2021-2022

Blood Donation
This team worked on creating an app that will bridge the gap between tourists who want to donate blood + the organizations that can make that happen; they also worked with the National Blood Transfusion Center to redesign their website (dormant since 2018); finally, they worked on hosting a blood drive at Liger as a pilot — what is effective in changing people’s attitudes toward voluntary blood donation? they also gathered data on people’s ideas on why they do or do not donate; they’ve had several conversations with doctors, NGOs, and others associated with blood donation to get their perspective

Hidden Stories
This team gathered stories from people over 70; what is a hidden story from their life that they want to share with the younger generation? they have been learning a lot about storytelling and what makes it good, in order to inform their interview questions; they edited the stories into a series of podcasts

Economy Book Version Two Final Design
There were three teams in this Exploration: (a) photos/comms team, (b) digital illustrations/drawings (graphs, chart, etc.) + (c) content designers; a big breakthrough came when the Art4Food campaign agreed to give us access to all their photos for the book; the goal was to do a rough print and send it to the Ministry of Economy and Finance so they can take a look and write an opening letter; this team is also working with the graphic design department at BINUS University in Indonesia, who are consulting with them about the design of different sections of the book

Green Chemistry
The final products for this team were a series of articles and lesson plans for government school teachers; they also had several guest speakers, including one from a French solar company; the owner of Knai Bang Chatt, a sustainable hotel in Kep, and a talk on neurological disorders from a PhD student from Ireland

Microfinance
This group started with an in-depth study of the MFI landscape, looking closely at the problem with indebtedness in Cambodia. Students became familiar with understanding MFI financial reports. Then, after reaching out to a couple of MFIs, they realized that the timing for a partnership with either MFIs or the Central Bank of Cambodia was not possible. Therefore, they pivoted to the problem of overindebtedness in Cambodia and created a financial literacy website in Khmer: http://www.heranhasekhatean.com/. This website deals with how to avoid overindebtedness, as well as tips in Khmer on how to save and develop better spending habits. There is also advice on the right and wrong things to borrow for and how to invest. Currently, the website is up and running.

Chainsaw Tree Animatic
With support via weekly Zoom calls with Kip and Kern Konwiser, director/producer brothers from Hollywood, and Chris Viscardi, a screenwriter also based in California, this round’s goal was to dive deep into the story and the design of the animatic for the chainsaw tree animated film. The writing team worked very hard on fine tuning and writing and rewriting the script. Our design team of seven created a lookbook, finalized it, divided up the characters and settings, and began sketching out ideas. We also purchased new digital drawings tablets, as well as researched various software programs to assist in the design process.

2020-2021

*Please note the impact of COVID-19 and related school closures during this academic year.

University Support Platform
Facebook-based university support platform for students in Grades 11-12 who are looking to go to university in Cambodia, but don’t know where to start; a hub of resources that they can use to discover different options like schools and majors; including videos with student interviews

Anti-Bullying Workshop
Students worked on modifying an existing workshop outline, keeping the best parts and including new ideas; their product is several videos using animation (no real actors), an informational poster and a code of behavior suggested to school admin — all of these products can be packaged in connection with the workshop, and given to World Renew and other NGOs

Frisbee Handbook and Videos
Finalization a guidebook for teaching ultimate frisbee in Khmer; also making a series of short how-to videos (25-30 seconds) to be accessed via QR codes inserted into the manual; for public school teachers to better understand how to integrate ultimate into their PE curriculums

2019-2020

*Please note the impact of COVID-19 and related school closures during this academic year.

Outdoor Leadership
Students learned critical outdoor leadership and survival skills to gain environmental awareness and appreciation, develop risk management and emergency response strategies, and build physical and emotional resilience in the outdoors through collaboration, problem-solving, and stewardship. This was a preparatory class for the development of a packaged and distributable outdoor leadership course, to be given to other classes in schools around Phnom Penh and Cambodia. The Exploration is intended to teach young learners about outdoor leadership roles, how to live and travel in the outdoors, and become stewards for natural spaces in Cambodia.

Core Value Books for Children
Students planned, wrote, illustrated, and designed their own English and Khmer language children’s books, one for each of Liger’s six core values. As part of the process, students reviewed literary devices, learned how to analyze children’s literature, learned the makings of a good story, practiced illustrating in different mediums, and employed book design principles. Students also learned the benefits of reading at a young age.

Foldscope
This Exploration is a component of a Senior’s individualized impact project. The members of this group were divided into three teams: video creation, research and development, and school partnership. The video team was tasked with creating three videos, all in Khmer, about how to assemble Foldscope, a low-cost microscope, how to create sample slides, and a general info video about the device. The workshop team planned the overarching workshop structure, which included the videos, and the school partnership group worked to secure a partner with which to pilot the workshops.

App Development
One of the teams who participated in Technovations 2019, and ended up traveling to America to participate in the Global Finals (where they won second place!), wanted to launch their app and bring it to market. However, they did not have the time or the expertise within the five of them to make it happen. Now, a Tech Facilitator and five additional students are committed to helping them in their pursuit.

2018-2019

ILO Collaboration
In collaboration with the United Nations’ International Labor Organization (ILO), students worked to adapt and modify modules created by the ILO for corporate level training for Cambodians. Students customized the existing material for a Cambodian audience. These training modules will be offered to select high schools and universities in Cambodia as Liger students monitor the engagement with these modules.

Business Model Competition
The Business Model Competition (BMS) Start Up Accelerator is competition for undergrad and post-grad university students. Liger was granted special permission to enter – the only high school aged entrants in the history of the competition – and had both teams reach the top ten. One of these teams placed first and represented Cambodia at the Asia regional Mekong Challenge with their app UNI – designed to assist job seekers to create their own multimedia 360 degree profiles which will be a fuller reflection of their skills, interests, experiences and abilities, supplementing the professional skills normally listed on a resume. It is designed to give potential employers a more complete knowledge of a job candidate’s background.

Geography Book
The 420-page student-written, student-published book “The Geography of Cambodia” took more than 18 months to complete – involving 4200 hours of research, 3150 hours of design, 1848 hours of editing, 5560 hours of revision, and a visit to all 25 provinces and cities around Cambodia. The book is intended to be a reliable and credible source of information about the geographical diversity of the Kingdom.

Critical Teen Issues
Several of our students learned about important topics for teens including consent, healthy teen relationships, and gender equity. The Critical Teen Issues exploration was inspired by a campus visit by Catherine Harry, the feminist educator behind a Dose of Cath. At the conclusion, they created a video that aimed to end gender-based violence and entered it into a competition in conjunction with USAID Cambodia – and won!

Health Promotion
In this exploration, seven Liger students collaborated with eight students from the NGO World Renew to explore ideas and pathways of how to execute a community project. The students conducted a workshop for 40 youth from four different Cambodian provinces. After the pilot workshop, World Renew students were able to lead workshops in their own communities in the four provinces and expand the impact of the project.

Frisbee League Pioneers
The goal of this Exploration was to create the first Cambodian frisbee league that is replicable and scalable, enabling empowerment of rural girls in Cambodia, challenging female stereotyping, through facilitation of a more gender-equitable environment.

Disabled Animals
Working with the Phnom Penh Animal Welfare Society (PPAWS), Liger students learned about working with disabled animals. As part of this exploration, they worked to design, manufacture and fit a wheelchair to a dog missing both her hind legs in order to improve her mobility.

Khmer Sight Foundation
Liger students assisted the NGO the Khmer Sight Foundation with pre- and post-op eye testing and documenting patient experiences so that anxiety can be reduced among those in need of surgery.

Community Tech
Liger students worked with international non-profit World Renew to teach youth living in rural communities basic IT skills including internet, e-mail, and Google. These skills will give them access to more information and services and allow them to share their knowledge and skills with other students in their communities.

Junxtapose
Junxtapoze is a new social venture in Phnom Penh that creates positive sustainable change by creatively upcycling garments. Our students worked with the Junxtapoze team to learn about clothing design, the impact of fast fashion, and the garment industry.

Liger Edge
Liger Edge is a student run digital platform for young inspired writers. Their mission is to deliver thought-provoking, interesting, and relevant articles each week. The students are dedicated to cultivating a culture of reading, writing, and critical thinking at Liger and beyond. They hope to provide a medium of change for youth to share their stories through writing.

Hydroponics
To assist with food production for rural families, students created a hydroponics system at Liger. This involved engineering, designing, and figuring out the economics with the ultimate goal of recreating a viable system in local communities.

Sustainable Farming
Students learned about sustainable practices in farming and put this knowledge to good use at the NGO Camkids’ garden. They identified a need for soil testing to help make their soil replacement more sustainable and created a soil testing kit that can be distributed and utilized widely throughout Cambodia. Additionally, Liger students became registered contributors of Open Development Cambodia and visited local farms to help give more information to ODC.

Indigenous Communities
Students explored various indigenous peoples such as Suoy, Kreung, Kachok, Tumpoun, and Jarai. They wrote a book about SUOY Indigenous people in Kampong Speu province.

Traditional Foods
Students explored how food plays a role in culture and the passing down of recipes and restaurants generationally. They produced blogs, videos and photo essays, and published these online.

2017-2018

App Development
Students worked to further three apps that were developed in previous explorations – Tos Tov, IMEX, and Liger Digital Currency. By the end of the round, the students presented their progress on the apps, and the steps planned to move forward with development in the future.

Journeys of Change Bike Tour Business
Students utilized their past knowledge of business planning and implementation to develop their own bike tour business, named Journeys of Change. It has been developed into a successful enterprise, and now runs bi-monthly tours.

Dengue Fever
Students investigated the incidence of dengue fever in Cambodia – identifying factors for its recent outbreak, health effects, and ways to reduce transmission and increase healthy practices. Students partnered with local and international health organisations to help educate public populations about dengue fever risks and prevention in Cambodia. The exploration culminated with a formal risk analysis of dengue fever incidence and transmission in the Ta Khmao neighborhood, with recommendations for transmission prevention.

Solar Pi 2
Students planned, researched, installed and monitored two computer labs in government schools. One is run on solar power and the other is connected to the grid. Students worked in collaboration with the Ministry of Education Youth and Sport; Edemy, a company which provides English software; and NRG Community Solar, a solar company. This project is working on the Cambodian government’s initiatives to bring STEM education and English to low income government schools.

The Network Performance
Fifteen students produced, stage directed and acted in the play The Network by Christian Kiley. Students built acting and event management skills, culminating in two successful public performances at the School of Performing Arts.

Gender Equity
Students learned about the broader issues of gender equity worldwide as well as the manifestation of these issues in Cambodia. Students created writing pieces, artwork, and activities to put forth into the community. They used their developed understanding of the issues to host creative and interactive workshops on gender with fellow students and other community members.

Zoonotics – Rabies
Students conducted an investigative analysis of different zoonotic pathogens and disease incidence throughout Cambodia. They conducted research on prevalent zoonotic diseases, prevention and control methods, and the success of and challenges facing current public health campaigns. After receiving training, students partnered with Animal Rescue Cambodia to vaccinate dogs and cats and implant microchips in animals using pagodas local to Liger, as gathering places.

Diggin’ up Dinos: Discovering Dinosaurs in Northern Cambodia
Students used investigative and paleontological research methods, networking and communication skills and public education/outreach strategies to determine the existence of dinosaurs in Northern Cambodia. Students investigated the natural and evolutionary history of dinosaurs in Southeast Asia.

To Spray or Not To Spray
Students learned about the chemical, physical and biological hazards to human health. They studied the health consequences of human-environment interaction. By researching the chemical sprayed on the Liger campus, students compared the health hazards of spraying or not spraying pesticides.

Geography Publishing
Students continued working on a publishable book on Cambodia’s geography. Work included translating between Khmer and English, creating the art for the book and laying out the book using desktop publishing software. This was a multi-term Exploration and this round focused on the publishing aspect. Students hope this Exploration will result in Liger’s third student-authored published book.

HIV/AIDS in Cambodia
Students investigated the influence of HIV/AIDS on public health in Cambodia, and interviewed individuals with HIV/AIDS to bring awareness of individual experiences to the public and start normalizing conversations about the disease. They designed a workshop aimed at the Cambodian public and high school students for spreading awareness, prevention methods, and normalization across the country.

Drug Intervention
Students learned about drug awareness and intervention in Cambodia. This Exploration was done in collaboration with the non-profit World Renew. Students visited a Cambodian rehabilitation center where facilitators are using a combination of therapy and vocational training to redirect patients’ lives. They attended a drug invention workshop and training hosted by the Ministry of the Interior. Students then collaborated with World Renew to plan, organize and implement drug campaigns in four provinces.

Creating Curriculum for Bambujaya School
Bambujaya (BBJ) is a privately funded school in Cambodia which aims to teach the government school curriculum in a more dynamic, activity-based way. Students were hired as consultants by the founder and funder of BBJ to create supplemental activities for the Khmer Grade 3 curriculum. In this Exploration, students played a critical role in developing ideas to add value to government schools and improve the government school curriculum.

2016-2017

Liger Digital Currency
Students designed and implemented a system for transferring currency digitally between Liger students and staff. While building their programming skills, students were challenged to view the project as a system of many interconnected parts. Students were responsible for communicating the progress of their team to the exploration as a whole, as well as educating the Liger community about the currency and how to use it.

Entrepreneurship: Waste Management
Students approached the problem of waste management in the local community from a business perspective. The first group surveyed the community and put together a feasibility study for a waste disposal start-up, the second group worked the feasibility study into a business plan, the third group attempted community outreach and began developing compost recipes, and the last group finalized the business plan, perfected the compost recipe and tumblers and targeted the local community to find people willing to implement the students’ composting ideas

Game Design
Students applied design theory to create a dynamic board game that addresses issues pertinent to Cambodia. Students researched causes/ effects/ micro-solutions of climate change to build into the theme of the existing game. Students collaborated with local educators to integrate the government school curriculum into the game “packs” and trialed the game with local students at varied levels in local schools. They also connected with graphic artists, manufacturers, and 3D printers on the concept art and design for the game. The design for manufacture (DFM) project for the climate change game was developed in round three. Students examined each part of the game and found the fastest, least expensive way to manufacture 500 game sets while still keeping the components to a decent grade of quality.

Lucky Iron Fish
Students worked in conjunction with the Song-saa Foundation and the Lucky Iron Fish organization to research anemia in Cambodia. Students used the Iron Fish product in experiments, testing variables like time spent in the water and temperature of the water to come up with the perfect plan for users of the fish. They finally conducted four presentations to local communities about the symptoms and prevention of anemia.

Preventative Health
This exploration focused on dental health and diabetes, researched the Khmer diet and the negative effects of sugar, heard from three unique speakers about various components of preventative health, presented to the Junior cohort about dental hygiene and the dangers of too much sugar, and created workshops on these topics to present to communities on the island of Song-saa.

Khmer Rouge
Students split into four groups to study the history of the genocide that took place in the 1970s. The first group studied what led up to the Khmer Rouge seizing power; the second group studied the four years that the Khmer Rouge held power; the third group learned about the fall of the Khmer Rouge and the immediate aftermath; and the fourth group learned about the on-going tribunals to prosecute the senior leaders and the intergenerational impact of genocide on a population. All groups took trips to the Killing Fields, S-21 (torture prison), or Anlong Veng Peace Center and built a partnership with the Documentation Center of Cambodia.

Advanced Robotics (VEX)
A team participated in the Vex robotics competition in Taipei at the beginning of December. Ten students were broken into three groups: robotics, fundraising and website design. Students recorded personal video messages to potential donors and launched a student-coded website. On the technical side, students constructed their own robot after trials and practice with a model robot. Through a crowdfunding platform, students raised money to finance their trip.

Climate Summit
Students applied their understanding of the causes of climate change, analyzed climate change policy, designed a Climate Summit, and invited and hosted students from other schools for the Summit which was held on the LLA campus.

Filmmaking in Government Schools
Students delivered a crash course in filmmaking to two groups of government school students; after learning and practicing technical skills, the government school students produced two short films, which were entered into a youth film festival organized by Liger students.

Cambodian Geology
Students traveled to the provinces to learn about the various geological properties of their country with the support of a visiting American expert. Students created an open informational social media platform to share their knowledge and encourage other Cambodians to show interest in their country’s unique geology.

Solar Pi 1
This was Part One of a two-part project to install a solar-powered computer lab into a Cambodian government school. Included in the commissioning of this lab were different curriculums to inspire creative digital work including CAD design and programming as well as using an English learning platform designed for Khmer speakers.