The Learning Expedition

Youth are facing new challenges to find a job and a purpose in life, while mental health problems keep on rising in a critical moment of social and environmental rupture. The Framework of Future Competences of the International Bureau of Education of UNESCO places as top skills: life-long learning (which includes curiosity, creativity and critical thinking) and self-agency (which includes motivation, resilience and responsibility) to face these challenges. 

However, the models practiced by most schools undermine rather than support the development of these two core skills. Most schools do now allow any agency for youth to have a voice on their own learning processes. Many international organizations, such as the European Union, are aware of this and are publishing recommendations to increase empowerment and agency in education, but it is not cascading down to most classrooms. It is not just the tools that need to change, but the mindset of educators for this new educational paradigm. How to transform schools when they have never seen or experienced other way of learning themselves?

Around the world a wide range of new learning models have evolved to enable children and youth to develop these key life skills, empowering them to develop a sense of responsibility towards their learning, their lives and the world that they want to co-create. These educational solutions allow youth to identify and follow their passions and to carry out real-life transdisciplinary projects with a present impact in their communities, respecting cultural diversity. At Evolving Education we have researched these projects and captured their practices and video testimonies from founders, educators, parents and learners. More than 150 education pioneers from 17 countries have contributed to our research.

There is a huge difference between children who have developed in environments that empower them and in conventional schools. Their self-awareness, creativity, critical thinking and social skills are evident. Still the huge majority of children do not have access to these learning opportunities. And the huge majority of educators is not even aware of the possibilities and how much more enriching their roles could be. 

We are bridging the gap between these pioneering institutions and mainstream educators and schools. We are democratizing the tools and mindset to empower youth to take control of their learning, their lives and creating a world with values.

The Learning Expedition is a 3-month online training and community for educators to create learner-centered projects based on youth empowerment and change-making agency. In these learning spaces children and youth develop key life skills, like autonomy, empathy and critical thinking. 

It supports educators to transition from an educational paradigm based on content and obedience to one based on competencies and responsibility in three steps: (1) help educators connect with their passion for education; (2) learn to work with children and youth’s intrinsic motivation to learn; (3) discover the educational practices of the most transformative schools in the world to transfer the responsibility of learning to the learners so that they can be lifelong learners and lead social changes.

Our EXPedition methodology is based on three key elements: (1) EXPlore the tools of the world's most progressive learning centers: holistic, socio-constructivist, self-directed, agile, democratic… explained in video by +150 education pioneers from 17 countries. (2) EXPerience first-hand these tools in the management of our learning community, and find out what works in your context developing experiments using design thinking. (3) EXPress your challenges and find support in our community, a safe space where you can be vulnerable and grow as an educator and as a person.

It is structured in three stations, following the analogy of a journey: (1) The Base Camp of Personal Growth, where we focus on self-knowledge, purpose, and what makes us inspire others. We also learn to follow a structured approach to make changes in learning spaces. (2) The Valley of Motivation and Meaningful Learning, where you learn the keys to intrinsic motivation, what practices end up demotivating learners and multiple tools to spark curiosity and achieve meaningful learning. (3) The Sea of Autonomy and Responsibility, where we explore a wide diversity of methodologies to empower youth to take responsibility for their own learning, lives and communities. 

It provides +250 resources as easy-to-digest learning pills in an e-learning platform customized for educators’ experience. In addition to regular community videocalls managed horizontally to work and reflect about the topics of the program. 

It breaks with the feeling of isolation that many educators experience when they decide to lead changes in their schools and communities by inviting them to be part of a global community of change-makers. It also empowers them with the tools, the vision and the self-confidence to try out new approaches. Finally, it breaks down with the traditional North-South bias, as our platform presents as many inspiring schools from the Global South as from the Global North. All our contents are available both in English and Spanish so far.

This development program and community is designed for education change-makers. Some of the profiles that have already joined in previous editions are: school founders, teachers in conventional or alternative schools, committed families, education NGO managers and college students of education. 

Educators of more than ten nationalities and of all educational levels (primary, secondary and university) have already trained with us and praise the cultural and educational diversity that it presents and that inspires them to be more creative in their work and to take action to transition towards an education relevant to the present and the future. 

Some recent testimonies from participants:

“Every interview I have watched has helped me reconsider elements of my teaching as well as reaffirm myself in my understanding of education. I have been able to see other schools that are trying to respond to the changing world with ideas such as democratic education or sociocracy. Watching people working in such settings have proven to be invaluable.” - Julia, primary school teacher. 

“You’ve done an amazing job of gathering resources and first-hand testimonies. But another thing that you do really well and it’s not easy is to hold the space to help move the thinking forward. And that’s how you have that transformative experience.” - Liz, university professor of education for sustainability.

"I don't think I've seen anywhere an approach to the miracle of education that is both as diverse and as detailed as the one you two have created." - Sidney Morris, school founder

Our team, while small, combines experiences in a wide range of areas and disciplines, including: academic research, adult professional development, social entrepreneurship, high-school education, self-directed learning communities, audiovisual communication, digital marketing, partnerships and alliances. We have trained at top educational institutions, like Cambridge University, and our work has already been recognized by social innovation awards in Spain.

Most importantly, we are aware that no solution is ever perfect. Hence, our program integrates continuous feedback and reflection points where participants can tailor the program to their needs. This has allowed us to optimize it quite rapidly, working in parallel with various cohorts. 

We also face the challenge of education reform with the awareness that not a single organization can make enough and the humbleness to learn and partner with others to scale our impact. This has allowed us in a short time to form partnerships with multiple networks and organizations, such as Ashoka, Ecoversities and the European Democratic Education Community.

We place much emphasis on “democratizing” what already works and find technology and digital channels a key enabler for this. It has so far enabled us to provide educators with a virtual journey around the world that would have been incredibly expensive to produce otherwise. And to be able to offer our training at very low cost to participants in low-income countries like India, Tanzania and Peru.

We would value the inspiration, resources and support of Solve’s ecosystem to help us scale the impact of our solution to thousands or tens of thousands educators through business models for social impact. We are particularly interested in networks of educators or schools, partnership models to combine our resources with other organizations aligned with youth change-making, and funding mechanisms to make the program accessible to vulnerable communities.

We have aimed at replicating the experience of a journey around the world visiting and learning from some of the most innovative schools in an accessible online program. The cultural and educational diversity presented in this program surpasses the previous experiences of all the people that have trained with us so far. It inspires them with real-life examples of how to do things differently in education. While we provide them with many tools, our emphasis is on the change of mindset that needs to happen for youth empowerment and change-making agency. A key part of that is that we embody and use those educational tools for empowerment to manage the learning community. Most people that train with us have never experienced such an empowering, horizontal and vulnerable space; which leads them to give it a try in their own contexts. 

A key part of our work is not to impose a single view of how education needs to change to allow cultural diversity and customs to keep evolving and flourishing. So we provide educators with the framework to carry out experiments in their communities and reflect about their needs and opportunities, with a mindset open to learning from mistakes. We are combining elements of design thinking, entrepreneurship, community building and personal growth to make this possible. 

Our impact goal is to support +100 education change-makers in 2023 to create or transform learning spaces that embrace youth empowerment and change-making agency. In five years, we aim to reach +3.000 educators a year. To achieve it, we are focused on three paths: (1) public relations through social channels to increase our client base, (2) funding and partnerships with networks to reach vulnerable communities, (3) alliances to cocreate support programs and innovation labs for school transformation. 

Our impact measurement and indicators are still under development. Some of the indicators that we monitor currently are: number and engagement of collaborators for diffusion of our program applications, number of people interested in our program, number of people that we train, their engagement and satisfaction with the training, and documenting their actions for school transformation.

Our activities focus on developing high-quality engaging learning materials and methods to manage the personal and professional development of a community of education change-makers. The immediate output is that they feel energized and inspired by connecting with their purpose as educators, feeling less isolated as change-makers, and being aware that many educators around the world have already walked that path and driven significant changes in their schools for the betterment of their communities. They feel more capable and empowered having new education tools, frameworks to drive changes and the support of our community. The long-term output is seeing in the empowerment, agency and life-long learning skills of youth in their communities. It is not an immediate process, as there’s a lot of un-learning and re-learning that needs to happen for youth empowerment. But the seed is planted. The educators that participate in the program know that it is possible to create empowering learning spaces and cannot unseen it. The dissonance that they might find with their conventional educational settings will lead them to take action. 

The following testimonies from recent participants talk about the immediate outputs. We are now documenting evidences of their final projects to have an impression of the impact on youth.

“I have shown your videos to my school principal and he has authorized the used of student parliaments in the classes and a trip to a democratic school to learn more about it” - Teresa, high-school teacher, Peru

“It’s been so life-changing! Cause… I don’t really know how to say it. I have been set on fire with ideas! Your platform has sparked my own vision and helped me to find myself. I am so grateful. I am having a big idea and I hope that it expands across Nigeria and beyond the country. You have no idea of what you have done!” - Samuel, primary school teacher, Nigeria

“I feel more empowered. I have learned new tools to improve my work and relationship with students” - Jesus, high-school teacher, Spain.

“Thank you for the opportunity to join The Learning Expedition. I feel less alone when I see and listen to all these people who believe that we cannot follow the same educational path as always and that acting is our responsibility.” - Diego, school founder, Mexico

Our core technology is a virtual learning management system that enables educators’ personalized learning journey following audiovisual stories. On the human side, we combined a wide range of technologies for horizontal cooperation, co-creation and decision making that empowers educators to customize the program to their needs. They include: the art of hosting, design thinking, liberating structures, agile management and mind-body practices. 

We believe that diversity, equity and inclusion is essential for innovation to flourish and have an impact. We have previously provided training to organizations on this topic and embrace it in our organization. All our work is centered around inspiring people with the diversity existing around the world and enabling their unique characteristics and potential to develop. We have this same aim with our team as we think about expansion plans. Of note, our founding team is composed of a man and a woman. 

We have so far focused on selling our program to individual educators (B2C), and made our first attempts at selling to schools or education projects (B2B). We have used a cross-subsidized pricing model that allowed us to offer the program at a much lower cost to educators in low-income countries. While the sales in high-income countries made possible the financial sustainability of the program. As we plan for scale, we will keep working on direct sales; at the same time as we apply for grants and build partnerships with foundations to make our program accessible to vulnerable communities and educators in public schools.

We will keep investing in the activities that are enabling us to reach customers more effectively and at low-cost, such as through social media; while leveraging the low cost of our delivery platforms (e-learning) to keep our prices accessible and offer a range of promotions for groups and networks. We are currently building partnerships with organizations experienced in working with funding agencies and donors to open a new venue for funding. Our plan is to keep an active workstream focused on digital marketing and sales to individual customers and private schools; at the same time as we double our efforts on partnerships and grant management for specific regions and collectives.

So far we have managed to enroll +100 people in our training, either paying directly for the program, through their organizations or with a donor-backed grant. Our price scale has allowed educators from a wide range of geographies and socio-economic contexts to join in, such as a network of learning centers in India and Africa (Project DEFY). We also identified a donor that sponsored 10 grants for the program for educators from vulnerable communities. We have received two prizes for social innovation in Spain, which we invested in our digital marketing campaigns. We have received a micro-grant from Ecoversities Alliance for our outreach activities (EE Webinars), which are key for building our customer base; and for our upcoming research trip to explore the most innovative learning centers in Egypt and the UK. Looking forward, we will be the training provider for the next cohort of education change-makers selected by Ashoka Mexico. We are also exploring partnerships with various universities in Latin America and other foundations to make our program accessible to more educators.