MIT Solve

Step 2

Our Solution

OpenSpeaks Open Educational Resources (OpenSpeaks POERs)

Our solution's stage of development:

Pre-Seed

Our solution:

The proposed multilingual Open Educational Resources (OERs) is about internet-related threats like privacy, web security, online censorship in some of the marginalized languages of India. These risks affect a large section of people that are monolingual where their lack of knowledge in major languages make them more vulnerable.

Our pitch:

1. Building multilingual Open Educational Resources (OERs) on privacy, web security, and online censorship that are affecting a large number of people, and train some of the communities about protecting themselves from such threats using storytelling and gamification as a tool.

2. A significant portion of the entire globe that are already connected to the Internet and the ones that are going to be connected in the coming decades have very limited or no educational resources in native languages whereas they are posed to new online risks everyday. They need to educate and protect themselves from a wide array of internet threats like privacy, web security and online censorship.

3. The proposed project aims at building open and reproducible educational resources that can easily be localized and bundled into an app or a web platform, and distributed for free. Additionally, it is promoted among target communities using social media and other high-impact engagement tools so that more people get to use it.

The problem:

When it is a great news that a large number of people are getting connected to the knowledge commons via the Internet, they are being equally exposed to new threats. However, in an English-centric internet, majority of them need interactive education in their native languages to be able to protect themselves from risks like privacy, web security and online censorship. After working for years — at organizations like Mozilla and Wikimedia Foundation —building communities, and Open Educational Resources (OERs) in several linguistically and culturally diverse regions in Asia, I am building a project to co-create gamified-OERs for the threatened communities.

Why our solution will solve the problem:

While closely working for over six years across Asia in building Mozilla, Wikimedia and other Open Source communities, I have observed how most people better learn about things related to the Internet in their native languages. The recent Google-KPMG research confirms that ~70% internet users from India trust content in their own languages over English whereas the web is quite English-centric. As the state laws also ignore most languages that do not have official status, it is extremely important to create educational resources in marginalized languages.

Who recommended you to Solve - or - how did you find Solve?

MIT Newsletter and website

Step 3

Step 4

The technologies we employ:

Consumer-facing software (mobile applications, cloud services)
Digital systems (machine learning, control systems, big data)

Why our solution is unique:

So far, most digital archivists have recorded marginalized languages with a focus on academic research which is extremely important. However, the proposed project aims at engaging with native speakers and building first of its kind interactive Open Educational Resources. The education process involves real-life social media and other apps that people otherwise use, and also uses gamification and storytelling as tools for teaching technical subjects for common masses. When most/all target language do not have much audio-visual resources online, a futuristic app will engage with users of all age groups.

Why our solution is human-centered:

The proposed project involves a high level of engagement both in the creation and implementation end. Many native speakers will be consulted while designing the resources. Though the primary goal is to create an app, there will be many resource persons and native speakers that will be engaged with in all stages — for creating the content, testing the prototype, and most importantly localizing the app to fit into the local cultural scenario.

How people will access our solution:

The app will be open source and will be released under an open license with its source code. A detailed user documentation with tutorials to modify and localize the content will also be provided so that anyone can create their own language version of the app. The apps will be made available publicly on app stores and will be promoted via web and paid ads on social media so people get to find it. Major channels like mailing lists, institutional outreach, and outreach by major stakeholders in different languages will also be used for promotion.

Technology-Readiness Level:

1-3 (Formulation)

Our website

https://openspeaks.com/

Step 5

Our organization:

Non-Profit

Where we are located:

India

How we will sustain our team financially:

We are a team of experts with years of experience in Open Source and web technology, Open Educational Resources, Open Data, community catalyzing, developing curricula and games, and user research. Though we have registered ourselves as a nonprofit very recently, we all have worked in many roles in organizations like Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation and the Centre for Internet and Society. We have already started applying for funding in both organizational and individual capacity. These investments are yet to bear fruits. We are very hopeful to procure some funds for our research, development and outreach.

The factors limiting our success:

Administrative incubation time for running the organization and all the entry level barriers of a new organization
Lack of basic education in many native-language-speaker communities that are already using the Internet - this affects the way they generally engage online and sometimes become vulnerable to several risks
Lack of existing native language educational resources, and socio-anthropological research that can be used for reference while developing the app
Existing local stakeholders are new to digital technology and do not themselves use it for any outreach. Transiting them from conventional methodologies to modern might be a challenge

How long we have been working on our solution:

Less than 1 year

How long it will take to develop a pilot:

3-6 months

How long it will take to scale beyond our pilot:

6-12 months

Our expected annual budget:

70000

How much of our budget we've secured to date:

0

Our promotional video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e2QvXLDFEQ

Our promotional materials:

https://twitter.com/openspeaks

Step 6