Fundamentor

We are trying to significantly reduce the drop-out rates in school education.

Problem: In rural India, 95%+ of eligible girls get enrolled for Grade 8 but a further 27% drop-out in the next 2 years.

Three key reasons of dropout are academic, economic, gender-discrimination. Academic cause is inability to comprehend basic concepts and pass evaluations. 56% of Grade 8 girls don’t know basic math like division. 27% are unable to read Grade 2 level text.

Economic cause is family pressure on both genders to seek employment at an early age.Gender discrimination in continuing education also adversely impacts many girls.

Solution: Fundamentor mainly, tackles the academic challenge. Fundamentor is a tech-based intervention that allows children to practice and master foundational math and English skills and gradually reach their grade level.

If scaled globally, it will enable girls to have differentiated job opportunities and contribute significantly to economic growth.

The challenge we are trying to tackle is the dropout rates for rural girls in Indian schools.

The scale of this challenge is enormous in India, Every year, 10Mn rural girls making 95% of eligible girls population enroll for Grade 8.  However, 3 Mn of them drop out in the subsequent two years. 

Three key problems underpin this challenge. These problems are economic, gender-discrimination and academic. 

Economic cause is family pressure to seek employment at an early age. Gender discrimination exists as dropouts among boys is 5% lower than girls.   

Academic problem is inability to comprehend basic concepts and pass evaluations. Pass/ Fail evaluations are introduced from Grade 8. 90% of Grade 8 girls cannot apply discounts in practical situations. 56% of them don’t know division and 27% are unable to read Grade 2 level text. (Source ASER report-2019).

The specific problem we are trying to tackle is the academic problem.

The key factors that we are trying to solve are improving the understanding of basic math and language in a time and cost effective manner.

Solving for these factors will reduce the academic problem. The dropout rate can reduce from 3 Mn to 1Mn over 2 years. 

Our solution is technology enabled, low-touch, gamified platform to build foundational Math and English skills. We have implemented this in 3 rural schools in Grade 8, 9 and 10.

Technology enabled: This ensures the solution’s scalability.

Platform: The program is hosted on the Fundamentor platform, which is a highly awarded web application already being used by 150,000+ students from urban schools.

Content: The content Math, language, logical thinking and creativity is aligned to curriculum, but tailored to rural requirements and abilities and addresses the current gap in grade level learning outcomes.

Gamified, engaging: The platform is gamified, intuitive. Students start at a foundational level and gradually skill up. It does not require high teacher intervention.

Hardware: Works on most devices. Shared devices like tablets, computers are usually available in rural schools and the program can be deployed on these.

Offline availability: The solution is available offline but needs an internet connection for analytics like relative performance.

Pre and post-performance: A baseline test is given to students and the test is repeated after the intervention to measure improvements.

Length of intervention: A minimum of 1 year, starting at grade 8 and typically, ending at grade 10.

Target population: The target population is a rural Indian girl, who gets enrolled and stays enrolled up to Grade 8 or 14 years of age. There are various incentives to stay enrolled including mid-day meals and a no-detention policy. Only in grade 8, does she feel the academic pressure of clearing examinations, which she is ill-equipped for. On an average, 32% among her fellow girl classmates are likely to drop out because of lack of confidence in academic abilities and other reasons.

Understanding the Users: We have continuously interacted with our target segment to address her needs and aspirations. We have asked them who they want to be when they grow up and their aspirations of becoming doctors, teachers and engineers can be achieved only through success in formal schooling. There is a huge gap currently in learning outcomes which we are trying to address.

Solution: Our solution addresses the academic causes by giving girls’ sufficient practice on foundational numeracy and literacy skills, which translates into confidence in her academic abilities and which is crucial to reduce drop-out rates and help her achieve her dreams of becoming successful professionally.

Increasing the number of rural girls participating in formal learning and training is the specific dimension we are tackling in the challenge.

Our target population is 10Mn rural girls that enroll annually in Grade 8 in Indian rural schools. 3Mn of them drop out in the next 2 years. Our solution is aimed at tackling the academic root cause of the dropout and reduce the dropouts from 3Mn to 1 Mn over a two year period.

We have conducted a pilot where we have significantly improved formal learning outcomes by more than 50% for 1000 rural girls across 3 schools

Our solution is innovative because it uses the disruptive combination of gamification, multimedia content and machine learning to make the learning easy, mission oriented and outcome oriented for students. Traditional methods of learning are based on single way communication of teachers providing information. It doesn't take into consideration enough practice or practical application to make the learning stick. 

Our solution feels like a game and enables mental exercise without pressure. Students feel happy about it and want to do it. So its based on pull rather than push. Thats what makes our solution different. Short quizzes, short videos, Points, badges, social leaderboard, rewards are 6 dimensions through which the pull is generated. 

Other solutions that worked in the past were all pull based. Mid day meal scheme, no failure till Grade 7 enabled students to keep going to schools. Push based systems of making everything online or providing students digital devices work in the short term and are not sustainable. 

The key is to make the students motivated to continue learning. Its important to make them feel that they are improving and can aim for higher education. 

Our key competitors in this space are Ekstep, Khan academy and Byju's. Byju's is commercially oriented. Khan academy is urban oriented. Ekstep is a non Govt organization. Its aimed at primary segment upto Grade 6. 

Our solution is uniquely targeted at improving learning outcomes beyond grade 8. The platform intensifies engagement through gamification, allowing sustained interest among rural students to continue education. 

The solution, Fundamentor, is a technology based product that uses cloud, Big Data, Machine learning and Artificial Intelligence. The machine learning and big data modules enable auto question generation in line with the students performance. The machine learning algorithm also enable questions to go from easy to difficult and vice versa based on students response. An in-built recommendation engine enables personalization. It suggests a learning path, based on the students' abilities. 

AI based module with Natural language processing converts text book concepts to local language based learning outcome requirements. Natural language processing also enables evaluating students to their listening, speaking and written skills. 

The questions, images, videos, responses are stored in the cloud. It reduces cost significantly and make it possible for us to offer the solution at an annual price less than the cost of a Starbucks basic coffee. 

An offline variant is also available on a USB drive for schools without internet connection. While there are some limitations in data and analytics in the offline variants, there is sufficient practice and adaptability for students to practice.

Big data solutions involving data management and analytics solutions enable analytics to be available across various visualizations. Learning outcomes can easily be shared with prospective sponsors. 

How to video link: https://youtu.be/WvbKaoILHu4

The solution utilizes widely used and accepted technologies like Cloud, Big Data, Machine learning APIs and Natural language processing. 

All these have proven advantages in personalizing recommendations based on a student's skill levels, abilities. 

A gamified interface ensures repeated student engagement with minimal teacher interventions. The Fundamentor program is integrated as a once in a a week, 1 hour intervention for students and is sufficient for them to practice Math and English skills.

We have engaged with girls in rural Indian schools to find them remarkably aspirational about becoming doctors, teachers, engineers. Yet, they do not have foundational skills in numeracy and literacy to ensure academic outputs. (Source: Aser report 2018 http://img.asercentre.org/docs/ASER%202018/Release%20Material/aserreport2018.pdf)

Activities: 

The program that we have implemented in grade 8, 9, 10 is a gamified and adaptive practice platform that a student can access and use on her own. 

Outputs:
Repeated practice in a fun and engaging manner has shown remarkable improvement in her learning outcomes, in Maths and English. This has given her confidence in her academic abilities and to continue her education.

 
Outcomes: We are targeting a reduction in drop-out rates post grade-8. For a girl to take up a profession like academics, healthcare, technology, she needs to succeed academically. Once a student passes out of high school, she becomes eligible for college education which will help her reach aspirations. 

Impact:  
The short-term impact will be that a girl will complete her high-school education and become confident in her abilities to take up a profession of her aspirations. In the long-term, this intervention will have a huge impact on her economic independence and social growth. 

The solution currently serves 1000 students in rural India. We intend to serve 10000 students in 1 year and 1 Mn students in 5 years. This will still be 5% of the potential impacted population of 20Mn of which 50% are females. 

India has 20 Mn students entering Grade 8 in rural school every year. Of this population, 50% are girls. 6 Mn students drop out in the subsequent 2 years, of which 3.2 Mn are girls. 

Our goals within the next year are to increase our footprint from 3 schools to 50 schools in Maharashtra and Karnataka states in India. In 5 years, we want to reach 5000 schools across atleast 20 of the 30 states in India. 

In the next 1 year, we intend to reduce the drop outs in the selected 10000 students from 3000 to 1000. Similarly, we intend to reduce the drop outs in 5 years among 1Mn students from 300,000 students to 100,000 students.

During this 5 year period, we will also develop vocational training through an easily consumable online mode. 

We have partnered with Ushatai Lokhande Charitable trust for the pilot across 3 rural schools in Maharashtra. We have NGO partners identified including NGOs, foundations and nonprofits like  MYRADA, Bajaj Education, YRG Care for scaling in next year. 

We plan to have more such NGO and Govt partnerships in increase our footprint and the impact of our solution over the next 5 years. 

We have very ambitious goals for the next 5 years. To rapidly achieve scale, we need to overcome a number of barriers. 

Financial barriers: We are a self funded organization and don't have a dedicated big team to look at rural initiatives. While the next year's numbers are reasonably achievable, to reach our 5 year target numbers of 1Mn, will need a significant expansion of team dedicated to rural India. 

Cultural Barriers: We have two local languages configured but configuring more languages and imbibing culturally unique elements will need a significant effort

Technical or legal barriers: We don't see technical or legal barriers impacting our outreach for the next year. But as we scale, one technical barrier would be rural schools which have no access to even shared devices. 

Market Barriers: Government schools may not encourage our program. we need to tie up with Government to make the maximum impact. This is a difficult and long drawn process. Success is not guaranteed in this process. 

People or Resource barriers: We are currently a very lean team. To scale up, we will need crucial resources who have expertise in scaling up efficiently

Overcoming Financial barriers: We intend to get funding from various donors to enable setting up of a bigger team and thus enabling a virtuous cycle. We also intend to keep working with corporate companies and urban schools for funding the rural initiatives. Seeking funding from global education programs is another way of overcoming financial barriers

Overcoming Cultural barriers: We intend to overcome cultural barriers by tying up with local NGOs and local Government. We also intend to use local school teachers to enable validation of curriculum and learning outcomes. 

Overcoming Market Barriers: We intend to keep working on Government relations to expand market outreach. Community networks of prominent players like MIT Solve will help overcome market barriers.

Overcoming Technical Barriers: At scale, there may be rural schools with no access to any hardware (devices) at all. We would need to partner with large corporations who are interested in giving access to poorest of the poor who have no access to hardware. 

Overcoming People or Resource barriers: We are on the lookout for advice and mentorship on how to achieve scale rapidly.

Not applicable

Full time staff: 4 (1 Ecosystem Partnership lead, 1 Content Lead, 1 Tech Lead and 1 CEO)

Part Time staff: 10 (All on content)

Contractors: 14 (4 on tech development, 5 on content and 5 on channel development)

Advisors: 3 (2 PHD in Education, 1 lead of a rural NGO)

Our team is well positioned to deliver this solution based on our experience, accumulated knowledge and skills. We are all enginners and MBAs from premier institutes with considerable experience in sales, channel development, strategy and technology product development.

We have picked up experience on rural India in the past 5 years through our and our channel partner's continuous efforts. 

Our partnerships, our content development prowess and our speed to market of product variations puts us a formidable position to deliver this solution. Our advisors have worked for extensive years in rural education. 

We partner with 2 types of organizations

1. Rural NGOs and charitable trusts: We enable rural NGOs to fulfill their education, gender equality, informal training targets. We also work with them to improve our rural outreach

2. Corporates: Have funded and shown an interest in funding the rural school programs as part of their CSR initiatives.

We have carried out a pilot with Ushatai Lonkhande Charitable Trust for carrying out a pilot with rural schools in Maharashtra. They have funded a project called 'Bal Utkarsh'. We have implemented the project at a low cost, no profit basis. 

Our key customers are Non Government organization and corporate organizations. Our key beneficiaries are high school students. There is a product market fit because our key customers are looking at improving learning outcomes of the key beneficiaries.

We typically make revenues of $3 per student per annum from the NGOs/ Corporates, We currently have 1000 students and are making $3000 in revenues from Rural education. In addition, our company works with urban schools and corporate India to generate a further $20,000 in annual revenues. 

The keu services that we provide to our customers are analytics on how we improved the learning outcomes and provision of Fundamentor product to end beneficiaries. Both are delivered through technology. The analytics reports can be assessed realtime through a link. The product is enabled on desktops or mobiles for the beneficiaries.

The NGOs and Corporates need the product and service to showcase the impact. Our analytics engine enables them do prove the impact

Presently, we sustain the salary and expenses through our business with urban schools and corporate India. The fundamentor aptitude development and assessment product generates $20,000 in revenues every year. It enables us to provide the rural product at a price of $3 per student per annum. 

We bring in money through NGOs and corporate/ individual grants to fund the rural initiatives. 

We are also looking at capital to form and fund a dedicated team for rural initiatives. 

Our revenue streams next year are expected to be

1. Urban India Schools: 1000 students. $15 per student per annum. Total revenues $15,000

2. Corporate India: 1000 users. $15 per user. Total revenues: $15,000

3. Rural India: 10000 users. $2.5 per user. Total revenues: $25,000.

Total expected revenues = $55,000.

Current revenues= $23,000

Expected salary expense next year: $19,000 per annum as 4 permanent employees will take subsidised salary of $ 400 per month. 

Expected tech expense: $12,000 per annum as most tech development is done

Expected supplier expense: $12,000 per annum

Expected Overheads: $12,000 per annum for travel and subscriptions. 

Total expense= $55,000 per annum. 

Current expense= $24,000. Founders are not drawing any salary. 

We can achieve break even but it doesnt allow us to hire more people to expand the rural footprint.

Raising capital and extended grants will allow us to hire people to expand the rural footprint and scale our operations

Our goals within the next year are to increase our footprint from 3 schools to 50 schools in Maharashtra and Karnataka states in India. In 5 years, we want to reach 5000 schools across at least 20 of the 30 states in India. 

In the next 1 year, we intend to reduce the drop outs in the selected 10000 students from 3000 to 1000. Similarly, we intend to reduce the drop outs in 5 years among 1Mn students from 300,000 students to 100,000 students.

We have a strong product and use-case but lack the experience to rapidly scale. To achieve our ambitious goal, we need support, mentorship, financing and partnerships, and a community network to reach scale.

With the help of Solve network, mentors, experts, we could reach out to many more students and perhaps, partner with governments to create more impact. 

We need support to overcome financial and market barriers to reach scale.

Our main partnership goals are:

1) We would like to work on long-term outcomes with partners who care about improving the quality of education, reducing high-school drop-out rates, promoting gender equality in higher education who will support us in taking our solution to as many students as possible.

2) We would like to fulfill our partners goals of making an impact on the availability of quality education to school students through our platform. Our platform improves learning outcomes, reducing the current gap between academic abilities of rural and urban children. It will make them more employable. 

3) We would need support to help us scale our solution rapidly and need support from mentors, advisors who have expertise in this area.

Our potential partners could be 

1) large organizations like Microsoft, Cisco who are invested in improving the quality of education, reducing high-school drop-out rates, promoting gender equality in higher education. They could also help us overcome technical barriers at scale like the non-availability of devices in the poor rural schools

2) MIT Faculty, expert advisors- to mentor us on how to achieve scale rapidly. 

3) We would also like to partner with the larger Solve community network for advise and expertise on achieving scale, and for help in tying up with government organizations

Our target population is 10Mn rural girls that enroll annually in Grade 8 in Indian rural schools. 3Mn of them drop out in the next 2 years. Our solution is aimed at tackling the academic root cause of the dropout and reduce the dropouts from 3Mn to 1 Mn over a two year period.

We have conducted a pilot where we have significantly improved formal learning outcomes by more than 50% for 1000 rural girls across 3 schools. We now want to scale this solution to fulfill rural girls' aspirations

Our target population is 10Mn rural girls that enroll annually in Grade 8 in Indian rural schools. 3Mn of them drop out in the next 2 years. Our solution is aimed at tackling the academic root cause of the dropout and reduce the dropouts from 3Mn to 1 Mn over a two year period.

We have conducted a pilot where we have significantly improved formal learning outcomes by more than 50% for 1000 rural girls across 3 schools. We now want to scale this solution to fulfill rural girls' aspirations

Our target population is 10Mn rural girls that enroll annually in Grade 8 in Indian rural schools. 3Mn of them drop out in the next 2 years. Our solution is aimed at tackling the academic root cause of the dropout and reduce the dropouts from 3Mn to 1 Mn over a two year period.

We have conducted a pilot where we have significantly improved formal learning outcomes by more than 50% for 1000 rural girls across 3 schools. We now want to scale this solution to fulfill rural girls' aspirations

Our target population is 10Mn rural girls that enroll annually in Grade 8 in Indian rural schools. 3Mn of them drop out in the next 2 years. Our solution is aimed at tackling the academic root cause of the dropout and reduce the dropouts from 3Mn to 1 Mn over a two year period.

We have conducted a pilot where we have significantly improved formal learning outcomes by more than 50% for 1000 rural girls across 3 schools. We now want to scale this solution to fulfill rural girls' aspirations