What is the name of your organization?
Koloso Application Technology Zambia Limited
What is the name of your solution?
Koloso - insights for change
Provide a one-line summary or tagline for your solution.
Generating, analysing and transforming learning data into real-time, actionable insights to improve learning outcomes
In what city, town, or region is your solution team headquartered?
Lusaka, Zambia
In what country is your solution team headquartered?
Zambia
What type of organization is your solution team?
For-profit, including B-Corp or similar models
Film your elevator pitch.
What specific problem are you solving?
Zambia's education system is failing our children - too many children leave, or drop out of school without essential foundational learning. The learning poverty rate here in Zambia is reported as 99%, and across sub-Saharan Africa it is estimated at 80%.
“The foundational learning crisis in Africa is significantly compounded by the lack of systematic and frequent assessments to effectively measure foundational learning outcomes” (UNESCO). Key players in national education systems across sub-Saharan Africa don’t have access to the real-time, actionable learning insights they need to make the most of limited resources, and play their role in improving educational attainment:
* Teachers need individual and class learning data to identify learning gaps and target instruction where it is most needed.
* Parents need to know how their child is progressing towards learning objectives to offer effective encouragement and support.
* School principals need class performance and progress data to be able to guide and support their staff, and to manage their schools for improved results.
* Governments need to have big picture data to implement and assess the effects of policy decisions at a national level.
Solving this problem is a vital step towards “Africa rising”.
What is your solution?
Koloso is a low-data, affordable Zambian solution for an African problem, that rests on the simple hypothesis that access to reliable, real-time learning data is critical to any functional educational system.
The foundation of Koloso is the daily, two-minute, ten-question quiz for students that we use to acquire learning data. The quiz is compiled from our database - questions coded to the school curriculum, and selected according to the child’s grade, and the class teaching plan.
As children play Koloso games, they generate learning data, 1) Accuracy: If an answer is right or wrong, and which incorrect answer was selected, and 2) Responsiveness: How long it took to answer each question and to complete the quiz.
Data is analysed and transformed into actionable insights, presented through a dashboard for teachers, parents, students and policy makers - fostering a growth mindset among both students and teachers.
Our planned AI integration will make it even easier for everyone to interpret and use data by selecting and adapting suggested interventions.
Koloso facilitates and encourages data-driven systemic change at micro-, meso- and macro-levels of education systems.
Product video: https://youtu.be/3_KM8CCNo-c?si=C0E9wQ-YdSB7nQG4
Who does your solution serve, and in what ways will the solution impact their lives?
Koloso could serve the majority of the 400 million school-age children in sub-Saharan Africa who are currently being failed by national education systems, and largely ignored by commercial edtech providers.
We recognise that infrastructure constraints mean that we cannot reach all of these children immediately, but data and device availability is expanding rapidly. Our approach is to design for the frontier and not allow the perfect be the enemy of the good. If we can reach and impact the lives of a significant proportion of the population today - tens of millions of children - then that is enough reason to start work now, rather than wait for an ideal moment.
Koloso will provide the real-time, reliable, learning data-driven insights that teachers, parents, principals and governments need to guide action:
* Teachers - able to track performance and progress of every child to target instruction;
* Parents - knowing how their child is doing at school to support and encourage accordingly;
* School principals - able to manage their schools, and guide their staff, to improve results; and
* Governments - able to monitor the effects of their actions and resource allocation decisions.
