**Problem: **There are not enough resources available to developers wanting a more hands-on approach to learning Substrate. In order to see a vibrant Polkadot ecosystem, we must first address education so that developers have the tools to build.

**Goal: **Create a hands-on and affordable educational environment where developers can learn first hand from existing developers in the Polkadot ecosystem. We want to give developers the tools (education and mentorship) to build the next great DApp or Parachain on Polkadot. While Acala has created the educational framework, we need help ensuring that any qualified developer who cannot afford the Academy will have access to it through a scholarship.

**How we’ll get there… **

The Substrate Blockchain Developer Academy brings together the best in industry expertise, interactive learning, and a recognized certification program to help developers learn to program and build on Substrate and Polkadot in just 6 weeks. Here’s what developers can expect:

Hands-on Start a Project from Scratch
Understand the Polkadot ecosystem and Substrate codebase. Use Substrate to develop a product-ready blockchain project.

Code & Launch Your First Blockchain & DApp
Learn blockchain design principles. Learn Polkadot.js SDK. Launch your first blockchain, and build a web3 front-end DApp.

Connect with Global Polkadot/Substrate Developers
Connect with the most passionate, accomplished developers in the Polkadot and Substrate ecosystem, and have access to resources and opportunities from ecosystem projects.

Mentors/Instructors:
Bryan Chen -- Co-Founder of Acala and CTO of Laminar
Joe Petrowski - Technical Integrations at Parity Technologies
Ricardo Ruis - Runtime Engineer at Parity Technologies

**Course Details: **
6 weeks of online, video-based content + 4 weeks of project-based internship
The course is $492 -- this fee covers costs and ensures active participation from students. Crypto is accepted as a method of payment.

Lecture 0 Preparation

1. Why learning Substrate
2. Intro of Lecturer & Tutors
3. Course overview and how to be successful in this Course
4. Prerequisites & Preparation

Lecture 1 Introduction to Polkadot/Substrate

1. What is Substrate
2. Introduction of Polkadot Ecosystem
3. Setup development environment for Substrate
4. Start testnet and send a transaction
5. Substrate Kitties demo

Lecture 2 Substrate Basics

1. Create multi-nodes network
2. Commonly used Substrate command-line arguments
3. Substrate Architecture Overview
4. Substrate Pallet
5. Project file structure

Lecture 3 Writing Substrate Pallets

1. How to create a Substrate Pallet
2. Substrate macros
   cargo expand
   decl_module
   decl_storage
3. Implement Substrate Kitties
4. Code walkthrough: pallet-assets

Lecture 4 Onchain Upgrade

1. Implement Substrate Kitties Version 2
2. Onchain runtime upgrade
3. Code walkthrough: pallet-sudo
4. pallet-member and pallet-collective

Lecture 5 Data Structures, Testing & Debugging

1. Linked-list data structure
2. Unit test
3. Storage comparison: map / double_map
4. Code walkthrough: pallet-balances

Lecture 6 Install & Integrate with Pallets

1. Use pallet-balances pallet
2. Dependency Injection
3. Events
4. Introduce ORML
5. Integrate with orml-nft

Lecture 7 Advanced Topics

1. Weights mechanism
2. Metadata system
3. SCALE codec
4. Offchain worker
5. Code walkthrough: pallet-im-online

Lecture 8 Production Ready, Cross-chain, Parachain

1. Before go live
   Security
   Transaction fees
   Governance
   Compatibility
2. Cross-chain message passing
3. Become a parachain

For more information on the program, visit: https://www.industryconnect.org/substrate-runtime-developer-academy/

Substrate Developer Scholarships:
There are developers interested in attending who require financial aid in order to participate. We would like for the Polkadot Treasury to provide scholarships to students so that they can learn the skills it takes to build the next great application or parachain on Polkadot.

**Financial Commitment: **
643 DOTs

Your commitment provides:
Full sponsorship of 6 students into the Substrate Developer Academy

Scholarship Evaluation Process:
The Acala team will act as a stand in for evaluating scholarship applicants for this Substrate Developer Academy course and will work with other organizations in the ecosystem to identify developers who are in need of financial support.

**Criteria for scholarship will be based on: **
Applicant has mastered at least 1 programming language
Applicant has a minimum of one year professional coding experience
Applicant has demonstrated financial need.

Payment Conditions:
A one-time payment of 643 DOTs (monthly average of $4.36 per DOT)
Should there be any funds that are unused, Acala will roll them over into the next Developer Academy for scholarship purposes. At the request of Council, Acala will return any remaining funds to the treasury.

**Measuring Success: **
At the end of the program, Acala will report back on the amount of participating developers, graduation rate, projects started/completed, and other unforeseen success metrics (e.g., hires into the Polkadot ecosystem, etc). It is our goal to give developers the tools to build -- and then help them integrate into the ecosystem for collaboration and funding opportunities.

Future Plans:
Acala intends to continue refining and improving upon the Substrate Developer Academy. In 2021, we plan to roll out an updated version of the Substrate Developer Academy -- students will be able to apply for a scholarship directly via a Substrate Academy Bounty Program.