Learners on black chairs working on laptops in a bright hall in Sembawang

Building software used to need a degree. Now it needs a reason.

OpenSkills is a non-profit where university students build agentic AI solutions for Singapore businesses and charities. We also run free applied AI courses for migrant workers, with the hardware and teaching provided.

Bring us a brief See the first cohort

Learners at work in week three. Sembawang, 6 September 2026.

Why we started

Who gets shown how to build with these tools, and who gets left to watch?

Plenty of people understand a problem worth solving. Far fewer have been shown that they could build the fix themselves. OpenSkills exists to close that gap in two ways, and we keep them apart on purpose.

About OpenSkills

Teaching, hardware and materials are free for every learner, and partner builds are free for the organisation.

Twenty migrant workers, referred through It’s Raining Raincoats, meet in Sembawang for five Sundays starting 23 August 2026.

Cohort 01, five Sundays in SembawangEach session runs for an hour and a half. Every learner works on a laptop we provide.

Week 123 Aug
Week 230 Aug
Week 36 Sep
Week 413 Sep
Week 520 Sep

Every learner finishes the course by publishing an app of their own.

How the course started

Fourteen learners standing together for a photo in the hall after a session — The cohort after the second session. Sembawang, 30 August 2026.

From the first cohort

Photographs from the Sunday sessions in Sembawang, August and September 2026.

The first session, 23 August 2026.
Working through a prompt on the projector, week two.
Asking for help across the room, week two.
Showing work from the session, week two.
A question from the back, week two.
Photographing the screen, week three.
Work from week two.
Working on a laptop in week two.
First prompts, week one.

Photographs from the first cohort.

What we do

Two things, kept deliberately separate. The course learners are not members of the student build teams.

Four roles on each build team

For migrant workers

Free applied AI courses

In person, in Sembawang. No coding experience needed.

In-person courses for migrant workers referred through our partner charity It’s Raining Raincoats. We provide the laptops, the teaching and the materials, and no coding experience is needed.

Sessions are taught live, with volunteers in the room, and each learner finishes by publishing an app they built.

Course sign-up form

For businesses and charities

Student build teams

University students, supported by volunteer engineers.

University student teams build agentic AI systems for Singapore businesses and charities with slow, manual workflows, with support from volunteer engineers.

The partner keeps the code, the accounts and a one-page runbook, and the build is free for the organisation.

How build teams work

Rows of learners on black chairs, each working on a laptop — Every learner works on a laptop we provide. Week three, 6 September 2026.

Where things stand

20learners in the first teaching cohort
5Sundays, each session 1.5 hours
1published app each, built by every course learner
S$5,700+raised through ForAnother
100+people using Snapiq

Partner builds

Bring us the problem rather than a specification.

A good brief comes from a Singapore business or charity with a workflow that is slow, manual or hard to use, and a person who handles it today. You do not need a specification, only the problem in your own words and what a useful result would change.

Bring us a brief How a build works

Our founder

Yibo Yang

A student in Singapore focused on widening access to education and building software people actually use.

Yibo founded ForAnother, which has raised more than S$5,700 for students in South Africa and Singapore, and built Snapiq, a Chrome extension used by over 100 people. OpenSkills grew out of both.

Read the full story

ForAnother

Before OpenSkills, Yibo founded ForAnother, which has raised more than S$5,700 for students in South Africa and Singapore. The money paid for school essentials. These photos are from a school kit handover run with Gawad Kalinga.

See more from ForAnother

A school bag for the new term.
A kit with a bag and a notebook.
A volunteer with one of the kits.
Names printed on the back of a volunteer shirt.

Follow the project on Instagram at @for_another16_.

Questions

What does OpenSkills do?: Two things, kept deliberately separate. University student teams build agentic AI systems for Singapore businesses and charities, with support from volunteer engineers. Our free applied AI courses teach migrant workers practical skills. The course learners are not members of the student build teams.
Who can join the free applied AI course?: Migrant workers in Singapore, referred through our partner charity It’s Raining Raincoats. No coding experience is needed. Sessions are in person, a laptop is provided for every learner, and sign-up happens through the course form our partner shares.
What does it cost, and who pays?: Teaching, hardware and materials are free for every learner, and partner builds are free for the organisation. The founder and individual supporters cover laptops, venue hire, materials, hosting and AI costs. Sessions are run by volunteers, nobody takes a salary, and anything left over goes to the next cohort.
Our organisation has a slow, manual workflow. Can a student team help?: Bring us the problem rather than a specification. A university student team scopes it with you, builds it with support from volunteer engineers, and hands it over. You keep the code, the accounts and a one-page runbook, and it costs your organisation nothing. The first build cycle starts later this year.
Is OpenSkills a registered organisation?: OpenSkills is an unregistered non-profit initiative based in Singapore, established in 2026. We will publish registration details here if that changes.

Volunteers handing out lunch and bottled water from a table — Lunch after the session, week two. Volunteers run every Sunday.

How can you help?

Nobody at OpenSkills takes a salary. Laptops, venue time and volunteers keep the courses free, and every build starts with a brief from a real organisation.

Get in touch