STEM Help

The role of one of the largest industrial countries in the world is no longer to China’s liking, and following the United States and Japan, the Celestial Empire seeks to become the world leader in the field of artificial intelligence. Characteristically, it is STEM education that the Chinese consider to play a significant role in this process.

We are living in the post-industrial era, and the Chinese understand this as no one else does. The desire to develop more and more innovative sectors of the economy related to information technology in general and artificial intelligence in particular is declared at the highest state level. Investors from all over the world flock to high-tech Chinese startups like bees to honey. In general, there is enough money for IT development in China, but there is a lack of IT specialists, especially programmers. Activation of STEM-help in the country is intended to correct this situation.

Today the amount of financing of educational programs based on the STEM-principle in China is almost 10 billion yuan, which is almost 1.5 billion U.S. dollars. However, the Chinese are not planning to stop at this enormous amount by our standards, and according to the authoritative analysts of the Soochow Securities company, the STEM-education market in China will grow five times in the next five years. According to the same experts, in the coming years at least 4% of Chinese children under the age of 18 will pay special attention in their education to mathematics, engineering, scientific research and technology.

The scale and speed of spread of STEM education has already begun to surpass the study of the English language, the knowledge of which opens a “window to the world” for the Chinese in the era of total globalization. The relevance of English has not diminished, but the high-tech nature of the new world makes Chinese parents shift their focus and make every effort to ensure that their children can realize themselves in the era of artificial intelligence (AI). The fact is that, according to PwC’s Global Artificial Intelligence Study, it is AI that should become the main engine of progress for China, ensuring a 26% growth in the country’s GDP by 2030. According to many Chinese, whoever has time to become the most involved in technological production with the use of artificial intelligence in China in the coming years will become the most successful. It is this simple formula that makes STEM education grow so rapidly in this country.

The increased excitement is further stimulated by the acute shortage of Chinese specialists in AI, programming and robotics. This state of affairs forces large companies to lure highly skilled workers from competitors, attracting them with very high salaries. On average, specialists in the field of artificial intelligence earn 30-50% more than their colleagues involved in less high-tech areas of IT. The result is the desire of many Chinese to get exactly STEM-education, and educational start-ups, working on the STEM-principle, receive a huge financial infusion. Examples include Dianmao Technology and iMarsClub, which offer both online and offline programming education. They have no shortage of people who want to learn from them and collect impressive amounts of funding. Thus, only in the November investment round Dianmao Technology has attracted more than 120 million yuan, and the number of students of this startup is more than 30,000 people and is constantly growing.

In Ukraine, the situation is much the same as in China. The only difference may be that the forecasts for the number of enterprises using artificial intelligence technology are not as rosy. However, good IT-specialists were, are and will be worth their weight in gold, so STEM-education promises to develop by leaps and bounds.