Filmmaker Jerry Rothwell has won the first annual Sundance Institute | TED Prize Filmmaker Award, Institute senior executives announced on Tuesday [11].

Rothwell receives $125,000 to make a documentary about 2013 TED Prize winner Sugata Mitra.

The Sundance Institute | TED Prize Filmmaker Award will be offered each year to one filmmaker to document the winner of the annual TED Prize, awarded each year to an individual with a world-changing wish.

Rothwell and producers Al Morrow and Dan Demissie proposed a film, Like Whirlwinds, charting the development of Mitra’s project. The story is told from the perspective of impoverished Indian children with little access to education, a retired teacher in the UK who mentors them via the internet, and low income students in Gateshead, England.

Mitra earned the 2013 TED Prize for his concept, A School In The Cloud. Mitra’s idea is based on his belief that children can teach themselves via a cloud-based education network overseen by a global network of mediators.

“We congratulate Jerry Rothwell and his team as they begin an exciting journey to bring to life the extraordinary vision of Sugata Mitra’s large-scale collaborative project, providing a record of his work and an inspiring way for audiences to engage with the ideas behind it,” said Sundance Institute executive director Keri Putnam [pictured].

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