The app Focus By Dispurse Foundation

We believe that learning to read, write and count is the first step to empower the person and get out of poverty. We have developed the app FOCUS that is used with tablets that teaches reading, writing and counting, without the need of a tutor or internet access. With only 70 hours of work, an absolute illiterate student can reach the same level as third grader of primary school in Sweden. The app FOCUS allows us to access statistics on an individual level.

We work together with local municipalities and all sectors of society to create agreements to implement Focus. Initially we lend them tablets where approximately 10 students can work with one tablet by rotating them during the week. We have volunteer coordinators helping with distribution. Since we started in 2017, we have never lost a tablet. 

According to UNESCO, 750 million people worldwide are illiterates and adult illiteracy rates in 2015 summed 31.2 million in Latin America (source). In Peru there are over 9.6 million people over 15 years old who have not completed High School and over 1,4 million illiterates (source: ENAHO 2017). The only option for adults to finish their studies implies 9 hours of class in person, which is impossible for most individuals living in vulnerable conditions. This is reflected in the results of the Centres of Adult education  which has a drop out number of 20% (source).

Not being able to read and write not only isolate people from society but makes seemingly easy chores such as reading a doctors prescription or going to bank impossible. The Hamburg declaration from UNESCO in 1997 states under Resolution 11 “Literacy, broadly conceived as the basic knowledge and skills needed by all in a rapidly changing world, is a fundamental right" (source).  At Dispurse we are convinced that being able to read, write and count is the key to being able to live an independent life and be a positive force that can participate, influence and help for sustainable democratic social development

We are working to directly and meaningfully improve the lives of young people and adults in vulnerable areas of Latin America. Currently we are working in 5 different regions in Peru: Cusco, Cajamarca, Lima, Huancavelica and Apurímac and have over 2000 students enrolled in our literacy program. As the current solutions offered for adults to finish their education is very limited and the classes are in-person many students cannot attend. We have developed a solution that adapts to our students reality. For example, we have students that work selling food in markets and when they are not attending clients they can work with the app. 

We also reinforce what our students learn with workshops where they get to practice their new skills and to introduce them into their everyday life to make it sustainable over time. For instance we have carried out workshops with Innovative Agrarian Institute of Peru to teach our students how to grow purple corn and keeping track of the harvest with their literacy knowledge. 

The app FOCUS is used with tablets that teaches reading, writing and counting, without the need of a tutor or internet access. With only 70 hours of work, an absolute illiterate student can reach the same level as third grader of primary school in Sweden and on average our students finish the program in a period of 6 to 8 months. FOCUS is a didactic app and friendly even for people who do not have previous experience with electronic devices. 

FOCUS was developed during 5 years together with neurologists, pedagogues and test groups composed of 400 people in their original locations in Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador and Colombia. The FOCUS app is unique because it allows us to access statistics on an individual level every time the tablet is synchronized. This allows us to monitor the progress and results during the entire project. 

Furthermore, our program involves functional literacy in order for the students to apply their new knowledge in their everyday life. We find this important to make sure that the students won't forget what they have learned and make it sustainable over time. We also provide our students with texts that are useful to them and that they can relate to. 

As the model below displays, our way of work rises from the person and involves three areas: literacy with Focus, Functional Literacy and Digital Literacy. Firstly, with our app Focus, secondly through functional literacy to ensure that they will not forget what they learned and thirdly digital literacy, which includes being included in the digital world and being able to use digital solutions such as the internet. 

Furthermore, we would like to provide you with a video about our pedagogy and one about our foundation. 

About our foundation

 Our pedagogy 

The use of an application and tablets to teach people how to read, write and count without the need of a tutor or teacher, allows you to reach the most remote, dispersed areas with difficult access. In addition, it provides our students with flexibility and they can adapt the time they use for their studies with their family and productive dynamics.

On the other hand, our program fulfills a double purpose because in addition to providing basic literacy it also allows our students to achieve digital literacy and to become familiar with technology which in itself opens doors to be able to get access to information and resources through the internet.

It is unique because it combines basic literacy, digital literacy and functional literacy and because of its offline qualities.

The Focus app is an adaptive gamified education (edtech), targeting people living in poverty, teaching them to read, write and count.The technology is a self-contained, tutor-less education and it requires no assistance.

The user interface is user-friendly. Typically the target students have no prior experience of technology, and is directly introduced and gets help learning how to use the device.

The student starting the education only has a an oral language, but when finishing the student has on their own learnt how to read, write and count. A major challenge has been how to develop technology to fit this very special user group, and the key innovation how to create an adaptive experience lies in the very fine granularity on how knowledge acquired is measured.

The pace of the education is adaptive and it progresses at the pace of the students capabilities, based on both prior knowledge as well as the individual capabilities such as how fast students learn.

The Focus app’s offline capabilities allow the technology to be brought to the most remote places on earth and reach the poorest, in places lacking both electricity and Internet. The Focus app has been used in remote locations in the Latin American jungle, deserts and on mountain tops in the Andes. Through the kind tonality and carefully designed user experience (UX), the Focus app offers the students an education they can take on at their own pace and in a place that suits them.

Our solution provides adults who have not had access to educatation the opportunity to learn. Education plays an important role in areas such as:

• poverty reduction: For people in vulnerable areas is education is an important tool for getting out of chronic poverty and preventing poverty from being inherited generations.

• Increased income and diversification: The clearest effect of education is increased income for the individual through increased pay (UNESCO 2014: 147).

• Education contributes to better health: Education is a powerful tool for improving people's health for themselves and for the future generations. Research shows that there is a connection between health and education level then more educated people often have better health (UNESCO 2014: 155).
• Education promotes sustainable communities: Education promotes sustainable communities in, for example, three areas; increases democratic participation, protects environment and gives more power to women.

• Increases democratic participation and sustainable governance: Good-quality education gives people the opportunity to make well-informed and active choices and give them the opportunity to access questions that are close to them (UNESCO 2014: 170
• Education helps to reduce corruption: An investigation like that made by 78 countries shows that higher education level is the most powerful indicator of low levels of corruption. (UNESCO 2014: 178).
• Education strengthens women's ability to make active life choices: If all people have access to equivalent education, vulnerable groups can have the opportunity to influence their lives and make active choices (UNESCO 2014: 181).

Currently we have 2500 students enrolled in our program. Our objective for 2019 is 8000 students and for 2024 our goal is to have 25000 students. 

Our goal for the upcoming year is to:

• have 8000 students enrolled in our literacy program Focus and that at least 2000 students have finished the program. 
• Work actively to spread our message and position ourselves on the market. 
• Continuously update Focus to make sure that it is the best tool for learning how to write, read and count available on the market.

Our goals for the next five years are to have:

•  25,000 people have enrolled in our literacy program.
•  Our main focus is still Peru but expanding to other Latin-American countries. 
• Dispurse and our app Focus in order for our operations to be auto financed by this time. 
• Our application should be developed continuously each year so that it is considered the best tool on the market for learning how to read, write and count. 
• Develop tools for impact measurement in our areas of influence. Further develop procedures for follow-up and evaluation both in both a quantitative and qualitative ways. 

The barriers that currently exist are that illiteracy is what we call an invisible problem. With that we mean that it is a major problem since millions of people are illiterate and many of those who learned when they were children have forgotten due to lack of practice. However, this problem is not being taken serious by politicians and authorities and no major effort are being done to deal with it. Furthermore, lack of resources to being able to purchase equipment. A further problem is the bureaucracy in the public administration to manage public resources. 

To overcome the existing barriers, we aim to work with politicians, companies and other organizations to raise awareness about the problem and involve them in the project. Furthermore we aim to show evidence regarding the results and different models developed by Dispurse such as different working groups, different functional literacy practices, and different management models with the participation of allies. We are already partnering up with the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Development & Social Inclusion as well as the Women’s Rights Ministry which we consider important steps in order to overcome these barriers. 

In Peru we have 14 full time workers, 1 intern and 2 external consultants. As for Sweden we have our board consisting of 3 people and 1 person full time working on the development of Focus. 

We are a multidisciplinary, multinational and dedicated team. We have a team of pedagogical and technical specialists in Sweden who have developed the methodology of our literacy proposal and the application of Focus. As for the management team of Dispurse they are located in Lima and are responsible for generating the conditions for the implementation of the literacy program in the country and its operational development in each region.

We all have different backgrounds regarding academics, culture and working experience which complements us as a team and we all share the same values of equality and respect and we strive towards the same goal: to eradicate poverty through education.  

We believe that partnerships are key to success. We are currently partnering with:

• The Peruvian Ministry of Education
• The Peruvian Ministry of Womens Rights
• The Peruvian Ministry of Culture
• The Peruvian Ministry of Development and Social Inclusion
• The Peruvian stately social programs: Pension65 and Juntos 
• Local, distrital and regional municipalities in each region where we work: Cusco, Cajamarca, Huancavelica, Lima and Apurimac.
• Rotary Cajamarca We work with our partners in different aspects. We are doing a pilot project with the Ministry of Education to verify Focus as an official learning tool. With the Ministry of Women’s Rights, we are implementing Focus to empower women. With the Peruvian Ministry of Culture, we are implementing reading projects to encourage reading and increasing the levels of reading comprehension. We are working with the social programs Pension65 and Juntos from the Ministry of Development and Social inclusion to provide the elderly (Pension65) with reading and writing skills. Furthermore, local, district and regional municipalities are of vital importance to implement our literacy Program and to count with their support. Furthermore, we sign agreements directly with the local entities regarding the objectives and the loan of tablets. 

Our business model is literacy as a core product through efficient and effective technology which adapts to the different contexts where illiteracy exists.

We put our technology at the disposal of authorities and other partners involved to make sure that they can make the literacy project their own, educating the adult population and investing their available resources. In this sense we advise technically to develop operational models adjusted to their context focused on obtaining results.

We will keep supporting other entities to implement projects and advise them technically in order to make the project sustainable over time. 

Our path to financial sustainability seeks to make local actors gradually assume economic responsibility for the execution and sustainability of the projects. Initiating the project Dispurse provides economic assistance if necessary. We provide technical advice during the entire project.

We are applying to Solve because we are convinced that education and technology are the key to eradicate poverty. Not only can you help us scale but also function as a catalyst to help us reach out to more people. Furthermore, the network and advice provided will be of vital importance for the reaching out with our project and completing our mission - ending poverty through education. 

More specifically, with Solves help we will be able to:

• Implement more literacy projects all over Peru.
• Constantly keep updating our app Focus to make sure it is the best tool for self-learning on the market.
• Receive advice on how to perfection our business model and how to make our projects even more sustainable over time.
• Develop an evaluation tool for Peru to be able to measure development  progress in detail. 

It would be fantastic to exchange insights with organizations such as Sustainable Community Development on Standing Rock, Peripheral Vision International, Thunder Valley Energy and Red Cloud Renewable Energy Center.  Furthermore we would love to partner with organizations that can help us develop tools for monitoring and evaluation poverty levels and development on a close-up level. 

We would like to apply for the GM Prize on Community-Driven Innovation and we would utilize the prize to expand our FOCUS project to more communities in Peru. Also focusing on developing tools for evaluation and monitoring poverty levels to further measure our impact. 

In Dispurse we believe that learning to read, write and count is the first step to empower the person and get out of poverty. With our program we empower women through new knowledge and self-esteem. Several of our students who have not worked before have begun to earn income after our program, unifying the family and empowering the women.