New World Campaign and TEGV Digital

Pandemic conditions have brought along significant difficulties in children's access to education. We aim to support equality of opportunity in education with the New World Campaign.We initially focus on the village schools where problems are even more pronounced in disadvantaged areas, where there is substantial inequality in terms of access to quality education. This is coupled with low educational attainment levels, large family sizes, low socio-economic status, and insufficient access to social services. With this campaign we provide tablets to the children at village schools,so they will also facilitate the participation of our children in the EBA system created by the Republic of Turkey Ministry of National Education(MONE) for distance education. Also, children will have opportunity to attend TEGV digital education.If it was scaled globally, this project would positively change lives of children who are living in disadvantaged areas and do not have tablets to access online education. 

According to UNICEF's Policy Brief on the Impact of COVID-19 on Children: In 188 countries, 92% of schools were closed temporarily.More than 1.5 billion students were affected.UNICEF, UNESCO and World Bank's Survey on National Education Responses to COVID-19: A huge gap emerged between countries in terms of access to technological tools;learning via online platforms was very effective 39% or quite effective 58% in high- and middle-income countries.According to TURKSTAT's 2020 figures:In Turkey, 12% of households have no internet access, 82% have no desktop computer, and 51% have no laptop computer.Briefly, as of 2020, 50% of our children lack the technological means to attend distance lessons.This data suggests that during the pandemic, devising distance learning systems and digital course/activity content is not sufficient by itself.For children from low-income families to have equal education opportunities, they must be provided with technological hardware in the form of in-kind assistance.The study that we conducted among TEGV parents was one of the first studies of its kind in the field of education,revealing that children could not benefit from public distance education programs in an equitable manner, and pointing to the lack of necessary technology in households.

In cooperation with Former Arçelik Employees' Association, we launched the New World Campaign so as to generalize access to distance learning and expand it to disadvantaged areas.Within the scope of the campaign, we bring tablet PCs to children enrolled at schools in disadvantaged regions, in order to provide equal opportunities in education.Our children attended TEGV's programs on IT, Science, Mathematics, English, Reading, Social and Emotional Learning, and school support programs via remote digital education with their tablet PCs.Children's education will not be interrupted whether they can or cannot attend school; on the contrary, they will grow up as children who master digital devices.

Until today, we offered tablet PCs to 4000 children from 101 schools in disadvantaged areas. These children can now access TEGV's digital platform and follow the MoNE’s courses. TEGV's 1650 highly experienced volunteers, who constitute the most valuable distinguishing factor in our campaign, each completed 4 training modules on distance education, thereby further enhancing their skill set. We brought 15,189 children together with our distance education programs.

The education culture and ecosystem had to change drastically with the Covid-19 Pandemic and the interruption of formal education, which increased the value and significance of distant synchronous education due to the social learning and human connection elements required especially in the learning ecosystem of primary school children. As a Non-Governmental Organization offering the most extensive service in Turkey in the field of education, the Educational Volunteers Foundation of Turkey (TEGV) had to interrupt its face-to-face activities with 50,000 children, aged between 6 and 14 and were registered to TEGV Programs during the Covid-19.

In Turkey, inequality in education has increased in the distance education process. Children who do not have sufficient technological resources could not even attend the courses provided by the state. Since March 2020, especially children studying in village schools have not been able to access education and have not benefited from the right to education equally like other children. As TEGV, we conducted a study to identify children affected by inequality in education. The study that we conducted among TEGV parents was one of the first studies of its kind in the field of education, revealing that children could not benefit from public distance education programs in an equitable manner, and pointing to the lack of necessary technology in households.

First of all, we started our distance education through the TEGV Digital Education Platform with our children who have technological resources and internet access. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, we stepped up our transition to distance education, which already figured among the digitalization goals of our Strategic Plan 2019-2021. In 2020, we established our distance education model and digitalized our content, in collaboration with Google.org and INCO Education Accelerator. We designed an integrated information system, as well as a volunteer and learning management system. We brought 15,189 children together with our distance education programs.

With the help of school principals and teachers, we identified children in need of technological resources (tablet PCs) and we also launched our "New World" campaign. Children who need tablets most received their tablets and can now access TEGV's digital platform and follow the Ministry of National Education's courses. Within the scope of the campaign, we bring tablet PCs to children enrolled at schools in disadvantaged regions, in order to provide equal opportunities in education. Our children engage our solution by attending TEGV's distance education programs.

We carry out separate measurement & evaluation studies for each course taught on TEGV Digital. During education activities, we conduct pre and post-tests on children in order to observe the impact of education programs and we obtained positive results.

We understood children’s needs from volunteers’, parents’, local authorities’, children’s feedback that is stated at below:

These tablets open the doors of the New World to our students.

Some of the feedbacks from village schools :

Impressions of Utku Kaya, Education Specialist at Şanlıurfa Sevgi-Erdoğan Gönül Education Park:

I wish you were with us to see those children who never imagined they would have a tablet PC one day, a mother who came to receive a tablet with two children on her back, and the smile in the eyes of a teacher who was happy knowing that she would now access her students with more ease... Children with henna on their hair, dressed in their Sunday best, smiling under face masks that seemed one size too large... We asked the children's permission to take a group photo and then asked them to smile at the camera: You must have seen those smiles covered by their face masks but visible in their brilliant eyes...On behalf of the TEGV family, we were honored and proud to get together with children living along the border and share in their happiness, in these villages 60 km away from the nearest center.

Impressions of Kasım Yıldırım, Deputy Principal of Gaziantep Burç Primary School:

We are aware that these tablets open the doors of the New World to our students. Our school is a hub of sorts since there are students who travel here from 17 villages and settlements. Our school was at a disadvantage during the pandemic. Students live in remote settlements, making it very difficult for teachers to access them, and 90% of students did not have tablet PCs to attend distance education programs. In the weekly meetings with teachers, everyone noted that students could not participate in the classes, and the number of attending students attending the classes was 4 or 5. This truly de-moralized our teachers since our students lagged behind their peers. Then the situation suddenly changed.

Class attendance skyrocketed on the first day after the tablets were delivered. When our teachers saw their students online, they immediately called us to share their joy. They were not used to see so many students attend distance education. Our students were also very happy to use their tablets, and see their friends and teachers albeit on screen. Of course, we are cognizant that the tablets are just the first step of the campaign, and that these devices open the doors of a “New World” to our students. The inclusion of our students, teachers, and school in TEGV's campaign, and the horizons that TEGV volunteers will open before our students are simply invaluable. We consider our students and us very lucky to be a part of this campaign. We thank everyone for their diligent efforts. We received some feedback after the tablet distribution in Mardin in January. Our children have been participating in the activities 100% since January. After the tablet distribution, we received requests from many of our villages. Thanks to TEGV, the headman of the villages collected signatures and started to demand internet infrastructure for their villages. The School Principal of the children who bought their tablets stated that at the end of the research, they came first in the ranking of participation in the EBA, (the Ministry of National Education's courses) thanks to the tablet distributed by TEGV.

During the pandemic process,we have revised our plans to launch a distant education system and we have been delivering our education to our children through our free and qualified distance education platform called TEGV Digital, that is comprised of education programs.TEGV Digital which is appropriate for all children age groups has interesting, educational, and entertaining asynchronous content.We have prepared specifically for the education programs, they have the opportunity to freely share their stimulating information, experiments and interesting designs with their peers and volunteers in the social groups created.We delivered tablets to our children to participate in our online activies.

We distributed 4000 tablets in 21 different villages of cities in Turkey. As a pilot study, tablet distribution was initially started at a village school in Istanbul.Children, teachers and parents showed great interest to the campaign, and wished the continuation of the campaign.As they gave positive feedback, we decided to extend our campaign.In the pilot study of the TEGV Digital Platform, 900 children registered the platform. Till today, 15.189 children benefited from our distance education programs.

We carried out separate M&E studies for each activities taught on TEGV Digital. Between October 2020 and February 2021, we conducted an evaluation study with the participation of 241 parents, 153 volunteers and 800 children. We conduct the pre and post-tests to children in order to observe the impact of education programs and we obtained positive results.These positive feebacks inspired us to expand our campaign.

Our project is an innovative and pioneering project in the field of education. A project that is desired to be implemented by many institutions and schools. During the distance education period in Turkey, there were individuals and institutions that provided tablets to students, but TEGV both distributed tablets and produced activities through TEGV Digital, providing children with free access to quality education.

With the TEGV Digital and New World projects, we both eliminated the technological resource deficiencies of children and provided them with free access to quality education. In addition to the basic courses in public schools, we made them take courses on different themes such as social emotional learning and STEM at TEGV. Thus, in addition to the basic achievements, we helped them become children who grew up with technology, who could produce solutions to problems with mathematical and coding logic, who could apply what they learned in the lessons in real life, who could understand the environment and nature better with the help of the experiments they have done in the activities, who could express themselves socially and emotionally, and whose desire to learn a foreign language increased.

We applied pre-tests and post-tests to measure the effects we had on children, and conducted measuring and evaluation studies. As a result of our work and the feedback we received, we have proven that we have a positive impact on children. And in the field of education, we supported the education provided by the state, leaving positive impacts on children

With our New World campaign, which we have been continuing since September 2020, we gave tablets to 4000 children. We aim to deliver tablets to 3500 children in the next 1 year and 17.500 children in the next 5 years.

In the 2020-2021 Activity Period, we brought together 15,189 children with our distance education programs.We aim to reach 25,000 children with our distance education programs, 10,000 in the Fall Semester, 10,000 in the Spring Semester, and 5,000 in the Summer Semester of the 2021-2022 Activity Period. We will continue to contribute to their development by preparing them for their activity periods with the trainings we offer to our volunteers, who play a major role in achieving this goal. In the new period when we will start the widespread application of the TEGV Digital User Information System and TEGV Digital Learning Management System, we will receive activity applications online via the platform and through our event points. We believe that we will increase the number of children we reach by providing children with the opportunity to attend our educations at any point where they can access the Internet, regardless of location and time.

We evaluate our Education Programs in the focus of reaction and learning, which are the first two dimensions of Kirkpatrik Educational Evaluation Model. We have Quantitative Data Sources (Individual Child Evaluation Form, Child&Volunteer& Parent Questionnaire,) and Qualitative Data Sources (Child Focus Group Discussions, Volunteer Focus Group Discussions, Volunteer Feedback Form, Consultant Observations and Activity Monitoring Form) to learn about their reactions to the programs and the learning and behavior changes they observe in their children.

Convergent Parallel Design, one of the mixed research method approaches, was adopted in the collection and interpretation of data for these focuses.

When we look at the measuring studies of our science education program, when the pre-test and post-test mean scores are compared; An increase of 0.14 points was observed. One of the children's feedback for this lesson: “We used to learn by writing, now we learn by experimenting” - E.M. One volunteer feedback for this lesson: “With this activity children learned that they could also experiment with the materials at home. They realized that the experiment wasn't just in the lab and that it wasn't just scientists' job to do experiments." –G.T.

Some important results from the general m&e studies of the program:

Increasing the level of knowledge in related training programs,

Positive behavior and attitude change in social life,

Increasing the level of interest in specific programs: Gaining the habit of reading books, increasing interest in foreign language learning, combining coding with daily life practices.

6 full-time experts, 3 managers and 1 general manager are working as the executive team of our project.Also, our employees at the activity locations give support to our project.  The number of full-time employees at TEGV is 196, and the number of part-time employees is 3.

TEGV employees, TEGV management team, colleagues, volunteers, government authorities, public schools are working closely for achieving success in this project. TEGV team members touched the lives of many children who live in disadvantaged areas, have economic problems, and cannot access education. They have given importance to the principle of equality in education, led education on disadvantage areas of Turkey. They pioneered the New World Campaign and TEGV Digital for village school children to provide their access to education.

We conduct projects according to a methodology customized for our Foundation, in order to create team synergy, enhance quality, minimize risks and measure performance. We monitor our projects regularly through monthly Review Meetings.

As the executive team of our project, 6 full-time specialists, 3 managers, and 1 general manager work.Our specialists are experienced and well-educated employees in both project management and pedagogy. They have been involved in the creation and management of many different projects.

Our directors and general manager are highly experienced and highly educated managers who have been in the management phase for years and have worked in Turkey's most reliable companies and foundations.

We created with our business model, our governance structure according to the our values; our credibility, volunteerism and solidarity, innovativeness and creativity, respect for diversity, responsibility. We execute our decisions, actions and practices according to the objective criteria of the organization. We work in a spirit of volunteerism and support all our stakeholders in order to achieve the common goals of the Foundation. We operate with an open approach to innovation, change, and development.We consider social diversity as a richness and intellectual differences as opportunities.We perform our duties and responsibilities in full, in accordance with business discipline and ethical rules.

We are applying to MIT Solve because we want to present the projects we have produced to ensure equality in education to you, the esteemed Solve team, and to everyone who is interested. In this way, we want to gain exposure in the media and at conferences and increase the popularity of our project and increase the number of disadvantaged children we deliver tablets to by collecting donations, which is our main goal. We believe we can achieve this as part of the esteemed MIT Solve team

We are non profit organization. We create our revenues from funds and our corporate &individual donors and firms who support our Foundation. Therefore we need financial support to conduct our projects & campaigns. In addition, within the context of New World Campaign, we also need technology (tablet PCs and internet) to implement our project.

We would like to partner with MIT, computer firms, and any organisations which give financial support and tablet support to our projects.

We provide education programs, short-term activities for children with volunteer support.Since 1995, we worked with over 80,000 volunteers to deliver quality educational programs to 3 million children in Turkey.TEGV is, Turkey’s most extensive NGO in the field of education.Child-friendly,TEGV Activity locations are situated in disadvantaged areas of Turkey.We have a signed protocol with the Ministry of Education that provides our programs to public school children and are part of the UN Global Compact.We have  free and qualified distance education platform called TEGV Digital.TEGV Digital is comprised of long term education programs(18 hrs) in the areas of Math, Science, Reading, Art, Algorithm, and English language. Children can participate in the programs they interested in.We need  donations to achieve our goals and provide education support to more children. We aim to support equality of opportunity in education with the New World Campaign.We initially focus on the village schools where problems are even more pronounced in disadvantaged areas, where there is substantial inequality in terms of access to quality education and lack of infrastructure.This is coupled with low educational  levels, large family sizes, low socio-economic status, and insufficient access to social services. With this campaign we provide tablets to the children at village schools,so they will also facilitate the participation of our children in the EBA system created by the Republic of Turkey Ministry of National Education for distance education. Also, children will have opportunity to attend TEGV digital education. We believe that we are qualified for this prize.