Coschool - Edumoción

Problem: Latin America (LATAM) is “facing a learning crisis”. The World Bank’s conclusion is verified through their macro learning measurement, Learning Adjusted Years of Schooling. The measurement calculates the average number of years of schooling, adjusted by the quality of learning, that a student can expect to receive before reaching 18 years of age. In 2020, pre-pandemic, the average was 7.6 years for LATAM countries, compared to 10.8 years for students from within the OECD (World Bank), however, in the next report,  LATAM’s average is expected to decrease following the impact of COVID-19.

Pedagogical practices: The pandemic has changed the educational landscape, yet educators have not received tools, resources nor professional development training required to thrive in these “new” and unpredictable teaching environments (online/blended/sudden school closures). Many found virtual channels overwhelming and have been unable to adapt their teaching methods. Latin American educators identified both their lack of expertise (31%) and access (23%) to digital pedagogical tools as two of the principal reasons affecting their ability to develop and guarantee educational continuity (INEE).

Wellbeing and mental health: During the pandemic, 72% of educators, from Colombia, Ecuador and Peru, reported feeling tired and stressed, yet only 27% believed the education sector has supported their emotional needs (INEE). As a result, over 10% of Colombian teachers reported having missed at least one day of work through stress or anxiety related issues since the pandemic began as they struggle to cope with the “new normal” (University Javeriana). 

The pandemic equally impacted Latin American students; on average, they lost 168 in-person school days (Save The Children) – more than any other region. The consequent confinement resulted in 52% and 47% of students reporting an increase in stress and moments of anxiety, while 73% felt the need to ask for help concerning their physical and mental health, however, worryingly, 40% did not do this (UNICEF). 

Social emotional skills: To address these wellbeing and mental health challenges, and especially following the return to in-person education, it is vitally important to develop and strengthen the social emotional skills of educators and students (WHO). Nevertheless, only 45% of educators have received training in how to develop the social emotional skills of young people, while only 30% believe the physical, mental and social needs of students are being accompanied by their schools (Escalando). The lack of training has a knock on effect upon students; in the 2018 PISA report, Colombian students ranked in the lowest 10% globally for a number of social emotional skills, for example, 60 from 64 countries for perspective taking.

Coschool has developed “Edumoción”, an online learning community and content platform that supports Latin American educators to address social-emotional challenges and improve their teaching practices. Edumoción is the product of multiple educational projects over the last 8 years and represents a sustainable and long-term commitment through which we adapt to and support the ever changing needs of educators in the region. 

Strategy 1: Access to high quality, inclusive & contextualized resources 

Using Edumoción as a vehicle, we develop new resources, specifically contextualized and designed to improve the learning environment and quality of education. We do this in conjunction with local partners who are experts in themes such as gender, disability, LGBT and diverse learning needs as well as local branches of international organisations such as World Vision and Plan International. These partners ensure our intervention is accessible and inclusive for all. The resources are grouped into three overarching categories: 

1. Social emotional wellbeing for educators

2. Social emotional wellbeing for your students

3. Innovation in your pedagogical practice

Resources: Within each category, we will develop courses, content and tools with the following formats:

• “Eduflash” – less than 5 minutes - high quality multimedia and resources that provide practical and concise tips and information.

• “Edumini” – less than 1 hour - this is our "anti-course"; access 5 to 7 short videos on a topic and download an Edutools kit to apply in life and in the classroom with their students.

• “Edumaster” – less than 10 hours - this is our masterclass; courses and content between 1 and 10 hours, downloadable Edutools and activities to put into practice in the classroom and in life.

To access the resources, educators create an account on Edumoción and complete a self-assessment survey related to their needs. Based on this, our platform suggests Educaminos (soon to be powered by artificial intelligence); personalised thematic learning routes (recommended courses, content, events etc). Courses will be asynchronous, allowing educators to learn at their own pace. With teachers, we have identified key themes to support educators and on which we are currently focusing development; gender equity, inclusion and diversity, sexual education, mental health, managing emotions and stress, SEL at an institutional level, adaption to change and positive relationships.

Strategy 2: Online communities of Practice

Coschool understands the importance of mentoring and support to achieve learning. A core element of Edumoción will therefore be the community support network facilitated by Coschool and centered on developing a thriving community where educators from across the region engage, mutually support each other and exchange education content and experiences. We will achieve this through the following: 

• Educomunidades: Professional learning communities between educators is our core strategy to strengthen support networks and shared learning experiences between educators. These connections will be created from intentional actions and routines; eg online workshops, circles of support, and weekly gestures of recognition.

• Edumotivadores: Educators with a special role; they are expert content tutors/coaches, but beyond that, their mission is to encourage the intrinsic motivation of the participants. Edumotivadores monitor progress and provide personalized contact by messages or calls and synchronous meetings to ensure that the motivation of educators is maintained and they feel constantly supported as they access and engage with Edumoción.

Educators: 

Profile: Spanish speaking educators in Latin America, of which there are currently 2.7 million that have access to the internet (World Bank) and could therefore benefit from Edumoción. Approximately 75% of these educators are women and the average age is 40 years old (World Bank). 

Underserved: The average expenditure per student (primarily teacher training, salaries and resources) is $5,293 USD less in LATAM than other regions (IADB). Teachers' salaries are between 10% to 50% lower than other equivalent professionals (Economist). Following the pandemic, educators are working longer hours, suffering from burnout and increased stress, yet they are not receiving adequate emotional support nor professional development.

Benefits: Our solution will strengthen the social emotional skills of educators, including resilience, compassion and their ability to manage emotions, which are vital for improving wellbeing. While new pedagogical tools will renew motivation and enjoyment in their jobs as well as develop their teaching skills and therefore professional development. Importantly, at least a third of our resources can be accessed free of charge to ensure inclusivity. 

Students:

Profile: our solution can benefit all students and young adults enrolled in education, from early childhood to university students. 

Underserved: LATAM students receive a low quality education; on average, 15-year-old students in the region are three years behind in reading, mathematics, and science of a student in an OECD. Moreover, students do not receive adequate support or guidance from schools in relation to the development of social emotional skills, which impacts their ability to complete their education. Over 40% of students reported missing at least one day of school in the previous two weeks, while as many  4 out of 10 Latin American students do not finish their high school education (IADB)

Benefits: students will receive a higher quality education from educators that have been reinvigorated with new tools, methodologies and skills, which in turn will boost academic attainment. Moreover, the development of their social emotional skills will be integrated into the teaching techniques and resources of educators, with students additionally benefitting from bespoke classroom activities. This will support their wellbeing and the opportunities to graduate from school.    

Coschool: Since 2014, Coschool has developed social emotional skills in more than 33,000 youth and educators through a diverse team from across Colombia and increasingly, the region. The capability of this team was recognized globally through Coschool’s selection as one of HundrEd’s top education innovations in 2020 and 2021. 

1. Project implementation: Our team will leverage learning, experience and networks from over 200 projects successfully delivered with the public, private and third sector, across multiple countries, to bring our solution to scale. For each project, we conducted needs analysis with local stakeholders to ensure the solution responds to their needs, something that we will continue to do with Edumoción, accompanied by our Edumoción educator committee.

2. "Ruta Edumoción" - between January and March 2022, Coshcool launched an investigation strategy to facilitate a deeper understanding of educator needs within different contexts, one which ensures the engagement and meaningful inputs of educators towards the development of Edumoción. Over three months, a group of Coschool educators traveled by bus, our “learning lab on wheels”, to urban and rural communities across Colombia, where at each stop, the team conducted research, implemented workshops and co-created resources with educators for Edumoción. Coschool intends to expand this strategy to other parts of Colombia and LATAM. 

3. "#60Interviews" - an initiative, in which each member of Coschool’s team conducts at least 2 interviews with educators in the region. This ensures that our team, regardless of role, understands the pain points and needs of the educational community and can take this forward through their work.

Monitoring and Evaluation - we will need Solve and its partners to support our transition from implementing timebound, stand-alone projects to a timeless community platform with multiple resources to access. For example, how we can robustly measure learning and change in relation to different teaching competencies and social emotional skills through various resources and opportunities that Edumoción offers; courses, workshops, coaching, classroom activities, events etc. This will be especially important for educators that access a mix of resources; how can we objectively separate and measure the impact of individual and collective interventions. In addition, we will need to develop instruments to measure the impact of educators’ cascade to students. 

Market expansion: Coschool has a wide and loyal customer base in Colombia, a growing number of users in Mexico, Peru and Venezuela, however, there remain a number of Latin American countries where the organization has a limited presence. We believe that the advice and support from Solve and MIT networks, experts and partners can help to expand our number of users and partnerships within other countries,

Brand and exposure: Coschool seeks to be a thought leader in the education and SEL sector and for Edumoción to be a one-stop-shop for educators’ training and developmental needs in Latin America. To achieve this, we are eager to be part of Solve’s wide network and have the opportunity to participate and lead global events. We are confident that, if selected, it would support the growth of our solution and brand.

Methodology: Our solution has the potential to change how students are taught; Edumoción will put emotion at the heart of education; each resource is carefully developed using our innovative pedagogical model, also called Edumoción. Aligned with Social Emotional Learning and Positive Education, all our content includes the fundamental elements of: Feel, Think, Act and Reflect. Moreover, our resources are highly engaging. Educators and students actively and willingly participate with and enjoy our content that simultaneously supports their skills and wellbeing. This differentiates us from other approaches that view wellbeing as an add on to education and equally lack the engagement of young people. 

Multifaceted: Edumoción will strengthen the entire ecosystem through a multipronged and multistakeholder (the entire educational community; students, teachers, parents, government) strategy. Other approaches are too static and one dimensional in their target audience; our innovation will adapt to and address the constantly evolving environment of educators and students and how this impacts educational outcomes.

Next year 

Improve teaching practices and reduce technology gaps

• Through Edumoción we will develop innovative pedagogical practices that improve teaching practices and support the achievement of student learning outcomes. Resources will additionally develop the technological skills of educators, for example, through Educaminos that support distance learning and that can mitigate the risks and disruptions of potential school closures in the future.

Develop the social emotional skills of both students and educators

• Resources will provide both groups to develop particular skills such as decision making, empathy, self-confidence and resilience. These will help to improve wellbeing and mental health in the long term.

Five years: 

Improve the wellbeing and mental health of students and educators

• The development of an educator community will provide an invaluable support network, while our resources and services will provide tangible actions that educators can take to maintain positive mental health. An educator who has a positive mental health will best be able to support the needs of students; a ING Foundation survey shows that 75% of students say teachers are role models, 83% say a teacher has boosted their self-esteem and confidence and 54% say a teacher helped them through a difficult time.

To reduce educators turnover 

• To avoid the “Great Resignation” of educators, it is vital to support their professional development, providing opportunities to strengthen skills, be part of networks and facilitate personal growth. Educators need to feel valued within society otherwise we will lose the sector’s biggest asset. 

Improved academic attainment and student employability

• We will improve educators’ teaching practices and skills. If students actively participate in school life and enjoy interactive and stimulating classes, then they are more likely to perform well academically, which in turn, increases the probability of employment.

Improved graduation rates for students

• The development of a positive classroom and school environment and the feeling of belonging will increase the likelihood of student attendance and graduation. 

• Number of educators subscribed to Edumoción

• Number of resources developed (courses, videos, podcasts)

• Number of educators completing courses

• Number of community activities implemented (events, workshops and psychosocial circles)

• Attendance rates at community activities and evaluation scores

• Number of educators engaging in communities of practice

• The development of educators’ social emotional skills 

• The development of educators’ teaching practices

• The development of educators’ skills as facilitators of social emotional skills 

• The development of students’ social emotional skills 

We are currently using the following tools to measure progress: 

WHO-5 Well-being Index: A simple instrument that measures someone’s wellbeing through a series of simple statements/questions. We have used this tool in over 20 projects since 2019. 

Youth Social Emotional Skills Instrument - developed by the World Bank, and the Corona and Luker Foundations, it is designed to measure the development of social-emotional skills of youth. The tool is based on the CASEL framework and is thus aligned with Coschool’s own skills framework.

Teacher Empowerment as Social Emotional Educators - the instrument was designed and validated to measure teachers’ efficacy in character education (Milson). This self-report instrument asks teachers to determine to what extent they believe their actions influence students’ development of social emotional skills.

Emotional and stress management efficacy - an instrument  that measures one’s self perceived ability  to manage and deal with emotional and stressful situations. 

Growth Mindset Index - an instrument that gauges one's assumptions, methods, beliefs, and attitudes as they relate to five distinguishing qualities: passion, emotional intelligence, drive, resilience and gratitude.

Inputs/Activities: 

• The development of high quality resources; videos, courses, activities

• The design of workshops, support circles and tutorials

• The expansion of our coaches and mentors pool

Outputs

• Educators are trained in new and innovative teaching practices and participate in courses to develop social emotional skills. 

• Educators actively participate in community activities

Short term outcomes

• New knowledge that helps to respond to the challenges of the moment and be better in the classroom

• Strengthened growth mindset as this is associated with better job performance 

• Higher welfare rates; e know that a teacher who has wellbeing can facilitate better learning and growth environments for their students 

• Strengthened socio-emotional skills, especially the management of emotions and stress, which is essential to prevent burnout 

• More confidence in their abilities as educators 

Long term outcomes

• Higher teacher retention rate

• Better graduation rates for your students

• Better classroom environment and school environment

• Better performance and employability of your students

Edumoción has adapted existing Learning Management Systems and Content Management Systems that has allowed us to integrate courses and multimedia onto our platform at lower costs. Through audiovisual media, we create short and entertaining videos, with options to download high quality, low data resources such as infographics, activity notebooks, guides and podcasts. This is a vital part of our inclusion strategy to ensure that educators in rural areas, with limited internet, can still access resources, especially through their mobiles. While our social media networks are integrated onto Edumoción, through which offer online events and workshops. If educators need help, the platform is connected to our support team through Whatsapp which our research has shown to be the most common channel of communication.

In the next 12 months, technology is at the core of our development plans. Using artificial intelligence, we want to recommend Educaminos to educators; personalized learning routes (courses, content, events etc.) based on their preferences and needs. Moreover, we would like to pilot a virtual reality mental health course.

- Coschool strives to embed gender equality transversely through promoting equal participation in our work, starting in house: our C-Level is 63% women and the team is 65%.

• Our team is multicultural with staff from five countries and 12 of Colombia’s departments represented. 

• We are developing an Edumoción committee of educators that will include a diverse group of educators from across the region, ensuring that we hear different voices and feedback (countries, race, experience, rural v urban).

• Disability - Coschool’s approach to mainstreaming disability focuses on applying an inclusion lens to all our project delivery; design, planning, delivery and evaluation. We ensure that  the language, messaging, resources, workshops and support are disability inclusive where possible. Our strategy pivots around the delivery of a project that removes obstacles for participation in education and increases awareness and understanding of diverse needs and a valuing of different abilities. In partnership with leading disability organizations, this will be applied to all the resources we develop, while we will specifically create a course that promotes this approach in the classroom and supports educators to incorporate it into their teaching practices. 

• Flexible working - our team has the option to work remotely or in the office, as well to a schedule that fits around additional commitments, such as child care. 

• We offer paid internships to provide work experience to young students that are studying. 

The centralisation of Coschool’s services and resources in one place, Edumoción, will diversify our opportunities to impact different audiences and generate revenue. Our solution will break down access barriers to resources, allowing millions of educators to benefit from Edumoción. This will be done through the following models:  

B2B - Currently our biggest market share, Coschool has been providing services to a diverse range of businesses (schools, universities, foundations, NGOs), whose network of educators have consequently accessed and benefited from our programs.We will leverage these relationships to build our community of educators and maximize our reach and impact.

B2G - we will leverage existing partnerships with the Ministry and Secretaries of Education in Colombia, as well as El Salvador, Honduras and Mexico. This market holds a high potential for reach through local, regional and/or national contracts that include high numbers of schools and educators. 

B2C - through Edumoción, this represents a new market for Coschool through which we will seek to enter through growth and communications strategies and campaigns, whilst also working with existing and new partners.   

There are big opportunities for cross selling between B2B/B2G and B2C markets, as individual educators champion upselling opportunities for their schools, and vice versa as we can provide additional content to individuals where Edumoción is already present. Since 2014, Coschool has generated $3 million USD. Our current research has shown that 87% of educators are willing to pay for Edumoción, while the current service addressable market is $192 million USD, while the total addressable market is $420 million USD. Our most recent investment will go towards content creation/tech developments (37%), digital marketing (31%), our sales team (19%) and key management hires (13%). This will be vital for developing a scalable solution that can maximize reach and impact in the long term.

To achieve long term sustainability, we have three target markets; health, education and educators’ budgets:

1. Health budgets

There is an increasing awareness of the importance of mental health and social & emotional learning, especially related to COVID-19. HolonIQ estimates that spending on Wellbeing & Wellness education will rise at over 25% per year

2. Education budgets 

Edumocion platform will offer an extremely cost-effective “one-stop-shop” for teachers’ training and development needs. We hope to arrive at a $2/month per user price for basic access which will be attractive to Governments, NGOs, Multilaterales to subscribe teachers. 

3. Educators as customers

B2C channels where educators (teachers, parents, coaches etc) can access resources on Edumoción as individual customers. Through increased buying power and the decentralization of education, educators can join the creator economy and “teach anything to anyone from anywhere”.

Moreover, we will continue to raise investment capital. In 2024, we will seek$4 million USD to facilitate an in-house tech scale up (Series A) and $25+ million USD in 2026 to facilitate our proprietary global software.

In December 2021, Coschool secured a first round of investment ($450,000) from Acumen, Fundación Bancolombia and Rockwood Advisors to develop educational content on social emotional learning, with a particular goal of reaching rural areas. For Acumen, it was their first education investment in Latin America.

Over the last 5 years, Coschool has been recognised as a leading organization in the education sector, working across different countries on multiple education projects. We have been awarded with the following grants:

• Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation ($100,000 USD) - design and pilot a teacher training course focused on the development of social emotional skills. 

• Templeton World Charity Foundation ($233,793 USD) - training school leaders in the PRIMED model of character education. 

• Botnar Foundation ($221,300 USD) - improve the wellbeing of adolescents through the development of their socioemotional skills.  

Coschool has additionally been contracted by the Inter American Development Bank ($35,000) to work directly with the Ministry of Education in both El Salvador and Honduras on strategies focussed on teacher education in addition to working with Plan International ($60,000) and Save The Children ($80,000) to support teachers in emergency contexts across Latin America. While additionally, a training program to support the social emotional needs of over 1,200 Colombian university students ($114,000).