Goal: Develop an online module for Learning Links Foundation’s Student Teacher Empowerment Program.
Background: In India, over 50% of class 10 students are reading below grade level and only 16% of grade 10 students achieved grade-level competency in Mathematics (the National Achievement Survey 2015).
Partner: Learning Links Foundation is one of the largest and most respected education enhancement and skill-building organizations in India and has one of the largest teacher professional development networks in India. They have served over 15 million students, 2.2. million teachers, and 34,000 school leaders. One of their flagship programs is STEP (Student Teacher Empowerment Program), which provides teacher capacity enhancement, classroom observation of teachers, and personalized mentoring post-observation. Capacity enhancement is resource-intensive, and thus has minimal scope for replicability and scale. Introducing a technology solution, such as a massive open online course (MOOC) to address this challenge could be a game-changer that would increase the number of teachers reached. 99% of teachers have smartphones supported by last mile connectivity (3G/4G) in India. In geographically remote and challenging areas, this could unleash options for teachers and schools.
Project: A Team4Tech team of Pure Storage employees supported Learning Links by transforming their Student & Teacher Empowerment Program (STEP) into a digital format. LLF’s field staff is excited to test the platform with teachers in rural partner schools to gather feedback and make adjustments over the upcoming months. The goal is to create an effective learning management platform for Learning Links to use for future teaching training so they can reach even more teachers in rural areas of India.