Nazeli Ter-Petrosyan

Raised in Armenia, Nazeli is a high school student who has been teaching programming skills to her peers since the 6th grade. Since then, she has continually added to her computing knowledge by learning web development, game design, app development, AI & machine learning, 3D modeling, AR/VR, blockchain, robotics, and many more skills. From the very start, Nazeli had such a passion for computing that she wanted to share her knowledge with everyone by teaching seminars, conducting workshops, and blogging for a general audience.

As Nazeli’s skills became more advanced, she also began to teach programming to her schoolteachers during the spring and autumn breaks, and conducted workshops for new students. By 10th grade, she was teaching robotics to 4th- and 5th-graders, and continues to do so today. During summer 2020, she also expanded her experience as an educator by teaching game creation to children at Armenia’s Mind Center institution. What drives Nazeli is not only the subject itself, but making it accessible so that the widest number of people can benefit. 

Nazeli has also lent out her skills to other public-benefit organisations and projects in need of support. In 2018, she created a website and provided free tech support for the NGO Delure, which provides juridical support for victims of violence, soldiers, and socially vulnerable people. Since September 2020, she has volunteered as a 3D modeler for the NGO Youth Opportunities, where she is designing and modeling a future learning centre that will allow children from more remote areas to have access to good education. In a 3-day hackathon in 2020, Nazeli also worked as part of a group to create a support chatbot for depressed people.

Nazeli’s achievements have been widely recognized. In both 2016 and 2017, she won the Edu Digitech award for the best educational blog, and she was awarded the Hakob Hakobyan annual award in 2018 for her program teaching robotics. In May 2019, Nazeli and her team took part in Technovation Armenia, receiving the Best App in Environment award for an app called Trash Master that encouraged people to sort their trash. Six months later, at the age of just 14, she received the Armenian Prime Minister's Best Student award for achievements in IT. Most recently, she won entrance to the most competitive university in Armenia at the age of just 16 – despite the obstacles of coronavirus lockdowns and a second Artsakh war in the country.

Should Nazeli win the Global Student Prize, she would like to use the funds for a variety of purposes. First, she would donate money to a foundation in her country that helps injured and handicapped soldiers. Second, she would support startups whose ideas and goals are similar to her own, to acquire further experience in the startup world. Third, some funds would be used for international volunteering and workshops, for example volunteering to teach English in Asian monasteries. Finally, part of the money would be used to pay her tuition for university.