Swift Learning Mobile App
We are providing a form of supplementary education in which courses and programmes are designed to be delivered fully online.We use pedagogical strategies for instruction,student engagement,and assessment that is specific to learning in a virtual environment.Swift Learning Mobile App is a mobile application that offers supplementary learning support to high school learners namely grade 8, 9,10,11 and 12 in South Africa.Providing lesson notes,exercises and answers based on chapters,pre-recorded video lessons on each chapter for offered subjects,mock exams practice and answers,past exam papers and answers.The mobile app also has the careers section where it includes university applications information, NSFAS, Bursaries and Scholarships information,interviews preparation(guidelines on how to conduct interviews),writing motivational letters for acceptance into academic programmes,bursaries or scholarships, career guidance based on IQ and EQ tests/quizzes.The app can be scaled throughout Africa giving learners a competitive advantage to learn using technology as the rest of the world.
The problem faced by South African high school learners in townships and rural areas is struggling to get access to supplementary learning material and tools to help them understand concepts taught in school better and to get good grades that will enable them access into institutions of higher learning. This problem is widespread in Africa, the success of the solution we are presenting through the Swift Learning Mobile App can be scaled throughout African countries to ensure we reach as many leaners as possible and help them change their lives and their communities through education. Factors contributing to the problem we are addressing include but not limited to access to technology oriented platforms to support learning in impoverished communities. Africa being behind in the fourth industrial age, where majority of ed-tech solutions are for private schools and not township schools and rural schools. As the project name suggests, Swift Learning Mobile App strives to make learning swift, efficient and effective through its app platform and learner support. Learners will get more involved in their learning having access to learning material at any given time, anywhere swiftly from the palm of their hands using their mobile phones.
Swift Learning Mobile App strives to make learning swift, efficient and effective through its app platform and learner support. Learners will get more involved in their learning having access to learning material at any given time, anywhere swiftly from the palm of their hands using their mobile phones. Our mobile app uses big data, AI, Algorithms and interactive audio visual learning material. Accessed through a cloud storage from anywhere on your phone. Our app is based on learners usage of mobile phones and tablets to access our mobile application. The content available on our application platform includes using audio visual material and green screen video recording for our pre-recorded video lessons and animations. We use specialized written code and algorithms to assess learners on our app to ascertain how we can assist them better to achieve their desired goals measured on the learners profile and performance dashboard. Paid subscription method is also available through voucher purchases which can be done from a cellphone using a specific USSD for all available mobile networks in South Africa through our facility with Blue Label Telecoms. Our solution encompasses the full idea of aligning education and learning with the fourth Industrial Age.
Our clientele is high school learners in public schools predominantly in townships and rural areas from grade 8 to grade 12 and willing network schools to roll out usage of our mobile application to their learners, thus end users of our mobile application is the high school learner.
Access to education in South Africa remains a big challenge, those who access education in the public education sector mainly learners in township and rural areas still face huge challenges in getting enough learner support to ensure that they get good grades. Our organization aims to address this challenge to ensure that learners can also learn beyond the classroom and become leaders within their communities and change their livelihoods through academia.
We have a tutoring program on Saturdays at a township school in Kwa-Thema, through out contact classes and our conducted marketing plan, that is how we managed to get to the problems that learners are facing and solutions that can help them overcome their challenged. We engage with learners through questionnaires in order to ascertain if our mobile app prototype address challenges they are facing, and what is it that we can improve and incorporate. Pricing also plaid a huge factor as we had to get from learners on how much do they think would be affordable for having an app like Swift Learning Mobile App for its value and impact it will have in their lives and the payment method they prefer. From the feed back we worked on a product and a business model that is centered around catering for the needs of our target market.
- Increase the engagement of learners in remote, hybrid, and physical environments, including strategies and tools for parental support, peer interaction, and guided independent work.
The challenge we are addressing is supplementary learner support in township and rural schools to ensure leaners learn effectively,understand concepts and get good grades to enable them to have access into good academic programs in universities.Access to information and guidance about opportunities post high school.Swift Learning Mobile App address this challenges by offering a learning management system on an app platform delivering learning content inline with the global standards model with the usage of audio visual learning,graphics multimedia,information and guidance about opportunities post high school.All this accessible via a smart mobile phone as most learners don't have acccess to computers.
- Prototype: A venture or organization building and testing its product, service, or business model.
Swift Learning Foundation is a formally registered and incorporated non profit company in South Africa. we have developed the business plan which includes a business model canvas, marketing plan, operational plan and financial plan. We have also managed to get curriculum content development teams creating content which its intellectual property rights belong solely belongs our organization. An app wireframe blue print has also been developed to show how the app will operate and to serve as a guide line to an app developer. We are in the process of finalizing video script treatments from the content we have to get ready for multimedia graphics, animation and video production of the lessons. We have done a market research from various township and rural schools where the teachers and leaners encouraged us to finish the app and launch it as its deemed to be highly beneficial once it arrives.
- A new business model or process that relies on technology to be successful
Swift Learning Mobile App strives to make learning swift, efficient and effective through its app platform and learner support. Learners will get more involved in their learning having access to learning material at any given time, anywhere swiftly from the palm of their hands using their mobile phones. Access to education in South Africa remains a big challenge, those who access education in the public education sector mainly learners in township and rural areas still face huge challenges in getting enough learner support to ensure that they get good grades. Our organization aims to address this challenge to ensure that learners can also learn beyond the classroom and become leaders within their communities and change their livelihoods through academia preparing themselves for careers in the fourth industrial age. Our mobile app seeks to transform lives of more than 1 million learners and the mobile app can also be scaled into Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Namibia. Learners using the mobile app in their respective countries can enter the academic competitions that will be done by Swift Learning to compete with each other, in a form of Mathematics and Physical Science Olympiads, Business and Social Innovation Challenge with prizes that can help them improve their own communities. Our mobile app seeks to form a community beyond the classrooms to have maximum impact in changing lives.
- Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning
- Audiovisual Media
- Behavioral Technology
- Big Data
- Software and Mobile Applications
- Women & Girls
- Rural
- Peri-Urban
- Poor
- Low-Income
- Middle-Income
- Minorities & Previously Excluded Populations
- 4. Quality Education
- South Africa
- Botswana
- Ghana
- Lesotho
- Namibia
- Eswatini
- Zambia
Our mobile application is a prototype at testing stage currently, we aim to be serving over 400 000 learners in the first year of launching in South Africa from a pool of over 9 million learners. In our second year of full operations post launching the app, we will scale the app in to neighboring countries namely, Botswana, Namibia, Lesotho and Swaziland. A move that will help us increase our market to more than 600 000 further learners. In year three we will focus more on serving the market we have already captured and increase our numbers steadily with a high customer satisfaction. In year four we will consider scaling our mobile application into Zambia and Ghana, a move that will help us attract approximately 300 000 more learners. In year 5 we will only focus on ensuring customer retention in the countries we are operating in and ensure steady growth whilst also focusing on our product development to cater for the ever evolving needs of our customers as technology keeps evolving. Ultimately in year 5, we estimate to have a target market of approximately over 1.3 million users.
We have thus far managed to create curriculum content for courses in Mathematics, Physical Science, Life Science, Geography, Accounting, Business Studies and Economics for Grade 12. We are running a tutoring project for 100 learners in a township called Kwa-Thema, Gauteng South Africa where we are testing the prototype of the app and measuring its impact through learners performance from the time they have started using our prototype and learning material. Our tutoring platform seeks to bridge the gap for learning that was affected by Covid 19 and abrupt school closures to curb infections. This has resulted in learners being behind schedule in their curriculum. We also assist leaners in planning and guiding them to choose careers best suited for them, university and college applications and funding opportunities. The school principal, School Governing Body and Parents are happy about the impact thus far as their children's grades and attitude towards education has changed and the learners are more focused to achieve their desired goals in getting good grades to ensure admission into institutions of higher learning. Their behavior at school and their communities has also changed as they behave like Swift Learning Leadership ambassadors demonstrating qualities other learners aspire to have.
- Hybrid of for-profit and nonprofit
Managing Director- 1 Full time
Operations Manager- 1 Full time
Business Development- 1 Full time
Education Content creators- 7 Contracted
Education Video Lesson Facilitators- 7 Contracted
Mobile App Developer- 1 Contracted
Multimedia and Audio Visual Production- 5 Contracted
This excludes 5 contracted contact lessons tutors for our Saturday tutoring classes
Mr Lesia Lucky Ntsane is the sole founding member and the managing director of the company. He is currently pursuing a Post Graduate Diploma in Business Management at Regenesys Business School, Sandton Campus and has over five years corporate background in business insurance, risk management, business development and operations management. He also had a stint background in media and entertainment industry where he had roles in film production as a line producer and theatre productions as a producer. Whilst working in corporate for Hollard Insurance Company, he started a school tutoring programme through Hollard Coporate Social Investment Initiative that assisted high school learners in grade 11 and grade 12 with Mathematics, Physical Science and English. A programme that was successful and saw participating learners having improved grades and some ultimately getting into institutions of higher learning, apprenticeships and learnerships. The success of the programme saw him being recognized by the company and winning a first place best employee award out of more than one thousand entries. Ms Karabo Sibanyoni is BSc Mechanical Engineering graduate from Wits University and our Operations Manager passionate about women in engineering and helping more young women to get access into STEM courses post high school. Our team include film production graduates, multimedia and design graduates, student and qualified teachers and computer science graduate.
Our approach is to ensure that we give opportunities to women and physically disabled individuals who are qualified for their appointed positions. We also embrace different cultures, religion and race from our team as it helps us create a a very diverse team that helps us come up with different and innovative solutions helping move us forward as a youth. In the near future, we intend to create a special leadership program that will prioritize women in the leadership positions for our provincial business development managers.
- Individual consumers or stakeholders (B2C)
We do not only have an idea waiting for funding to act on our idea, we have a viable product that can be improved and scale up immensely. Our team comprises of university graduates with passion in public education sector. With the right support, our mobile application can become one of Africa's great ed-tech start up successes that can put Africa in the Map within the Ed-Tech space globally. The impact that our mobile app will have is beyond the profits that the company will generate, we already have Swift Learning Foundation, a fully registered Non-Profit Company that our company will conduct its corporate social responsibility initiatives through to ensure that we change lives in communities and the public schools endorsing our mobile application. We are a team of youth and young professionals fully committed to improving the lives of leaners in the public education sector and making sure that we become competitive in the ed-tech space globally. Being selected to participate in this program will give our company and opportunity to get the world's best mobile app developers to ensure that we develop state of the art mobile app catering for our student needs. We will overcome the funding barrier in order for us to fully patent our product, get the best technology, rollout the mobile application through intensive marketing to ensure we reach our target of impacting more than 3 million lives throughout Africa.
- Financial (e.g. improving accounting practices, pitching to investors)
- Legal or Regulatory Matters
- Public Relations (e.g. branding/marketing strategy, social and global media)
- Monitoring & Evaluation (e.g. collecting/using data, measuring impact)
- Product / Service Distribution (e.g. expanding client base)
- Technology (e.g. software or hardware, web development/design, data analysis, etc.)
Financial- We need support in this area as we are a start up at development stage with a prototype raising capital to ensure that we launch a good product in the market. Support will also help us in managing our funds and profits well once we start generating revenue to ensure the financial sustainability of our company and choosing right investments with surplus profits.
Legal and regulatory matters are important as there is alwas risks associated with GDRP, copyrights and patents in the tech space.
Public relations will help our organization to have a strong and reputable brand that is visible and trusted to retain our customers and get new ones, potential partnerships and investors will be interested in working with us.
Monitoring and Evaluation will help us with big data and social impact studies reports to assess and measure the impact we are making in the education sector and lives of the communities we are serving.
Product & Distribution is important as we intend to scale our mobile application throughout Africa and potential countries overseas where our product can fit.
Technology also play a vital role as our product offering is centered around education technology, getting the best technology will give us a competitive advantage to create effective and affordable world class mobile app.
We would like to partner with Tech an/or Ed-Tech companies playing in the same industry to help us navigate some of the challenges we may face in our development and growth stage. This can be from the technology, hardware, cloud hosting, machine learning, AI and algorithms. Android Tablet manufacturers that can sell their mobile android tablets preloaded with our mobile app for ease of use to learners, as learners prefer using android tablet for learner purposes over mobile phones. Network mobile operators that can help learners to leverage zero rated or discounted data usage from our mobile app.
- No, I do not wish to be considered for this prize, even if the prize funder is specifically interested in my solution
- No, I do not wish to be considered for this prize, even if the prize funder is specifically interested in my solution
- No, I do not wish to be considered for this prize, even if the prize funder is specifically interested in my solution
- No, I do not wish to be considered for this prize, even if the prize funder is specifically interested in my solution
We do believe that we qualify for this prize because our solution seeks to provide access to education in South Africa and Africa as a whole which remains a big challenge, those who access education in the public education sector mainly learners in township and rural areas still face huge challenges in getting enough learner support to ensure that they get good grades and are still excluded from the digital education inclusion with the rest of the world. Our organization aims to address this challenge to ensure that learners can also learn beyond the classroom and become leaders within their communities and change their livelihoods through academia. Our solution is based on learners usage of mobile phones and tablets to access our mobile application. The content available on our application platform includes using audio visual material and green screen video recording for our pre-recorded video lessons and animations. We use big data, AI, machine learning and algorithms to assess learners on our app to ascertain how we can assist them better to achieve their desired goals measured on the learners profile and performance dashboard. Paid subscription method is also available through voucher purchases which can be done from a cellphone using a specific USSD for all available mobile networks in South Africa and Africa through our facility with Blue Label Telecoms. Our solution encompasses the full idea of aligning education and learning with the fourth Industrial Age and creating a sustainable future for all.
- Yes, I wish to apply for this prize
Our mobile learning application uses technology, Artificial Intelligence, big data, machine learning and algorithms to improve learning for our customers through usage of the app. Winning this prize will help us get the best team of developers to optimize our app to its full potential and vision, leverage big data and artificial intelligence can be utilized immensely to improve features on our app as Artificial Intelligence can assist us find out what a student does and does not know, create a personalized study schedule for each learner considering the knowledge gaps. Administrative tasks simplification: grading, assessing, and replying to students is a time-consuming activity that could be optimized by our staff using AI. With AI-powered chat-bots or AI virtual personal assistants, students can ask questions on the app making the learner support feature more effective. We can also ensure that our mobile app caters for students with special needs. We will also introduce introduction to coding vocation course on our mobile app that will prepare learners for careers in Artificial Intelligence. Through our Swift Learning Foundation, we will establish Swift Learning Hackathon, a basic, intermediate and advanced level coding high school competition inspired by The Patrick J Mc Govern Foundation where learners will compete to win awards and prizes like laptops. Winning this prize will have a far more lasting impact for our organization and your organization leaving a legacy that can be take throughout Africa as we grow and scale our app into other African countries.
- Yes, I wish to apply for this prize
The most pressing challenge in township and rural communities is access to education and those who have access to public education lack support to help them understand core STEM courses like mathematics and physical science. This in turn leads to leaners getting low grades and the decrease in learners choosing mathematics and physical science as part of their curriculum as they have already developed an attitude that these courses are difficult to understand and excel in. Universities and college need more learners to qualify and study STEM courses as there is a demand for these careers in South Africa and Africa as a whole. Swift Learning Mobile App seeks to address this challenge by offering supplementary learning support for mathematics and physical science from as early as grade 8 to grade 12 to ensure learners develop basic understanding of core concepts as early as possible. Winning this prize will help us create the Swift Learning Science Expo where high school learners can compete with innovate STEM solutions to win prizes and awards for their teams and respective schools. This will reignite the love for math and science encouraging learners to choose this subjects to prepare them for STEM careers. Swift Learning Olympiads will see learners competing academically through tests and quizzes at regional to national levels for awards. Winning this prize will make your organization proud as the STEM programs we will start will leave a long lasting legacy and impact in our public schools and communities.
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