Arrival Education (London, UK)

Theme: The Employability Gap, Social Mobility, Social change through human development.

Objective [+/-]

  • To create Arrival Education is a globally recognised brand providing students from disadvantaged communities in the UK and around the world with the personal and professional training and development to become the next generation of economic and social wealth creators
  • For Arrival Education's 4-year Social & Business Leaders Programme to become a recognised brand like Harvard MBA for employers looking to hire the best talent from the most challenging communities.

 

Customers [+/-]

  • Schools - We work with schools located in urban communities who might face any of the following challenges:

- Student and/or parental disengagement in the value of education and qualifications (showing up in poor attendance and attainment).
- Student personal/life challenges - often the students don't have a great home life or have had some pretty damaging experiences in the UK or overseas.
- Lack of ability to provide their students with any top-level business engagement.

 

  • Businesses - We work with businesses/sectors that wish:

- To help directly provide a solution to the social mobility and employability skills gap - without waiting for government - and without having to commit massive resources to the solution.
- Provide real-life learning & development opportunities for their staff.
- Create employee engagement.
- Provide low-risk community engagement activity that is time-light and highly managed.
- Develop a pipeline of genuine future talent at a very low cost per head These businesses are not interested in box-ticking - they want to provide real-life learning and development programmes for staff.

Essential qualities [+/-]

Most of the Essential Qualities - which Arrival Education call 'Success Skills'™ - the attitudes and abilities that young people need to achieve in life.
Key to the development of these Qualities is Daniel Snell's belief that "everyone has talent and ability, which when given the right environment, encouragement, credence and respect, can flourish and help the individual develop a genuine sense of themselves and their own voice, thereby making a positive difference to society".

Overview of Activities [+/-]

AE designs programmes and creates its own materials.
Students are not assessed in a formal way.
Recruits, trains and employs a network of freelance facilitators.
Delivers its own programmes - using sponsoring business's facilities.
Developing an e-learning platform for both adults and young people.
ROI measured by grade increase, attendance and behaviour in schools and volunteer feedback led evaluation in businesses.

  • 'Success for Life'

Whilst the AE is increasingly asked to design bespoke solutions for organisations, our core business is developing our four-year Social and Business Leaders Programme, currently called 'Success for Life':

A four-year talent development programme for young people from challenging inner-city communities to develop the capacities and skills to be successful in any area of work/life.

Who: The 20 most influential students from a Yr10 group within a school, some doing well academically others on the edge of exclusion.


How: Stage 1: Students are taken out of school and are given an intensive 5-day foundation programme where they visit different businesses, hear from top business people about their journey and undergo a rigorous, challenging personal leadership and behaviour change programme.


Stage 2: Students who successfully complete the foundation programme can apply for the second stage which lasts 12 months and where all activities are conducted out of school hours. This is a credits based programme comprising evening, weekend and holiday workshops covering the range of Success Skills™ and knowledge specific programmes (e.g. GCSE Success) that students can eventually run back in their school for peers not on the programme.
Students also create and deliver community success projects to resolve issues within the school and if they have demonstrated they are coachable and reliable, are partnered with a volunteer coach at one of 'Success for life' partner businesses.


Stages 3 & 4: Following the successful completion of the second stage, students can apply for the third and fourth stages, which also run for 12 months each. In these stages students are tasked to create and implement successful social change businesses - building on the 'projects' started in Stage 2, demonstrate genuine lasting positive impact in their community and develop the soft skills required for life and work success. At the end of the four years students will be either supported to scale-up their businesses, heading to top 20 universities or will have been recruited directly into one of our network of partner organisations on a fast-track development programme.

  • The Green Talent Fellowship programme

Created to engage young people on 'Success for Life' in the challenge of climate change, demonstrate how businesses are helping society overcome those challenges and to have them see the potential career opportunities available to them in this growth sector.
This programme comprises a 3-day visit at the Eden Project in Cornwall and a 3-day visit to a leading business in order to understand the way they were engaging in the challenge of climate change and helping society adapt.
The programme concludes with a 2 day debrief culminating in a presentation to business people.

 

Background and People [+/-]

Arrival Education is the collective vision of Daniel Snell (Founder) and Emily Shenton (M.D.). They have commercial experience in the media, the City and blue-chip FMCG marketing. The Arrival team have over twenty years of successful small business experience, training delivery, and change management consultancy as well as extensive experience of working with young people, senior executives, teachers and the government.

Results Delivered [+/-]

Arrival Education has completed five of its courses in 2008 for 100 students from across London and the south-east. 50 students are now developing their 'Success Skills' in partnership with some of the UK's leading organizations. In 2009 they are working with 300 students, and aim to work with 2000 students in 2013."(http://www.youngfoundation.org/home/themes/arrival-education).

The Arrival Education programmes have a 90% positive feedback from students across all key criteria and 85%+ positive feedback from businesses in terms of 'staff development in areas such as coaching skills, relationship building skills, leadership, and development and communication skills. Daniel Snell describes the feedback received from businesses in his blog "I was very impressed with the students yesterday both in relation to their presentation skills and their self awareness. Given that these were kids who used to cause trouble in class and not listen to anyone, it says a lot about the program run by Arrival to see the progress that had been made." http://arrivalworldwide.blogspot.com/

Worked with over 600 students now, and have delivered over 40 different programmes, we've delivered over 1000 participation experiences and we've worked in 6 cities (in the UK) so far.
"I was very impressed with the students yesterday both in relation to their presentation skills and their self awareness. Given that these were kids who used to cause trouble in class and not listen to anyone, it says a lot about the program run by Arrival to see the progress that had been made."

Looking forward: [+/-]

  • Challenges overcome

Developing a business model that doesn't rely on Government grants and dealing with the complexity of managing social impact while having a scalable business model.

  • What is needed to scale up:

- increase sales effectiveness (to corporates and schools)
- a formal assessment of the Success for Life program
- web site re-done
- a film to act as a sales tool
- money to employ sales people and good delivery people for both young people programs and adult support.
- development of l&d programmes for businesses and individuals
- reduce reliance on Daniel Snell as a facilitator
- increase pool of facilitators
- a formal Train the Trainer qualification
- share a pool of facilitators
- increase value to students
- a portal for the current students and alumni
- a permanent space to run programmes in
- a qualification for students who pass the programme
- a qualification for students who want to become facilitators / teachers - cf teach for America model
- train students to deliver programmes back to their peers and develop content for e-learning portal
- create new programmes
- help in building a solution to the UK's schools absenteeism problem
- help defining a new Green Experience programme (For which there may be 10k students needing to participate over the next 3 years)
- for business talent: develop adult led offerings that engage students in development.
- Curriculum development for the 4year program for students to reach the point where they can genuinely compete for the top jobs with students from the top private schools/ top global universities and the capacity to deliver on these programs.
- Internationalize
- franchise

 

 

 

Gilda Elizabeth Henriquez Darlas, CIDEL Foundation (Mexico, DF)

Theme: Education Reform

Objective [+/-]

"Universal Education Model for Children in Ethical Development" (CIDEL) aims to tackle intolerance and conflict that arise from moral and cultural relativism. I believe that many conflicts, from large-scale military campaigns between nations to small-scale arguments within families, arise because people believe in their idea of truth and are disinterested in differing perspectives. Often, when people discover that their views are incompatible, social conflicts may arise, unless they are able to learn from such different views, empathize with one another, and resolve their differences with wisdom.

I am convinced that all children have the potential to develop, Empathy, Compassion and Wisdom if only given the opportunity to do so, being this the most fundamental purpose of our model from where we can create Universal Values as the basis for the developmnet of our ethical behavior.

Years of work in the development of consciousness and cognitive structure of the mind led me to wonder how formal education facilitates human beings to develop the ability to empathize and make ethical decisions with wisdom and compassion. After extensive studies, I created the educational platform that aims to instill empathy, compassion, and reflective thinking in young children. This platform, known as "Universal Education for Ethical Development", builds children's inter-subjective social and emotional skills in the classroom and complements this by also working with teachers and parents. This innovative model enables children to make their own ethical decisions based on Inter-subjective understanding of the relations with one another, rather than teach, transfer or inculcate specific set of values.

From a pedagogical perspective, I argue that moral and cultural relativism is the result of educational methods that attempt to teach values which reflect a particular context or worldview, whether a specific religion, philosophy, socioeconomic, or cultural background. At best, this leads to the internalization of values that mirror a highly specific view of reality; at worst, it imposes certain ethical and moral norms on teachers and students, and prevents them from developing the empathy, wisdom, and compassion that are necessary for genuine universal values.

I would like to see the model being implemented across the globe and see how humans start interacting with more wisdom and compassion.

Customers [+/-]

The main customers are schools and institutions relating to education.

Essential qualities [+/-]

  • Empathy (Thoughtfulness)
  • Compassion (Helpfulness)
  • Assertiveness (Self assurance)
  • Communication (Self expression, Independent thinking)
  • Wisdom

Overview of Activities [+/-]

  • Social need

Our model tackles the very root of many social problems such as; violence, intolerance, crime and poverty. We believe that all these issues are the result of a very poor human development in our current education systems. Hence our model is trying to work with the very root of these issues by installing a platform in the mind of children were wisdom and compassion are the bases from where they will interact later on. Therefore we could say that our model is a preventive system more than a corrective one.

  • Programme design

We design our entire program and our techniques are unique since we base the whole learning process in projects, reality performance and simulators. We are the first to create and use educative simulators, which are not computerized and pioneers in its field of Universal ethical development.

  • Teachers

Our foundation was created with the intention to guard, implement and expand the model. Therefore, it is the foundation's responsibility to deliver, train and certify the schools and Institutions. We have a pool of trainers in each country were we are present. The school and I certify our trainees and the trainees certify institutions. The trainees have to be educators with teaching experience.

  • Students

We don´t target students, we target schools. In some countries we offer the model by going to school by school or sometimes we offer it through large organizations like for example Kellogg.

  • Programme delivery

Once the model is accepted in a school or institution, we train the teachers for 2 weeks. After this time, we help them with the initial implementation of the program, creating model classes. Every year we run a set of tests to show the school how the program is changing children's attitudes. Once the full model is implemented, the schools run it independently and we normally follow thisup with a visit once per year in order to collect data and feedback from them.

  • Student assessment

The foundation's own tools assess students, generally being the simulators we have created. The simulator´s main purpose is to push the children into different real life situations where they could experience their ethical reactions. Unfortunately, there are no tests for universal values or wisdom or compassion therefore, we create our own testing tools.

  • Student progression

The progression of the students is based in a simulated life experience (simulators) were they can sense and realize how their attitudes are changing and transforming. The simulators are used once a year so the students can see their progress. At the same time, they have projects that involve family and communities and through those, they sense their empathy and compassion for others.

  • ROI

Our impact is measured mainly by the children´s impact in their families and communities. The way we measure this is by tests to family and friends and by evidence presented directly by the schoolteachers or by the parents. We interview them once a year and our tests run once a year with pilot and control groups.

  • Quality Assurance

Academic people do our work and we make sure we work together with the academia in our research programs, which all perfectly balance between academic research and empirical work. The universities working with us are leading universities in the fields we address in our model. All our findings are the results of this conjoint effort and works of academic research.

  • Infrastructure

In general we don´t use technology for applying the model but we use computers for the research and control of the pilot programs as well as for allowing people to know who we are and what we do through the internet.

Background and People [+/-]

I was born and raised in Mexico City. From a young age, I developed an interest in the impact that religion had on people's behavior. However, since I knew I wanted financial stability in my life, I yielded to my father's exhortations that I should study computer engineering at the prestigious Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. After graduation, I moved to Europe to pursue job opportunities and to specialize in artificial intelligence at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid.

After a couple of years in Spain, I moved to England to learn English and seek work. I worked for several years for major multinational corporations and decided to become a naturalized British citizen to facilitate my access to all of Europe. Although my professional career was advancing rapidly, I recall that I felt an emptiness that simply could not dismiss. I became a freelance contractor and worked six months of the year; traveling the world during the other six months.

My travels throughout Asia in particular awakened a long-latent interest in human development. I felt particularly inspired by a stay at a Buddhist monastery in Nepal, where I discovered that the answers to questions that had always puzzled me as an artificial intelligence specialist -- questions about the formation of ethical standards and behavior -- had existed for centuries in the form of East Asian philosophy. On an especially formative visit to India, I met a monk in Varanasi who encouraged me to study ancient Indian philosophy and human cognition. On the same trip, I met an Englishman named Jeffrey who convinced me of the importance of applying my findings and conclusions to children's education and proposed the idea of opening a school together in India, which we opened in Bodgaya in 1998.

As the effectiveness of the Universal Education model became increasingly clear to me in the Bodgaya School, I realized that I needed to further my studies in philosophy and pedagogy to systematize my work and make it replicable, so I enrolled in a graduate program in Religion, studies and Philosophy at the University of Lancaster in England. I continued to have a hand in running the Bodgaya school along with Jeffrey, frequently traveling between England and India to apply what I was learning at Lancaster to our elementary school in India. I also entered a Master's program at Varanassi University to study Oriental Philosophy which enormously helped to shape the model. Throughout this time, I was conscious of balancing my academic research and classroom learning with real-world applications in my newfound role as an educator.

Over time, it became clear that the children in the Bodgaya School were developing tolerance and empathy without their teachers ever having to explain such concepts. Around the same time, I enrolled in a pre-doctoral program at the University of Hong Kong to synthesize all of my theoretical and practical knowledge into the cohesive platform I now promote worldwide: Universal Education for ethical development. After speaking at a conference in Vienna, Dr. Ferrer approached me; impressed by the early results from the Indian school, he expressed UNESCO's interest to support the Universal Education model. This interest prompted me to launch my current international pilot program in multiple cultural and socioeconomic contexts.

In August 2006, I decided to establish a formal citizen organization, Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo Educativo para Latinoamérica (CIDEL) -- Center for Investigation and Educational Development for Latin America, in Guatemala with the goal to make "Universal Education for Ethical Development" a financially independent and sustainable program. CIDEL's principal objectives are to generate income for "Universal Education for Ethical Development" and to spread the "Universal Education for Ethical Development" model to other sectors, such as business, government, and international organizations, thereby creating revenue for to implement "Universal Education for Ethical Development" in primary schools.

In 2007, I established a similar organization, the Fundación de Investigación y Desarrollo Educativo A.C. (Foundation for Investigation and Educational Development) in Mexico City to support "Universal Education for Ethical Development"'s expansion in Mexico. As of the end of 2007 CIDEL generated revenue to cover approximately 25 percent of The model's operating costs in Guatemala, while the Fundación de Investigación y Desarrollo Educativo A.C. generated revenue to cover approximately 10 percent of the model's operating costs in Mexico. I am sponsoring the rest.

Results Delivered [+/-]

We have implemented the model in 5 countries so far: India, China, Honduras, Mexico and Guatemala. The implementation was the result of a three years research program aiming to prove that the model works regardless of culture, social context and religious background. Our evidence is the children at the participating schools as well as all the videos and papers collected and systematized during the research. The main results will be published in London very soon.

Supporting Materials [+/-]

Our web site www.cidelatinoamerica.org presents material, videos and photos illustrating our work.

Looking forward: [+/-]

  • Challenges overcome

People´s awareness. In general, people do not relate social problems with human development and if they do, in general they try to blind themselves with solutions such as value systems or anything that is relative to that particular context. In general ignorance regarding brain functions or consciousness development or the construction of thoughts and emotions as well as the neuron function of the brain, are the main issues that stop people from understanding what needs to be educated and therefore our main challenge ahead.

  • What is needed to scale up

The main area for us is to create awareness in order to create the space where we can show what has been done and the results. Therefore, our main need relates to communication and how to be present in forums. At the same time, we need more organizations to join us in this incredible educational revolution.

  • Comments/ideas

Our model does not have a cost, the only charge is the training and the material since we believe the model belongs to all of us.

 

Interhigh (South Wales, UK)

Theme: Internet schooling, a fresh approach to learning.

Objective [+/-]

Our objective is to address the lack of choice and flexibility in education and the need for alternative learning provision. Our goal is for students, families and LEAs to benefit from our service.
Our ambition is to introduce the service to state and independent schools and tutors, for their own white labelled use, in the next 12 to 18 months.

Customers [+/-]

Our principal customers are families for whom something in their education has "gone wrong".
We also serve LEAS, schools and organisations and businesses supporting children and families.

Essential qualities [+/-]

We develop all Essential Qualities such as Self- Assurance, Inquisitiveness, Dependability and Thoughtfulness. We believe that judgment and decision making are also essential and could be incorporated in Dependability.

Overview of Activities [+/-]

  • Social need

Social need is addressed by involving the whole family and the flexibility of our service to meet the individual need. Cultural issues are addressed by the accessibility of the concept and the idea of individual control and responsibility. Our ecological responsibility is fulfilled by Interhigh probably being the most eco logical school on the planet!

  • Programme design

Our programmes are created by teachers and they are organic from pupils and parents. The pupil and parent input and solicited views in our programme design make it innovative.
We define our learning objectives and create curricula based on national curriculum and then demand led. We also define Essential qualities in our learning objectives.

  • 'Teachers'

Our programmes are delivered by teachers, authors, celebrities, organisation leaders and practitioners. The concept and culture 'attracts' certain people who bring innovation in our programme delivery.
We recruit our deliverers by always actively searching for interesting and interested people, and communicators. We continually train and support these deliverers in house and by means of the internet, press, events and campaigns.

  • Students

We find students through Google and other websites, word of mouth and organisation referral. We recruit and support our students in house through continual online access. Students can access our work through LEA Sponsorship, charity and private fees. We recruit students from the world, making our work truly international.
Programme delivery
Our programmes are delivered online during academic term times. We have created a fully interactive school online.

  • Student assessment

Students are assessed by teachers, exam Boards, pastoral staff, each other, parents, external supporters. We find that students assessing each other and the involvement of a parent or an original learning provider, to be an innovative form of assessment.
We assess student participation, interaction, behaviour, responses, communication choices, exams and homework.
Assessment is continual and takes place in all virtual environments.

  • Student progression

We help students apply their learning in the real world by advocating no real delineation between learning and real world. All communities of Intehigh are continually involved in student progression online.

  • ROI

We measure our work through feedback, results, progression, happiness and fulfilment.
We use Open Forum, questionnaires and personal interviews and apply our findings by feeding them directly into our service. We bring innovation into measuring our work by looking at the whole picture.

  • Quality Assurance

We assure the quality of our work by ODLQC, written schemes of work, open feedback not a system, sql databases with strict activity protocols and external inspections. This is done by LEAS and various organisations worldwide. It takes place constantly online, through interviews and at students' homes, schools and centres.
The world-wide authority inspections undertaken for individual pupils reach potentially 500 per year.

  • Infrastructure

We use all media related technology in our work and accessibility is a crucial part of our success. Infrastructure such as Broadband and communication, stability in politics in UK and countries not in unrest are also crucial in out success.
Interhigh's innovation lies in that Technology is now reproducing something that always otherwise done physically.

Background and People [+/-]

Paul Daniell started to develop the concept as a result of the very obvious need he experienced as a teacher. The concept has grown organically since its inception in 2003.
The key people involved are Paul and Jacqueline Daniell and Anderson Baille.
For the first 18 months, funding was from personal finances and now it is self funding from fees charged.

Results Delivered [+/-]

The impact of our work is evident when students start enjoying the experience of learning and school. Also, when students are ready to re enter formal education and take qualifications.

Looking forward: [+/-]

  • Challenges overcome

The initial challenge was staff recruitment. Now, it is the staff selection process on developed staff. Challenges such as Broadband instabilities have now transformed in developing carefully specified software. A challenge we have not yet overcome is finding available exam centers while it is an ongoing challenge to sustain the fresh approach for students outside Interhigh.

  • What is needed to scale up


We need general awareness, political acceptance and support in order to increase our impact.
We believe more young people will benefit as the community expands and it will reduce reluctance due to fear.

  • Comments/ Ideas

The Interhigh concept very much depends on, promotes and is great evidence of:
- the desire to learn
- independent learning by choice
- pupils making that decision for themselves
- offering mutual support through its community

 

Teach A Man To Fish (United Kingdom)

Theme: Financially Sustainable Schools for Entrepreneurs

Objective [+/-]

We believe that education is the key to tackling global poverty. At the same time we challenge traditional education as we know it. We want to eliminate the problem of limited access and bad quality of education in developing countries. Our organization helps young people from poor families across Africa, Asia and South America to get the quality education they deserve.
Teach A Man To Fish's Financially Sustainable Schools for Entrepreneurs aim to provide young people with the skills and knowledge needed for economic success in an institution which is financially sustainable through enterprise rather than relying on fees.

Goals

  • Creating 100% financially sustainable schools across developing countries - the key indicator of success is the income generated by the school businesses (both as an absolute figure and as a percentage of expenditure).
  • Providing students with relevant education and practical skills - the key indicator of success are students' achievements (proven understanding of both the theoretical and practical principles behind running a successful business, measured using standardized tests and continuous assessment).
  • Ensuring economic benefits to students - the key indicator of success is the income level of graduates measured relative to the baseline study control group.

Our mission is to make a long term impact on global poverty by supporting education projects in developing countries to generate sustainable livelihoods - giving young people the skills to help themselves.
We aim to inspire revolution in education in developing countries. At the end of 2007 Teach a Man to Fish and our sister organization Fundación Paraguaya launched the "50 Schools in 10 Years" commitment, a project to implement the basic methodology and organizational structure of the first Financially Sustainable School in Paraguay in 50 other locations in Latin America and around the world by the year 2017. This commitment was made to the Clinton Global Initiative and it is the first step to revolution in education in developing countries.

In the future Teach A Man To Fish plans also to:

  • Roll out an accreditation system which has recently been piloted.
  • Develop distance-learning courses for partner organizations on the implementation of our model.
  • Create additional locally adaptable tools & processes to allow partners to benefit from international best practice as far as possible.

Customers [+/-]

Our principle customers are students living in developing countries. We target students from low-income families, especially from rural areas of extreme poverty in Africa, South America and Asia.

Our other stakeholders are families of our students, the local communities, other development organizations operating in these communities, ministries of education.

Essential qualities [+/-]

We are especially committed to fostering students' entrepreneurship and 'can-do attitude'.


We also aim to develop Essential Qualities, with special focus on:

  • Self assurance - resourcefulness, self expression
  • Inquisitiveness - curiosity, imagination, independent thinking
  • Dependability - responsibility, trustworthiness, commitment, initiative
  • Thoughtfulness - tolerance, respectfulness

Overview of Activities [+/-]

  • Social need

Our core principles are:

  • Students welfare
  • High educational standards
  • Empowering the disadvantaged students from low income families
  • Environmental sustainability
  • Financial Sustainability

We are committed to:

  • Local ownership
  • Transparency
  • Equality
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Innovation


The innovation that distinguishes Teach a Man to Fish is in our approach to financial sustainability of schools. Our schools teach business through running their own businesses. These school enterprises - from beekeeping to carpentry workshops - earn the schools money, which covers facilities and teaching costs. Over time the schools become financially self-sufficient, meaning even the poorest kids can attend for free. We call this model 'Education That Pays For Itself'.

 

  • Programme design

Our schools create our programmes in partnership with representatives of local communities and community-based organizations.

We create curricula by combining national curricula focused on general education with field-based classes where students learn how the theoretical concepts work in practice and how to use them. We define learning objectives in curricula, as well as in our business studies.

Our innovative model combines teaching agriculture and business skills within school-owned enterprises.
Students firstly learn the underlying concepts of business and agricultural activities alongside general education. Then during field-based classes they learn how these concepts work in practice and how to use them. Thanks to the ''learning by doing'' approach they gain the practical technical skills needed to master each discipline. Rotating through the school's business units, students specialize and take on greater responsibilities. Finally, they are taught how to manage financial transactions, monitor profitability, learn to market and sell their produce. At the end of this education students receive a nationally-recognized High School Degree.

 

  • Teachers

Our programmes are delivered by teachers and production managers that we recruit, train and support locally.
Headmasters of local schools are responsible for recruiting and training teachers where our projects are based, eg. Bolivia, Nicaragua, Uganda and Kenya.

 

  • Students

We find and recruit students from local communities. We support them by improving access to education (we aim to provide education for the poorest kids for free) as well as by improving the quality of education. We pay special attention to 'Learning by doing' methodology which aims to equip students for life with the skills they need to help themselves in the future.
Students are supported by local staff - headmasters, teachers, Teach A Man To Fish Field Officers. The ways kids are supported are consulted with the Teach A Man To Fish headquarters staff.

Students are recruited before the academic year and are supported by our staff during the whole year. This is done mainly locally, in the places where our projects are based.
Students pay low fees for studying at our schools. Once the school is 100% financially sustainable, the aim of the school is to provide education for the poorest students for free. We work with local schools, so students from the local communities should not have any problems with physical access to the school. Students get access to our work mainly during the academic year, but because the businesses are run constantly, they have access to our work during the whole year.


The innovative way of supporting our students is the 'Education That Pays For Itself' concept. It shows that:

  • Schools can be financially self-sufficient without charging fees
  • It is possible to run schools which pay for themselves through teaching entrepreneurship within real school-owned businesses that generate real profits.

 

  • Programme delivery

Our programmes are delivered through our partnerships with local organizations. Teach A Man To Fish is committed to local ownership, which means that schools always retain full control of how their activities are run. This is why they also manage the delivery of programmes.
Our programmes are delivered at our school projects during the academic year.
The innovation in our programme delivery is that we combine providing general education with teaching students practical skills within the school - owned businesses.

 

  • Student assessment

Students are assessed by teachers on the daily basis and at national exams.
We assess students during exams, which are both theoretical and practical.
Students are assessed according to national schedule of examinations and the exams took place at schools.
What is innovative about the way in which we assess students is that our exams are not only theoretical, but also practical.

 

  • Student progression

It is our main goal to equip students for life and provide them with practical skills that will enable them to continue education, find a job or successfully run the family farms.
Teachers and production managers support students' real life learning throughout the academic year both in the classroom and on the production sites.
What is innovative about the way in which we enable student progression is that we develop a broad range of skills, not only at classes but also by organizing competitions for students or inviting guest speakers to schools.

 

  • ROI

Our key indicators of success are:

  • Financial sustainability - Income generated by the school businesses (both as an absolute figure and as a percentage of expenditure).
  • Technical skills and academic achievement of students - Proven understanding of both the theoretical and practical principles behind running a successful business, measured using standardized tests and continuous assessment.
  • Economic benefits to students - Income level of graduates measured relative to the baseline study control group.

The metrics we use include:

  • Graduate surveys, progression of students' career or / and their further studies
  • Financial monitoring tools

We make continuous improvements by applying lessons learned, conducting project evaluations and building of replication materials.

 

  • Quality Assurance

We assure the quality of our work on the basis of feedback from our students and their families, as well as other communities' representatives. For the purposes of replication of our model, we established a school accreditation process. It aims to assure the quality of each of our schools.
Local staff supported by the Teach A Man To Fish headquarters staff, continually strive to ensure the quality of our work.

 

  • Infrastructure

We use agricultural technological practices, including technologies that are essential for our income generating activities.
Technology is important, because it enables us to increase income and achieve the financial sustainability of our schools.
School infrastructure, production infrastructure are also important to the success of our work.

 

Background and People [+/-]

We are a young organisation. Teach A Man To Fish was founded by Nik Kafka in 2006.
The history of Teach A Man To Fish is closely connected with Fundacion Paraguaya - our sister organisation based in Paraguay. The common agenda of Teach A Man To Fish and Fundacion Paraguaya is combating poverty through high quality, financially sustainable education.
Fundacion Paraguaya is a non-profit social enterprise, which develops innovative solutions to poverty and unemployment in Paraguay. It was Fundacion Paraguaya that established the first financially self-sufficient school in Latin America. Teach A Man To Fish is laying the foundations for international replication of the Financially Sustainable School model.

The key person is Nik Kafka, Managing Director of Teach A Man To Fish. Leaving a successful banking career in the City of London for a local microfinance institution in Paraguay, Nik discovered an innovative school aiming not only to teach the poor how to become rural entrepreneurs, but to do so as a self-financing social enterprise. Having helped transform this school into a replicable model, and realising the huge potential for funding education through enterprise rather than charity, he returned to the UK to found Teach A Man To Fish.
Outside of the field of education, Nik is committed to supporting social change more broadly and is currently a trustee of BOND, the leading network of UK non-profit organizations working in international development.
He holds a first-class BSc in Chemistry from the University of Bristol, an MSc in International Development from the School of Oriental & African Studies at the University of London, as well as professional qualifications in finance. In 2009 he was honoured as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.

Our funding comes from both individual donations and trust and foundations grants.

  • Summary 2006 - 2009

Teach A Man To Fish was born out of a drive to share the pioneering work of the Fundación Paraguaya with like-minded educators and social entrepreneurs around the world. The UK-based group passionate about the role of education in poverty reduction established Teach A Man To Fish, that received registered charity status in January 2006. The NGO office is situated in London.

  • 2006
  • International Teach A Man To Fish Members' Network established as a channel for information sharing about our innovative educational approach
  • Through the Network, links with a large number of local NGOs in developing countries were established
  • First 'Schools for Rural Entrepreneurs' competition launched to identify innovative small scale projects using elements of our approach - 11 projects across four continents receive funding
  • 2007
  • Over 15 partner organizations internationally took first steps towards replication of the Financially Sustainable School model: from worm-composting to snail farming, from Armenia to Zimbabwe
  • Teach a Man to Fish and Fundación Paraguaya launched the "50 Schools in 10 Years" commitment to the Clinton Global Initiative
  • 1st 'Education That Pays For Itself' International Conference took place on December 2007 in Paraguay
  • 1st Pan-African Prize for Entrepreneurial Teachers was launched
  • 2008
  • Teach A Man To Fish received funding approval for its first direct replication of the Financially Sustainable School model in Bolivia
  • Teach A Man To Fish provided Technical Assistance for Financially Sustainable School initiatives in Vietnam and Nicaragua
  • Flagship school in Paraguay won second place in World Challenge 2008, a competition organized by BBC World, Shell & Newsweek
  • 2009
  • Five new school projects in Kenya, Uganda, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Paraguay launched
  • TAMTF continued supporting 'Education That Pays For Itself' in Kenya
  • Business of Beekeeping projects in the Rift Valley
  • Twelve agricultural income generating projects around Lake Victoria
  • Western Kenya Learning Hubs initiative
  • TAMTF provided Technical Assistance for Financially Sustainable School initiatives in Brazil and Uganda
  • Nik Kafka, Managing Director of Teach A Man To Fish, honoured as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum

Results Delivered [+/-]

The first Financially Sustainable School for Entrepreneurs that was created in Paraguay proves beyond all doubt that this is a practical model for the provision of high quality education in developing countries:

  • Generating over $300,000 in income through a range of sustainable income generation initiatives, it is able to cover 100% of its operating costs
  • This school which takes no government money, does not need to charge fees to provide a first class education to students from some of the poorest communities in the country
  • Because the quality of its teaching is so high, within 2 months of graduation almost every one of its students are either in good jobs, including with some of the country's leading agri-businesses; at university; or successfully running their own businesses.

 

Looking forward: [+/-]

  • Challenges overcome

The main challenge was building awareness and understanding for our pioneering approach to education in developing countries. Since 2006 we have been working hard to promote the 'Education That Pays For Itself' concept and the model of 'Financially Sustainable Schools for Entrepreneurs'. We are doing this through:

  • Organizing international competitions, eg. Pan-African Awards for Entrepreneurship in Education
  • Our international 'Education That Pays For Itself' conferences (in December 2009 the 3rd conference took place)
  • Preparing replication materials and guides

Since 2006 the Teach A Man To Fish team has been busy also with establishing and developing the free-to-join international Members' Network. It's an international network of schools, education organizations and individuals working in education committed to sustainable approaches to tackling rural poverty. It works as a forum for practitioners and organisations to share ideas and innovations, and to foster South-South relations in this field.

 

  • What is needed to scale up


The key resources needed to scale up to increase our impact are:

  • More partners from developing countries interested in replicating our model of Financially Sustainable Schools and with a capacity to become self-sufficient in the future
  • More financial resources for schools based in developing countries that wish to establish their enterprises and become financially self-sufficient
  • More funding to spend on organizational development of Teach A Man To Fish that would enable us to improve our replication resources and support more schools with our concepts