Some 40 high school students from the Ignacio Pacheco Castro institution in El Salvador received a diploma that certifies their knowledge of bitcoin (BTC). With this, the educational center located in San Marcos, a municipality in the department of San Salvador, becomes the first in the country to introduce teaching about the leader of cryptocurrencies.
In this sense, the pilot project led by the NGO “My first bitcoin” culminated with the first stage in its plan to bring bitcoin education to the entire population of El Salvador.
“Bitcoin is key to understanding money and its history,” said Raúl Guirola, a professor at the NGO founded by John Dehenny.
For Guirola, graduating the first group of students from the bitcoin diploma course has been quite a challenge, because it is often thought that learning about the pioneer of cryptocurrencies is complicated.
“However, from the beginning we were very clear that we would work with children between the ages of 17 and 20, so we set out to teach with simple language, designing an interactive study plan, including activities and some games,” added Guirola.
Add that in the first classes students had to understand very well what money is and the negative effects that the current world suffers with the traditional monetary system.
“So we set out to make everything clear about inflation, surveillance and centralization, with the idea that later it would be possible to understand why bitcoin is an alternative to the traditional system,” said the professor.
For 10 weeks, the young participants learned about bitcoin miningthe importance of nodes to protect the network and the role of the Lightning Network in the transfer of payments.
Equally covered the features of BTC wallets and practiced sats transfers (the smallest unit of a bitcoin).
As a final test, the young people were evaluated by bitcoiners from all over the world, who arrived in El Salvador especially for the occasion.
Some of these defenders of the queen of cryptocurrencies came to the Central American country from the United States, Cuba, Canada, Mexico, Colombia, France and even Salvadorans from the Bitcoin Beach community of El Zonte.
“My first Bitcoin” could bring bitcoin education to all of Latin America
Raúl Guirola and other professors from “My first Bitcoin”, such as Carlos Toriello and Napoleón Osorio, who also spoke with CriptoNoticias, say that the educational project has caught the attention of other educational institutions in El Salvador and also outside its territory.
“Part of our plans for the future is to take the My First Bitcoin educational program to the countries that request or need it, as long as there is someone who pays for the transfer of teachers, the teaching material to be used and the other elements involved,” Osorio said. .
Students receive free classes, however, the NGO has a cost to cover. Thus, the Ignacio Pachecho Castro school graduate was financed by IBEXthe Guatemalan bitcoin trading platform.
The “My First Bitcoin” team ensures that have received requests from other schools that have expressed interest in implementing the program.
“Us [la ONG] We are looking for companies or institutions that wish to sponsor schools to take the project to the largest number of schools in the country”, added Guirola.
On the other hand, they stated that there is interest from other educational institutions that are outside of El Salvador, which is why they are devising a way to serve them.