Darisni Launches New Free Service to Help Egyptian Students with their Research Projects

The Arab World’s first online learning application has launched a new service, Darisni Center, to help Egypt’s students through the research paper process, now mandated by the Ministry of Education instead of final exams, cancelled due to the Coronavirus.

The application was first launched in 2016 to make Egypt’s best tutors available 24/7, answering students’ questions across subjects and grades, in English and Arabic. With the new service, students can upload their research projects, receiving feedback from Darisni tutors, who — more than merely reviewing the paper for originality and preventing plagiarism — are focusing on developing students’ research skills, including formulating research questions and the use of credible sources.

“The research paper aims to teach students new skills such as teamwork, self-reliance, research, analysis, connecting topics and formulating ideas,” Minister of Education Tarek Shawky has said, adding that research papers test skills that a two-hour exam focused on students ‘retrieval capacity’ simply cannot.

The aim of the project is in line with the Ministry’s: if successful, the move to pass students according to their cumulative skills, and not just test-taking ability, would stimulate important progress in Egypt’s educational system, long derided for its emphasis on memory in gruelling tests that discourage critical thinking.

“The needs of students are changing,” Kuwaiti founder and CEO Noor Boodai said last year at Egypt’s Ecommerce Summit. “It is important that the education sector keeps pace with this change. With the internet revolutionising how we live, work and play, ensuring organic and continually evolving EdTech platforms are key to shaping the citizens of the future.”

The half a million-strong platform had previously responded to the Coronavirus crisis by making most of its services, including its estimated 4 million minutes of video tutoring, free of charge, also enabling teachers to create virtual classrooms for better interaction with students.