Mongolia’s Ministry of Education and Science and Facebook, the global technology and social media company have entered a new partnership to train 1,000 professional teachers in Mongolia to implement digital literacy education at their own schools.

The new partnership came after Facebook in April 2021 launched “We Think Digital”, a multi-phased awareness and educational campaign to help Mongolia internet users navigate the online world safely and responsibly, and cultivate responsible digital citizens with complete digital literacy. The “We Think Digital” program was developed and implemented in Mongolia in partnership with Faro Foundation Mongolia, and in support of the Ministry of Education and Science, Communication and Information Technology Authority, UNICEF and Mongolian Fact-Checking Center. “I want to express my deep gratitude to Facebook and Faro Foundation for investing in Mongolia’s education. We have had a lot of challenges in the past two years and our youth experienced much education loss. We are willing to extensively invest in our youth’s education and make up for the time we have lost. The Ministry and myself are more than happy to be working with Facebook to invest in the future of education,” quoted His Excellency the Minister of Education and Science Enkh-Amgalan Luvsantseren.

“Facebook is proud to have the opportunity to partner with the Ministry of Education and Science to train 1,000 teachers in Mongolia with the latest knowledge and resources of digital literacy through our ‘We Think Digital” program. We truly believe in early-stage education of digital literacy for the better and safer internet tomorrow. The first batch of 1,000 teachers will be the pioneers trainers in Mongolia to scale up such meaningful educational efforts in dealing with new technologies for the years to come,” said George Chen, Director of Public Policy, Greater China, Mongolia and Central Asia at Facebook.

As a response to the urgent need for stronger digital literacy and digital citizenship, Facebook brought the global program “We Think Digital” to Mongolia for the first time in April 2021. The program aims to teach people how to navigate their privileges and obligations in today’s evolving digital space, how they should decipher and share information online, and most importantly, and how they should interact with other people in online communities. Facebook’s We Think Digital Program is the expansion of Digital Literacy Library, which was also developed by Facebook and launched in Mongolia in 2019.

We Think Digital is an extensive training program composed of eight modules covering topics such as digital citizenship, online safety, hate speech and bullying, privacy and cyber security, as well as misinformation. Faro Foundation effectively launched the initiative in Phase I through robust and energetic social media advertisements and campaigns. In addition, the Faro Foundation had the distinction of organizing a series of panel discussions with notable public figures, political leaders, and influencers. The initiative is reaching out to people in the community to raise awareness about digital literacy challenges. In Phase I, Faro Foundation also held a series of We Think Digital workshops and handed out “Digital Citizen” certificates to nearly 1,000 people. Facebook is delighted to be partnering with the Ministry of Education and Science on Phase II of the initiative to educate 1,000 professional teachers to reach out to our communities and promote digital literacy.