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Participatory E-Learning for Student Outcomes (PESO)

Currently, in Uganda, 31% of Ugandans have access to regular internet. Furthermore, 28% of youth between 18 and 28 years have smartphones. These statistics reveal the possibility of successfully running online services. But despite that, no school in Lira city & Lango subregion has an online eLearning platform. Yet, e-Learning is part of learning, and schools should be at the forefront of adopting education technologies in order to improve learning outcomes, improve efficiency in learning, and give students digital skills of the future. 

Participatory E-Learning for Student Outcomes (PESO) is a flagship project that will provide a learning platform (using moodle) for students in different schools in Lira district, Uganda the opportunity to learn together. Considering the cost of access to the internet, for both schools and students, students will be provided with free internet access during the weekly e-learning sessions in the school computer labs. The project will be implemented in 10 secondary schools (both rural and urban) in Lira city, Uganda. 

Define three specific objectives that you would like to achieve with your proposal.

  • To use eLearning for enhancing digital skills, especially amongst girls. 
  • To use eLearning to encourage girls to pursue STEM careers. 
  • To roll out Development Education in order to widen the scope & perspective of learning. 
  • To popularize Moodle as an eLearning platform for secondary schools in northern Uganda.  

What problems (particularly in value chain competitiveness and global disruption) are your community’s stakeholders facing due to the Covid-19 pandemic?

  • Failure by schools to adopt and embrace digital strategies to improve efficiency and learning outcomes in schools. 
  • Learning during the lockdown through television and newspapers has not been effective, yet radio lacks the individual & interactive approach. 
  • By encouraging and adopting e-learning, we also encourage students to embrace technologies & pursue STEM careers, especially girls. 
  • Through this e-learning project, many students will gain confidence in the use of digital technologies, and also enhance their knowledge of internet and online safety. 
  • Many young people are already using social media to connect with their friends. By allowing them to use e-learning to connect with friends while learning together, PESO will help keep them away from disruptive social media and enable them to focus on learning while connecting with friends inside the learning platform. 

What minimum viable solution(s) are you proposing to address the challenge(s) in your community?

The Covid-19 lockdown has exposed schools and enabled educational leaders to fully appreciate the importance of educational technologies. Less than 10% of schools in Uganda have an online presence (websites), yet over 90% have computers and electricity or solar power. This project will serve as an example to education leaders and teachers that it is possible to use learning technologies, and that it should be a school initiative. Technology should be part of the learning, just like it is part of healthcare. 

The project will be a win-win for both students and selected teachers. The teachers will get the opportunity to have different students from different schools & backgrounds on the same virtual learning room, while students get to learn from their friends & experience how elearning works. 

The Ministry of Education prepared & distributed learning materials (http://www.education.go.ug/covid-19-sector-response/), but no particular interest was put on the assessment of learners. PESO allows for both access to lesson notes & online assessment. And the students do not need to be online all the time. Learning is self-paced, as long as the students meet certain weekly or monthly targets. 

The project is broken into 2 distinct phases as outlined below. 

Phase 1: 

•Selected schools & teachers will use our elearning system for 2 terms.
•Teachers will be trained to use the elearning platform.
• Selected teachers will use school computers or personal computers.
•Teachers will be helped to produce learning content & assignments.
•Students in different schools will use same learning content & assignments.
Phase 2: 
•Schools will have their own elearning platforms using Moodle.
•Schools will pay for their own Internet.
•Continued support to teachers & students for 1 year.

Share your story (your narrative)

I am an IT specialist and education professional. I am the founder of Centre for Skills and Innovation. From 2012 to 2019, I was a teacher and head of ICT in one of the biggest schools in northern Uganda. I am a STEM and eLearning activist, and I have moved all over  Uganda advocating for the adoption of eLearning to improve learning outcomes & efficiency in schools. I helped deploy and popularize the Kolibri eLearning platform, and I also created Walktrack Edu Platform.

Please provide any additional relevant information that you would like to share.

https://elearning.centreforskills.org/

Your Final Proposal for challenge

no

edited on Aug 31, 2020 by Emmanuel Angoda
Public (13)
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Nivashini Rave Rattey May 11, 2020

Dear Emmanuel,
Thank you for sharing the overview of your idea. It's a meaningful initiative!

However, I am a little confused about the "free internet" proposal. Which service provider is going to offer this? Is this even feasible? Perhaps, you may want to elaborate on this.

For an overview, your story is okay. But you should add more details to it when you submit your final submission form. The story ideally requires a conflict, opportunity, common interest and call-to-action- backed with solid scientific evidence and facts. The information for most of these factors are already in your answers to the questions above. You will have to refine them and fine-tune the overall tone to establish an emotional connection with the audience.

Remember, your story is your pitch. Therefore, it is important for you to get your audience "hooked" to it. Download our "Storytelling factsheet" and if not clear watch our video on how to use the factsheet. All these are available on this cocreate.itu.int site. Hence, please browse all its wepages! :)

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Emmanuel Angoda May 11, 2020

Thank you for the feedback. My view is that e-learning mentors will reach out to schools on appointed days and do e-learning sessions (or lessons), together with their subject teacher in class or computer lab. In the first phase of the programme, internet will be free (for only the duration of the lesson). My organization will cover internet costs & training in phase 1. With each visit, the eLearning mentor will take internet router and connect school computers to the internet for the duration of the elearning session. This approach will eliminate the excuses (that there's no internet) teachers have been giving for not incorporating e-learning into learning. My organization will train teachers (under the Teachers Support Programme), students, mentors & create e-learning content (with the help of participating teachers) and do school outreaches. This approach will enable us take elearning to the class. The approach is bottom-up. Phase 2 will involve developing e-learning platforms for secondary schools.

Patrick Obumselu May 14, 2020

I love you idea. It’s evasively and I can see the need in your community.

Emmanuel Angoda May 15, 2020

Thank you, Patrick. The current situation provides the opportunity to extend & popularise e-learning as part of learning in all schools. No more excuses!

Emmanuel Angoda May 22, 2020

A demonstration of the project can be found here: https://elearning.centreforskills.org/

Israel Abazie Jun 17, 2020

You've got a decent track record, however I was a bit confused with the free internet. Which ISP will be providing that?

Emmanuel Angoda Jun 25, 2020

My organization will provide free internet in phase 1 of the project. This is only during e-learning sessions in class.

Marabe Ditshego Jul 15, 2020

Hi Emmanuel,
I trust you are well.

Let me congratulate you on your idea. PESO is clearly a project which comes from your heart. I trust you will make sure it is realized for the benefit of the children in Uganda and the rest of Africa.

I wish to share a few considerations.
1. Consider mention which curriculum you will be offering and who will be offering the training. If it’s the teachers then perhaps you should consider inserting training for teachers as one of your key objectives as well as developing a curriculum?
2. Consider mentioning how your solution can help overcome the first problem that you listed, which I believe is a critical problem – ‘Failure by schools to adopt and embrace digital strategies to improve efficiency and learning outcomes in schools’.

Nivashini Rave Rattey Jul 16, 2020

The idea has been progressed to the next milestone.

Nivashini Rave Rattey Jul 16, 2020

Status label added: Community feedback received

Rahim Iqbal Jul 16, 2020

Hello Emmanuel,

I hope you are fine, your idea is very prompt and according to the circumstances. Your idea is explained quite nicely but I still have some questions;

1) Is internet availability a problem, If it is how does it affect PESO in a bigger picture?
2) I would like to know more about the e-learning experience, as in can you please explain the course work and approach.
3) You are involving schools in this venture, how willing are they to join you. In my experience schools seek some advantage for themselves.
4) Lastly I would recommend you to help us understand the difficulties in e-learning in your story.


Hope to hear back from you soon, Let me know if any of my questions need further explanation, Thank you.

Emmanuel Angoda Jul 28, 2020

I have been a teacher for 7 years, and have worked with many schools. I know how school programmes work, and I know how to create win-win outcomes for students & teachers.
1. My organization (Centre for Skills and Innovation) will provide free internet during weekly elearning sessions. This is phase 1 of the project. Phase 2 will involve developing elearning platforms for interested schools, and they will also provide their own internet access.
2. The advantage for schools is free elearning & digital skills training & content creation for schools (and teachers). There will also be ongoing support to schools, using elearning mentors for 1 year.
3. My experience is that students want elearning & digital skills in schools, but headteachers fear the costs, while teachers have little or no adequate skills. When we provide incentives to cut costs to headteachers & training & support for teachers, they will embrace change.
4. In promoting elearning, I have adopted both offline and online platforms. Kolibri for remote schools, no internet, with little resources & few computers, and Moodle for urban schools with internet access.

Victoria Masso Jul 21, 2020

Status label added: Mentor feedback received

Fahmida Hossain Jul 24, 2020

Hello Emmanuel, Undoubtedly your initiative will benefit both the school and the students in this Covid-19 situation. You mentioned that you want to implement this project in 10 schools in Lira city, Uganda. But how many schools have you already implemented? And how many students have benefited from this solution of yours?

Emmanuel Angoda Jul 28, 2020

The platform was developed after school were closed due to pandemic. Due to these, I have not yet officially enrolled schools to the project. We have notified administrators of the intention to work with them to roll out this project. However, teachers and students (about 50 users) have already joined the platform on individual basis. PESO project is designed to work both in framework of school environment (70%), and in the community (30%). Thank you.

Fahmida Hossain Jul 28, 2020

Thank you so much...

Alberto Farca Jul 29, 2020

Dear Emmanuel,

Congratulations on your idea. I specially like that you want to encourage students, specifically girls, to pursue STEM careers. My only comment would be regarding your project's sustainability. I would recommend to you to give more detail on how you are planning to finance the project. Are there any public funds from the local or national government? Private companies could also help funding the program. In Mexico, telecommunication and ICT companies have helped develop similar projects.

Best regards,

Alberto

Nivashini Rave Rattey Aug 31, 2020

I don't think you have reflected any of the feedback in your refined idea. It's weak. You shouldn't just dump something to get the expert feedback.

Refer back to my comment 3 months ago. You submission needs some serious work.

Also, clearly describe the mechanisms and processes behind your phase 1 & 2. There isn't any description on how it will benefit your target audience.

Go watch the video of the final webinar. You can however, start working on your final documents now.

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Nivashini Rave Rattey Aug 31, 2020

Status label added: Expert feedback received