Non-Profit - 2025 Finalist
Imagine Worldwide Tablet-Based Foundational Learning Programme
Malawi, Sierra Leone, Tanzania
Imagine Worldwide Tablet-Based Foundational Learning Programme from Imagine Worldwide
Imagine Worldwide's goal is to solve the literacy and numeracy crisis for millions of children in Sub-Saharan Africa. Imagine Worldwide partners with philanthropists, governments, organisations, and communities to provide child-directed, tablet-based learning that is accessible, effective, and affordable. Imagine Worldwide is currently partnering with the governments of Malawi, Sierra Leone, and Tanzania to scale its tablet-based learning system country-wide
Imagine Worldwide’s learning solution is designed to work in the most challenging environments and operates without internet connectivity and does not require grid-power or highly-skilled teachers. A child who has never seen technology and is illiterate can start their literacy and numeracy journey by listening to their own teacher avatar, via headphones, guiding them in the national language of instruction, from how to use tablets to basic literacy concepts and ultimately to fluency.
Each primary school-aged child learns independently on a tablet - used by an average of 5 students per day for 30-60 mins each. Tablets work without internet connectivity and are solar-powered. Adaptive software includes a culturally appropriate literacy/numeracy curriculum in the local language of instruction, created by software partner onebillion Tablet sessions align with the national curriculum and supplement teacher-led instruction with children learning at their own direction and pace.
Nine randomised controlled studies have shown dramatic learning gains across different countries, languages, and contexts, with at least 50% more children meeting reading benchmarks and 70% of children reaching expected maths levels after just 13 months.
As an ecosystem co-ordinator, Imagine Worldwide pulls together all the inputs required to make such programmes work — sourcing tablets and software, solar systems to charge tablets, secure storage to keep equipment safe in schools, community engagements to get the buy-in of parents, teacher training to facilitate tablet-learning sessions (for extremely large classes), high-quality monitoring, evaluation and research to ensure fidelity of implementation and drive continuous improvement, building repairs and maintenance capacity in-country, government engagements at the local, district and national level for system-wide adoption.
Many development interventions are designed to run parallel to the primary government educational systems, whereas Imagine Worldwide works in partnership with the government from inception to strengthen government systems and scale the programmes nationally. Its government partners are committed to operating and financing the programmes at scale, at a recurring maintenance cost (after the initial capex of launching each school) of $3 per child per year. Through its local NGOs, local leaders and teams work hand-in-hand with Ministries of Education to drive implementation and embed the programme into existing government structures for long-term sustainability.
