In November 2025, Team4Tech wrapped up our latest skills-based volunteering project in partnership with the Cadence Giving Foundations and Bindi International. Over ten weeks, 11 employee volunteers from Cadence worked closely with Bindi’s education and content teams to co-design sustainable technology solutions that strengthen digital learning and amplify rural voices.
The project focused on two essential areas:
- Building a stronger monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system for Bindi’s Digital Community Schools
- Expanding the organization’s capacity to create AI-assisted, local-language educational videos for rural audiences
The result is a set of sustainable, user-friendly tools that will help Bindi scale its programs, strengthen staff capacity, and expand educational access for more than 1,200 learners across 19 states.
Bindi International: Building Community-Based Digital Skills in Rural Areas
Across rural India, many students face barriers that go far beyond the classroom. Limited access to technology, unreliable connectivity, and a lack of localized educational content make it difficult for learners to build the digital and employability skills needed for today’s workforce. Bindi International is a grassroots organization demonstrating that with the right tools, training, and support, it’s possible to open new pathways to opportunity.
Bindi operates at the intersection of education, livelihoods, and vocational training. Their work includes:
- Digital Community Schools: Solar-powered learning hubs providing digital literacy, sustainability education, and life skills in remote areas.
- Rural Media Program: Local-language educational videos created by a small but talented media team to amplify rural voices and share critical information.
Bindi’s strength lies in their deep community roots and focus on self-sufficiency and sustainability among the rural poor. Many of their educators and content creators come from the communities they serve, making their programs both responsive and culturally relevant.
Team4Tech has partnered with Bindi since 2022, supporting their goals around enhancing digital participation, integrating innovative applications, and scaling their operations.
The Cadence Volunteers Behind the Work
Team4Tech and the Cadence Giving Foundation brought together skilled employee volunteers from India, Brazil, the UK, Germany, Italy, and the U.S. to support Bindi with this work.
Cadence has teams all over the world working on all sorts of different projects. But that often feels extremely siloed. I can now put a face and name to many of the Cadence offices and projects that were completely abstract to me before.”
— Liam Collins, Cadence Volunteer
As part of the program, Team4Tech’s expert staff led volunteers through a leadership development curriculum to help them build skills in human-centered design, cross-cultural collaboration, and decision-making.
Over two months of collaboration, the team:
- Conducted discovery sessions to understand Bindi’s workflows and challenges
- Prototyped and tested tools with Bindi teachers and staff
- Iterated based on real-time feedback
- Traveled to Kishangarh for two weeks of in-person collaboration, training, and implementation
Strengthening Monitoring & Evaluation
Before the project, Bindi’s M&E processes were largely fragmented and dispersed across multiple channels.
- Attendance was tracked through a single, crowded WhatsApp group
- Teachers recorded information in different formats and at irregular intervals due to low connectivity
- Reporting across different Digital Community Schools was inconsistent
These existing challenges made it difficult for Bindi staff to track updates and learner progress. The Cadence M&E subteam worked closely with Bindi to build a simple, scalable, and offline-friendly system that aligns with the realities of rural classrooms.
Key Deliverables
- Organized WhatsApp Community Structure
- Instead of one large group, volunteers created a structured system of WhatsApp communities organized by topic and state. This reduces message clutter and helps staff easily locate information from each school.
- Streamlined Assessment Tracking Form
- A user-friendly form now allows teachers to enter student assessment data quickly and consistently. It automatically formats information for analysis and generates clear student reports. Teachers can also upload optional images via Google Drive for documentation.
- Offline Attendance Tracking App
- Given spotty connectivity in rural Kishangarh, the volunteers designed an attendance tool that works even when teachers are offline. Data syncs once a connection is available, ensuring seamless usage in low-bandwidth environments.
Together, these systems will help Bindi manage program quality more effectively, support teachers, and gain clearer insights into student learning.
Expanding AI-Assisted Educational Content
Bindi’s Rural Media Centre plays a vital role in sharing knowledge with rural audiences through local-language videos. Topics include agriculture, health, sustainability, gender equity, and community leadership. However, with only two staff members producing content, the team needed improved workflows and training in accessible animation tools.
Key Deliverables
- Step-by-Step Animation & AI Documentation
- Volunteers created detailed guides for prompt engineering, animation workflows, lip-sync techniques, and graphic preparation. These resources allow the Bindi team to independently create polished videos long after the project ends.
- Hands-On Training Sessions
- Bindi’s media staff received training on:
- AI tools for visual creation
- Basic and intermediate animation techniques
- Prompt engineering
- Bindi’s media staff received training on:
- Research on Open-Source, Offline-Friendly Tools
- The team identified three animation platforms that meet Bindi’s unique constraints, including limited bandwidth and the need for free, open-source tools. The improved workflows will help Bindi produce more high-quality educational videos, expanding their reach and amplifying rural perspectives.
Collaboration and Cultural Exchange in Kishangarh
During the two-week on-site phase, Cadence volunteers and Bindi staff worked side-by-side to finalize solutions, test tools, and plan for long-term sustainability. The experience was strengthened by shared cultural moments that deepened relationships and reinforced the trust and collaboration at the heart of this partnership.
[Team4Tech] provides a great opportunity to rediscover yourself and believe in your capabilities to do something impactful. As an individual it gave me confidence to take up the tasks which I have never done before and put my effort to reach the goal. This is the biggest takeaway for me and it could change my perspectives in many aspects of my life. Building up this level of confidence is necessary to shine in every aspect of life and I feel this is important.”
— Mounika Kallakola, Cadence Volunteer
What Comes Next
The project created tangible, human-centered impact: teachers will now have easier ways to record attendance and assessments, school staff will have clearer insights to strengthen school operations, and Bindi’s training and content team will be equipped to produce higher-quality educational videos more efficiently.
Technical support provided by Team4Tech helped us adopt technologies to capture real-time data, and the creation of impactful content will further strengthen our evidence-based program designing and reach out to larger populations.”
—Paramjeet Kaur, Training Program Head, Bindi International
In the months ahead, Bindi plans to roll out these tools across additional school sites, expand their library of AI-assisted educational content, and share their learnings with the broader Team4Tech Community of Practice, ensuring that the benefits of this collaboration continue to grow well beyond the project itself.
This project marks Team4Tech’s third skills-based volunteering program supporting Bindi International, and our second project bringing Bindi staff and Cadence employees together. Skills-based volunteering programs are just one element of Team4Tech’s accelerator model, building the capacity and accelerating the impact of community-based organizations worldwide. Learn more about how Team4Tech supports NGOs around the world.