TAKMIL-Teach a Kid Make Individual Life

I am Co-founder of TAKMIL (Teach a Kid Make Individual Life) and i believe in becoming the change i see in my society. I have diverse past experiences as researcher, writer, educationist, and worked on different community welfare projects. My journey on the project "TAKMIL" is inspired by personal experiences with children who never got the chance to get education. I have worked with these children whose lives got a hope of betterment through education. I have worked on this project bit bu bit building it, working on community outreach, training of community members, establishing community schools, development of technology platform for out of school children, and representation of my project in international community. I have highlighted the challenge of 22.8 Million out of school children in national platforms and internationally in  World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) 2019 and World Bank Youth Summit 2019.

TAKMIL is an ed-tech-based and gender-inclusive solution that aims to provide free and quality education to the out of school children in the under served and remote communities of Pakistan. We propose an education model for the out of school children which incorporates the key components of digital learning i.e. training, delivery, assessment, monitoring, and evaluation into a portable, cost-effective, and scale able solution. The model has been tested in regions with the most challenging environment (no building, no electricity & limited internet) and have provided education to over 1500 children. TAKMIL aims to provide equal opportunities to the deprived children for a brighter future.

We address the most challenging problem of access and quality education in communities with no schools with concerted effort around empowering girls who are exponentially impacted.

Pakistan has the second-highest number of OOSC in the world with 22.8 million children between 5-16 years of age; representing 44% of the total population in this age group (UNESCO). Among these, the ratio of girls to boys is much higher. 32% of primary school age girls are out of school in Pakistan, compared to 21% of boys. Similarly, at the middle level, 59% of girls are out of school, versus 49% of boys. The situation is much worse in the underprivileged, slums, war-affected, and rural communities of Pakistan where people lack basic facilities of life, let alone the infrastructure and resources for education. Parents are more concerned about feeding their children than educating them.These communities are hard to reach and hard to impact due to multiple social and economic barriers. The children could not be streamed into the formal education system due to different needs and different age groups. All these factors require an intervention that addresses these challenges without any perturbation in the social & cultural environment of these communities.

We offer a cost effective and innovative education model aimed at reinventing the role of the modern-day classroom and the role of the teacher” while catering the needs of OOSC while keeping the standard of education at par with advances in educational paradigm. It consists of

ICT INTEGRATED LEARNING which enhances learning outcomes and digital skills among the children of diverse age groups in a short amount of time. The curriculum consists of 3 phases. Phase I covers primary education in 12 months, Phase II covers middle school education in 18 months and in Phase III the students have 3 options: 

• High school
• Vocational education
• Computer skills

Every lesson is developed through smart integration of video lessons curated and aligned with learning objectives. The lessons are then delivered through Raspberry Pi-embedded projectors and tablets powered by solar panels. 

DIGITAL ASSESSMENTS & MONITORING: TAKMIL evaluates the learning process of each child at regular intervals through digital assessments. Additionally, bio-metric verification and AI are used to monitor all schools.

COMMUNITY PARTICIPATION: We actively engage the communities we serve in the education process through regular community sessions to motivate them to take an initiative towards a better life for their children through education.

We target the out of school children between the age of 5-15 years in the poorest communities of Pakistan. These communities are mostly found in rural areas where for over generations children are locked out of the education system and trapped into poverty. The dreams of these children to “be someone” are shattered with flawed education systems and unequal opportunities. Low level of education has subjected these communities to various economic and social issues, including low income levels, child labor, child marriages, poverty, unemployment, societal crime, and poor quality of life. These factors make these communities hard to reach and hard to impact. The children could not be streamed into the formal education system due to different needs and different age groups. We address these social challenges with the help of our local community based facilitators who personally recruit these children by convincing their parents. Moreover, our flexible timing system allows the children who work with their parents to also get education easily. Instead of providing them only basic literacy skills we equip them with latest digital skills also which increases their eagerness to learn more. 

The Challenge and our solution are perfectly aligned as we aim to increase the level of learning among the girls and women by providing them basic education. Our solution has already produced significant results and now we aim to increase the number of girls in our schools which is our selected dimension. Apart from this, our unique model also covers the second dimension as we provide digital skills to our students along with literacy skills to empower enough to effectively keep up with the fast paced world.

16 Dec, 2014 was a normal day in Army Public School, Peshawar, Pakistan until the school experienced the most tragic incident. Gunmen raided the school and brutally killed more than 140 young school children including school staff. The day is marked a black day as bright futures were received in coffins which still makes the eyes of their parents teary with grief. In 2017T AKMIL (Teach a Kid Make Individual Life) has taken the inspiration from this tragic incident to pilot first school in Mardan and revive these futures for the children who never went to school in their lives. Each school of TAKMIL is named in the memory of martyred children of Army Public School Attack and we aim to keep these names alive for these children whose futures are saved through education. 

My passion is ignited and reignited everyday when i see optimism, hope, excitement, and passion in these children who are part of TAKMIL's projects. I have been raised in society where child begging, child labor, and child marriage are common societal evils. In 2016, I was a research student in top ranked university of my country, yet only a few kilometres away was a community of children who would clean windshields of cars, sell flowers on bus stops just to earn enough for a day meal. I volunteered to help these children learn about science, environment, hygiene and i could see their energies being transformed into potentially bright futures. I had a personal experience with an Afghani child who had a tragic past of losing home to terrorism. Yet, education gave him hope and today he is enrolled in a degre program. 

In TAKMIL's projects i have personally trained and motivated community members from far flung regions, speaking different languages, representing different cultures united to make education a reality for their community. I get energy from the children enrolled in schools who are now at higher learning levels and confidently use technology to learn. 

I have more than 2.5 years experience of working on TAKMIL's projects. During this time, i have adopted diverse roles to make this project have meaningful impact. I have experience of community outreach, training community members, identification and selection of communities for TAKMIL's projects, development and testing of TAKMIL's ed-tech platform, developing collaborations and partnerships. Moreover, i have raised voice for out-of-school children at multiple national and international forums including World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) 2019 and World Bank Youth Summit 2019. I have successfully deployed a partnership project Kolibri Hardware Grant Program (KHGP) by Learning Equality in 8 remote regions community schools. I have first hand experience of working with development team on design, instruction, testing and deployment of TAKMIL's ed-tech platform for put-of-school children. I have been mentored on this journey to learn, grow, persist and continue this mission for 22.8 million out of school children. I have wore many hats as needed from me to make TAKMIL grow and create an impact in the lives of these out of school children.  

I have learned from TAKMIL's journey to turn problems into solutions, challenges into opportunities, and never quit because of set backs. In 2019, TAKMIL received a hardware grant to implement a digital learning software in TAKMIL's schools. Let me share a picture of how these schools look like:

This a picture of a TAKMIL's school in a small in Mirpurkhas, Sindh. This village exist for nearly a century but education was never seemed real for these children. I took this challenge to make a digitally equipped school functional in this environment. There was no internet,no electricity, and no technically trained person. In June 2019, i worked with my team to work on technology, hardware, training, and support systems to fully equip this school with digital system. We selected portable hardware component, supported system through solar panel systems, provided training in local language, and updated hardware with content for offline environment. This had all been possible because we as a team were determined to make it possible despite all challenges and obstacles.Now let me share photograph this school now:

This is a photograph of Maria, Raani, and Ahmad in this school learning through offline content through technology.      

I have worked in multiple leadership roles since my student life. In TAKMIL's projects i started under the guidance of one mentor who unleashed my potentials. Today, i am leading a team of 40 members who are trained by me and making education a reality for out of school children. I believe in transforming these community members into community advocates for education. I have lead my organisation to International forums and presented the idea to experts, scholars, and stakeholders. In 2019, I applied in World Youth Bank Summit which received around 885 applications from 98 countries, and i qualified for top 13 selected for pitch decks. 

Many organisations are working tirelessly to solve the problem of 22.84 million out of school children but their solutions have few weakness which TAKMIL addresses as follows:  

Existing Solutions

Strength

Weakness

TAKMIL

Government Schools

Use of existing Infrastructure & System

Government Recognition

Not Applicable in regions with no schools

Lack of quality education system universally

Lack of ICT based Curriculum

100% applicability in regions with no school

The model is structured by combining education and technology. Technology is integrated in monitoring, and evaluation as well to ensure quality performance.  

Free Education Facilities

Free Education

Community Empowerment

Lack of Education Learning Model

Lack of Monitoring System

Limited to Specific Communities

We offer a unique model with a sound digitally built monitoring system applicable on a network of schools. 

Our schools can be established in diverse communities with different religion, culture, language, and

background.

ICT Based Solutions

Quality Education

Technology Use to improve performance

Mostly designed for Commercial Use & OOSC are not the target audience.

In most cases applicable in regions with internet and power (Remote areas not targeted)

Lack of balanced integration with curriculum

Not cost effective

Our primary target is the OOSC in Pakistan.

Primarily designed for non-commercial use, however, the model has potential to generate revenue commercially. 

TAKMIL harnesses the power of technology to improve curriculum implementation. 

1 year for primary education

1.5 years for grade 6-8

Highly cost effective offline model which requires renewable energy sources and does not depend on 24/7 internet or electricity.

22.8 million young children in Pakistan between the age of 5 and 15, in the underprivileged communities do not have access to basic education due to a life of poverty in which they lack basic facilities let alone resources for education. They are confined to a life of labor among many other social problems like child mariages and child abuse. 

TAKMIL targets these out of school children and provides them basic literacy and digital skills in three phases through an innovative education model which contains all the key components of digital learning i.e, delivery, training, assessment and monitoring. Additionally,  communities are engaged in this process for sustainable and significant outcomes. TAKMIL aims to bring a change in the society by providing equal opportunities to all children; girls, boys or disabled children. Education will unleash the potential of the out of school children and will help them in bringing a change in their lives which will trickle down to a positive change in the whole community. 

We believe that if you are unable to change the whole world then you should at least try to change the world of even one person. In partnership with communities, we will continue to provide students with quality education, innovative life and technical skills programs, and assess student progress in high-need areas. Our long-term vision is that our ed-tech model will be available for governments and partners to adopt and scale incrementally beyond TAKMIL schools. This will lead to a positive change in the cultural mindsets of the society leading to 100% literacy. 

Currently we are serving 1128 students and 29 facilitators making a total number of 1157. 

In one year we plan to serve an additional number of 300 out of school children and 10 new facilitators along with the current number of people we are serving making a total of 1467

In five years, we plan to serve an additional number of 1500 out of school young boys and 50 new facilitators along with the current number of people we are serving making a total of 2707 people. 

• Increase Outreach: TAKMIL aims to establish schools in the remote areas of Sindh and Balochistan with the highest percentage of OOSC and provide quality education to an equal number of boys and girls.  

• Introducing Phase 2 and Phase 3 of our Model: Recently some of our students have moved to phase 2 i.e Grade 6-8 education in 18 months. We plan to take all our students to this Phase 2 and then to Phase 3. Phase 3 is under development and will be ready for implementation in 1 year. 

• Digital Assessment and Evaluation to be implemented in all of our schools within 5 years. 

• We also intend to initiate a digital based adult literacy program for the family members of our students especially mothers within the next 5 years. 

• We plan  to commercialize the TAKMIL Education Model by offering digital solutions to schools in the private and public sector to uplift their education quality. Currently the idea is in the prototype development stage. It is one of the key milestones in our growth plan which we are aiming to achieve. The revenue generated from TAKMIL Tech will ensure sustainability of TAKMIL Foundation as it will be used to provide free education to out of school children. 

• As we grow we want to grow right. For this, we intend to build our team correctly to ensure achievement of our goals. We intend to develop our team so that our people can grow as TAKMIL grows -- a mutually beneficial relationship.

We are facing following barriers in achieving our goals

1. Financial Barriers: We need a constant stream of funding for the accomplishment of our goals. 
2. Technical: Onsite training of facilitators is a challenge due to various financial and time costs. It is also difficult for the female facilitators to travel far to attend training sessions. 
3. Cultural: The communities we serve are hard to impact due to cultural mindsets of the people. Although we are creating awareness in these communities, we need to go deeper now to make education possible for the other out of school children who are still chained in these customs especially girls. The dreams of these girls are shattered by their families by not allowing them to get their basic education right. This stereotypical mindset is one of the major barriers in girls' education. 
4. Marketing Strategies: At the moment, we face difficulty in letting the world know what TAKMIL is doing. We need to improve our marketing strategies to attract funding and influential people who are passionate to bring a change in the society. 
5. Covid-19: It is a recent barrier that not only us but the entire world is facing. Although we have not stopped our learning process, we are still fearful that some of the students might drop out of the system due to lockdown and the health crisis we are all engulfed in. 

1. Financial: To overcome financial barriers we have planned to use our education product and services for commercial purposes. In this way we will be able to generate a  stream of revenue which can then financially sustain the education of out of school children. 
2. Technical: We are planning to transform our on-site training to an online training system to overcome financial and time costs. Our long term solution is to develop an online training platform accessible all over Pakistan at any time. 
3. Cultural: To overcome this barrier, our plan is to engage the community through our local community based facilitators directly in the education process through community awareness sessions. Through these we will make them understand the importance of girls’ education and how it can help them and their future generation to get out of the trap of poverty. We have given incentives to these people in the form establishing school straight in their communities and providing them free education in flexible timings. 
4. Marketing Strategies: Experts will be hired to overcome this barrier and to devise effective strategies to let the world know of TAKMIL’s contribution to education. 
5. Covid-19: We will ensure to bring all our students back to schools by staying in contact with them with the help of our community based facilitators. Currently, pur facilitators visit them at regular intervals while following Standard Operating Procedure strictly and deliver worksheets to the students.  

We collaborate with Kawish Foundation for project development and execution. Kawish foundation is our key partner on ground who helps us with administrative tasks at no cost.

We look forward to partnering with IT and Telecom firms to increase our impact. The plan in under-process currently. 

• We offer a Model with Offline/Online use which provides dual applicability of the system.

• System is powered by renewable energy sources i.e. Solar Energy thereby promoting sustainable organizational practices.

• We offer a system which solves the problem of remote system monitoring. A system which provides data through authentication and verification (bio-metric and facial recognition).

• We offer Artificial Intelligence based Attendance System which provides detailed information including the timestamp, GPS location, facial recognition, and data processing on a daily basis.

• We offer an accelerated learning module evaluated through custom designed assessments according to the national curriculum standards.

• We offer a digital assessment system through an application for efficient evaluation of learning outcomes.

• The Cost of a system per school of 40 kids is around 1000 USD.

• We will offer our product to already developed schools including training for their staff members to get them updated to the current world and its technological advancements.

• We will generate revenue from already developed schools and spend that revenue on out of school children making this system self-sustainable.

We will bring financial sustainability through Community Based Fundraising which is one of our major sources of funding. In addition to this we will raise funds through

• Partnership Projects with NGOs

• Through various grant programs like this one we are applying for. 

• Crowdfunding: We have a local community who religiously and regularly donate in the form of personal donations.

• Commercializing TAKMIL products and services in public and private schools to generate a stream of revenue through which we will support the finances of our beneficiaries. 

We raise funds for TAKMIL majorly through community based fundraising. On an annual basis we organize fundraising events and bring all our existing and potential supporters on the same platform and generate funds. Through these events we generate approximately $100,000 USD each year. We collect funds online in the form of donations directly through our website and more recently through Launch Good campaigns. We generated $13,000 USD last month through Launch Good. 

In addition to this we received $16,000 USD under Kolibri Hardware Grant Program for the purchase of necessary hardware to implement Kolibri in non-formal schools, educational facilities, and non-formal learning settings of TAKMIL. 

Apart from direct funds, we receive financial support in terms of free of cost services from Kawish Foundation who helps us in administrative tasks without any financial charges and Microsoft Azure which allows us to use Cloud free of cost. 

TAKMIL seeks funds all the time for smooth running of its operations. We are continuously in search of education grants and apply for all we are eligible for. Currently we are in need of funds to cover the operational and hardware cost of 300 additional number of children in our schools. According to the annual per child cost of TAKMIL i.e, $100 USD, we are in need of $30,000 USD. We are hoping to raise this within one year. 

Funds for existing students will be generated through community based funding and  crowdfunding via online donations and Launch Good Campaigns.

30 Teacher Salary

$34,839

Books  for 1300 students

$10,065

Stationary for 1300 students

$10,065

Training twice a year for 30 teachers

$7,742

Staff Salary

$15,484

Hardware (Tablet, solar panel, Res Pi, Mobile Phone etc)

$19,355

Misc

$2,581

Total Program Cost

$100,129

We look forward to elevate our impact by overcoming the barriers with the help of SOLVE. Becoming a Solver will help TAKMIL to increase its resources required to engage existing and additional OOSC in educational activities and prevent them from becoming the victim of many social problems. 

Moreover, we want to share with the world the possible solutions for the education of OOSC and the challenges we have overcome in these areas. We have generated deep impacts in these communities and now we want to elevate this impact by letting the world know and to bring a positive change together. We look forward to contact with people having similar mindset and passion for possible collaboration in regions where it can create greater impact. Solve funds will help TAKMIL in scaling up and reaching out to more out of school children. 

Mentorship is another reason due to which we want to become a Solver.  We are a self-made team of seven young individuals who are seeking mentorships to make strategic improvements in our model and system to elevate the impact in Pakistan

We need help in making our solution more effective. For this we seek mentorship in improving our business model, solution technology and product/service distribution at a large scale for greater and deeper impact. We also need advice in improving our funding model for making it sustainable and increasing the visibility of TAKMIL with the help of sound marketing and media strategies. 

We are looking forward to partnering with organisations who are working in the similar domain of creating equal educational opportunities for all. In this regard, we are currently doing research and devising a strategy for potential partners. We have categorized our partners into categories like: Organisation who are working to provide education to out of school children. Reason for partnering with such organisations is to forsake personal interests and do collective efforts for those who need us the most. The second category is to partner with ed-tech products producing organisations to improve and enhance our educational products. The third category is of the organisations who provide effective vocational and life skills training. We will need their expertise in the implementation of our third phase i.e, vocational and life skills training to our students. We would also like to partner with technological organisations who can guide us in improving the technological components of our model.