SOUTH KOREA: The first round of the Global IT Challenge for Youth with Disabilities will be held from 10-11 August 2022. About 350 young people who pass through this Preliminary Round will then undergo an additional three months of training, and then compete in the Final Round on 15-16 November.
The finals will be held at the Glad Hotel in Yeouido, South Korea. Cambodia has sent four youths with disabilities to participate in this competition.
The Executive Director of LG Electronics, Daesik Yoon, remarked, “The long-lasting COVID-19 pandemic rather becomes an opportunity to realize the importance of accessibility to information using IT. I hope that this event becomes an opportunity for youth with disabilities around the world to realize their dreams and passions and share friendships under difficulties. LG Electronics will continue to fulfill its corporate social responsibilities so that any youth with disability can communicate with the world equally and conveniently using IT.”
According to chairman of the GITC Organizing Committee, Inkyu Kim, “It turned out to be the case through experience of the past two years that youth with disabilities are excluded and receive unfair treatment more frequently in the non-face-to-face era. However, I hope that they will take on greater steps through this GITC, since IT has been proven to transcend all barriers to youth such as nationality or region.”
He continued, by adding, “We will give our best to make relevant preparations so that our event can become an IT event approved by the international community by reinforcing its standardization and fairness ─ such as a way to operate games, or the event operation regulations, and the automatic scoring system.”
In the Global IT Challenge 2022, which will mark its 11th anniversary, 400 youths from 16 countries, ranging from 14 to 23 years old, with visual, hearing, physical, and developmental disabilities, are participating in the Preliminary Round.
The Secretary of State for the Cambodian Ministry of Social Affairs and Secretary-General of the Disability Action Council (DAC), Em Chan Makara, thanked the Republic of Korea, LG and GITC for organizing this program every year and encouraged young people with disabilities around the world, especially young Cambodians, to participate in the competition and do their best to win.
He said, "I encourage all young people with disabilities who participated this year, especially young people with disabilities from Cambodia, to strive to compete in all disciplines to get medals in honor of themselves and their country. Let all young people with disabilities do their best to win for themselves and their nation."
The GITC Organizing Committee selected a total of six competitions for this year, including three individual and three applied competitions, in which participation is possible either as an individual or as a team. In particular, the ‘eCreativeIoT Challenge’ was selected as a new competition category, reflecting the latest technology trends.
This event is hosted by the Ministry of Health and Welfare of South Korea and LG, and is sponsored by the GITC Organizing Committee and LG Electronics. All the events can be watched in real-time on YouTube.
