Small Steps That Count

The Fondation Rolf Schnyder was not born from a grand plan.

It was born from a wish.

Rolf W. Schnyder — watchmaker, adventurer, the man who took a bankrupt name and an empty warehouse and, over twenty-eight years, built one of watchmaking’s most celebrated houses — had a wish for what might follow him. He wanted, in the words of his wife Chai, “to help the hapless, with priority to children, the future of our world.”

He died in Kuala Lumpur in April 2011, at 75. Three weeks before, he had stood at Baselworld’s press day and spoken to hundreds about the future. He was, until the end, still looking forward.

Chai Schnyder established Fondation Rolf Schnyder in Switzerland the following year — not with fanfare, but with the same attitude she had watched in him for decades.

Just do it.

She is honest about the doubt that came with it. In her Founder’s Letter, she writes:

“There are so many problems in the world — what difference can I make? There are too many people suffering — what I can do is just a drop in the ocean.”

She does not pretend the doubt went away. She chose, instead, to act anyway.

“I do not have the answers to all those questions, but I decided to emulate my late husband’s ‘just do it’ attitude, and his courage in taking up challenges. Within a short time, I was pleasantly surprised that following my heart had led to many fruitful encounters — of wonderful, hardworking people, who dedicate their time and effort to helping the needy.”

Born in Kuching, Sarawak, she never forgot where she came from. The foundation’s work here is not coincidence. It is homecoming.

In Sarawak today, those small steps look like this:

Six-year-olds in government preschools learning to code — not as a novelty, but as a foundation. Teachers who stay in their schools long after the programme visits, carrying the knowledge with them. A Ministry of Education invitation to help shape the national AI curriculum.

Code.org — the organisation that has reached over 100 million students worldwide — recognises Fondation Rolf Schnyder as its International Partner in Malaysia.

The numbers are adding up. They were always meant to.

“Every effort makes a difference,” Datin Chai writes. “Let’s begin with small steps and let these count.”

Rolf saw what could be salvaged in a forgotten watchmaking house — not the assets, but the potential. He poured vision, patience, and craft into it until it became something extraordinary.

The foundation does the same, in a different workshop entirely.

Every child carries magnificent potential. Some simply need the right conditions to let it emerge.

That is the wish. That is the work.

Persatuan Kebajikan Rolf Schnyder (PKRS) is the Malaysian chapter of Fondation Rolf Schnyder, established in 2019. We deliver coding and digital literacy education to children across Sarawak and beyond — in partnership with Code.org, and in honour of the people who made this work possible.

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Sarawak Makes History: Malaysia’s First Integrated Coding and AI Curriculum for Preschoolers

By Datin Chai Schnyder, Founder, Persatuan Kebajikan Rolf Schnyder (PKRS)

Imagine a child — six years old — sitting at a small table in a bright classroom somewhere in Sarawak. Her feet do not quite reach the floor. Her eyes, though, are wide and entirely present. She is learning to give instructions to a machine. She is learning that the world responds when she speaks to it with precision and care. She is writing, in her own small way, the first sentence of a language that will shape the century she inherits. When I think of that child, I think of why we began. I think of why we must never stop.

A Milestone That Belongs to Every Child

In 2025, something happened that had never happened before in Malaysia.

Sarawak — our beloved state on the island of Borneo — became the first state in Malaysia to formally integrate computer science and AI literacy into its preschool curriculum, adopted at the government level, embedded into the fabric of early childhood education for every child. Not a pilot. Not a promise. A reality.

Through the KIDS: Bits & Bytes programme, PKRS introduced Code.org’s Course A and Course B alongside applied AI literacy — and our team trained the trainers at KPWK Sarawak, the Ministry of Women, Childhood and Community Wellbeing, to carry it forward independently. Today, more than 700 children across 80 SeDilik schools are learning through this curriculum. In 2025 alone, 7,500 children engaged in structured computer science education through the PKRS programmes.

It tells the world that a child does not have to wait until secondary school, or university, or some distant future, to begin understanding the digital world. It says: now. It says: here. It says: you.

The Premier of Sarawak, Yang Amat Berhormat Dato Sri Abang Johari, captured it with characteristic clarity: “Once this IT ecosystem is adopted and mastered by the children, Sarawak is in safe hands facing the digital economy.” We believe him. And we are grateful beyond words that he believed in us.

The Journey: Classrooms, Teachers, and a Programme Called KIDS: Bits & Bytes

This milestone did not arrive overnight. It was built lesson by lesson, classroom by classroom, through a programme we have nurtured and delivered with everything we have — KIDS: Bits & Bytes.

KIDS: Bits & Bytes is the foundational curriculum PKRS delivers designed specifically for preschoolers — combining Code.org’s globally recognised computer science coursework with age-appropriate AI literacy, and aligned with International CSTA Standards. Children do not simply complete activities — they verify their understanding before advancing to the next level. It is not about screens for the sake of screens. It is about thinking. About sequencing. About problem-solving. About the beautiful, empowering discovery that I can create something that did not exist before.

Our teachers are the quiet heroes of this story. They came to training workshops with open hearts and, sometimes, a little nervousness — many of them had never thought of themselves as “technology people.” They left as pioneers. They returned to their classrooms and they lit something in their students that cannot be unlit. We bow to them, deeply.

The children, for their part, needed no convincing. Children never do. Give them a problem worth solving and they will solve it with a joy that humbles every adult in the room.

Through PKRS and through the broader commitment of Fondation Rolf Schnyder, we have walked this path with steadiness — training educators, refining the curriculum, building trust with families, and working hand in hand with the Sarawak government to see this day come to pass.

The Partnership: A World-Leading Vote of Confidence

We do not say this lightly: PKRS builds its entire curriculum on Code.org’s globally recognised framework — part of a worldwide movement trusted by educators in more than 180 countries.

Code.org is the world’s foremost organisation dedicated to expanding access to computer science education. Its reach is global. Its standards are exacting. Its mission — that every student in every school deserves the opportunity to learn computer science — mirrors our own so precisely that, when we found each other, it felt less like a business partnership and more like a recognition.

The methodology we bring to Sarawak’s preschools is built on Code.org’s curriculum — a credential trusted by educators across more than 180 countries. It means the children sitting in those classrooms are learning in a way that meets the highest international standards.

In 2025, Malaysia’s Ministry of Education (BSTP) invited FRS to co-design the national AI-Powered Classroom framework — a recognition of what we have built here on the ground, lesson by lesson, child by child.

Every child in Sarawak deserves that. And now, they have it.

The Legacy: Rolf’s Spirit, Living On

PKRS was founded in 2019 to honour the vision of my late husband, Rolf W. Schnyder. Rolf was a man who understood, at his core, what it means to transform something the world had given up on.

When he took over Ulysse Nardin, the storied Swiss watch manufacturer was on the edge of oblivion. The world had largely dismissed it. Rolf saw something else — the latent brilliance, the heritage, the possibility — and through conviction, precision, and love of craft, he brought it back to world renown. He made something magnificent from something overlooked.

I see his spirit everywhere in what PKRS does. In the preschool teacher in Kuching who didn’t think she could teach coding — and now does so with confidence and joy. In the six-year-old who figures out how to make a character move across a screen and laughs with the pure delight of creation. In a government that dared to be first in Malaysia.

Rolf always believed that the institutions worth fighting for are the ones that shape the next generation. He would have loved this moment. I carry it to him.

Looking Forward, With Gratitude

We are grateful — to the Sarawak government, to our teachers, to Code.org, to every family who trusted us with their child’s earliest education, and to the many partners and supporters who have walked this road with us.

But gratitude is not a resting place. It is a beginning.

There are more classrooms. More children. More teachers who have not yet discovered what they are capable of. More places in Malaysia, and beyond, where the question “should preschoolers learn to code?” has not yet been answered the way Sarawak has answered it.

We will keep going. Because every child deserves a future that is already being written in a language they helped invent.

Every child deserves.

Persatuan Kebajikan Rolf Schnyder (PKRS) is a Malaysian non-profit dedicated to equipping children and communities with the skills to thrive in a digital world. PKRS is a Code.org International Partner.

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