, rocket sciences, drones designing, UAB's designing, satellite designing, you know, space robotics, robotics, electronics, IoT, artificial intelligence, cyber safety. You name the latest technologies, we have hands-on activity exposure for the students. Right from age group six to age group 18. There are structured ways of uh doing it, as well as their open-ended and self-research projects as well. We work with schools, we work with universities, we work with space agencies, and we work with industries. And that's where I think we are trying to create that ecosystem, uh, a platform wherein industries and space agencies can give the problem statements, industries can handhold the students because they are the ones who are executing it live. So there is nothing which is theoretical. They are converting theory into action. So students get a live exposure there. So, as an individual student, if I am enthusiast enough to learn about a new tech, we have got our own labs, they can come there, they can join the program, short duration or long duration programs, and learn from these skills. Everything that we do is hang zone. We don't teach theory, we just make them come, build with us, and then learn the academics around it. When we work with schools, we install this futuristic laboratories in schools, we do week without walls kind of workshops in schools, we do teacher training programs in schools, we provide them a complete tech platform which is integrated with their curriculum respective curriculums. So these are the ways I think we are moving forward, creating immense opportunities for students to just fly. We got some of our students of uh high school to launch their first stratospheric satellites just two months back. And they did nine scientific experiments at 21 kilometers of height. So that happened. Students designed their airplanes and won the Dubai Air Flow Challenge. And what I'm talking about is grade 9, 10, 11, 12, you know, as young as then. So, versus if you see the way we were engineered during our engineering days, it's a massive transformation. What they are doing, perhaps I would not have been able to do during my engineering days. So that really excites us that how you know students and educational setups can get involved with us.

SPEAKER_01 37:43

That's amazing. Where are you located?

SPEAKER_02 37:45

We are right opposite to Dubai frame. The lab is uh if we stand at Dubai frame, we'll be able to see the lab of feature. We have got our physical setup thing.

SPEAKER_01 37:54

Yeah, and so you also go into schools. So if schools want you to come in, design spaces for them, run workshops, that kind of thing, you're also able to do that.

Closing Reflections And Next Steps

SPEAKER_02 38:05

Absolutely. We are being fortunate enough, Lisa, to right now be working with more than 60 schools in Dubai. Now we are extending our operations in Abu Hhabi and other emirates also. And uh yes, we are designing innovation spaces for them, we are designing drone and air spaces for them, we are designing Skylabs for them, disruption labs for them, spark labs for them, we are giving them workshops, we are running after-school club activities for them. So a lot of things going on with schools at the moment with us.

SPEAKER_01 38:31

Brilliant. So, guys, if you're listening and you want to get in touch with Labour Future, I will put their link in the podcast notes so you can reach out if your school would like to take part in any of these very inspiring activities. Thank you, RPIT, for being on the podcast.

SPEAKER_02 38:48

Thank you so much, Deva. It was a wonderful conversation. Hope it will change some mindset.

SPEAKER_01 38:54

Yeah, I hope so too. I think so too. It really was enlightening.