In late July, six members of staff at Xavier Africa, a leading technology company in Gaborone, visited the Dow Academy in Mochudi to teach students how to create a chatbot using Microsoft Azure. The Dow Academy is an innovative school based in Mochudi, Botswana. The staff at Xavier Africa agreed that it was important for the students to learn about chatbots and AI because of how mainstream their use is becoming across all industries. Over seven hours and several sessions, Xavier Africa’s Business Support Manager, Leloba Lejane, and Midweight Developer, Withus Chivia together with their team, taught Dow Academy’s students all about chatbots and what they can do. The students then used something called the Cognitive Services Lab in Microsoft Azure to create their own.”

The Dow Academy is an innovative school based in Mochudi, Botswana. The staff at Xavier Africa agreed that it was important for the students to learn about chatbots and AI because of how mainstream their use is becoming across all industries.

The students were taught how to build a basic chatbot using Python, with the aim of giving them the foundation to build on in future. They will also be taught more advanced skills such as natural language processing and machine learning.;

Dow Academy’s CEO, Cheshe Dow said she was very happy with the training that Xavier Africa provided her students with. She explained that they usually train their students on other skills but were excited when Xavier Africa offered to teach them something new.

Xavier Africa’s Managing Director, Tavonga Muchuchuti was also very pleased with the experience and said that it was great for everyone involved. He went on to say that Dow Academy has been involved with Xavier Africa for almost six months now and looks forward to many more partnerships like this one.

This partnership between Xavier Africa and Dow Academy is a great example of how technology can help solve some of the world’s biggest problems. I’m sure we’ll see more initiatives like this in the future and am excited to see what our teams will do next!