CERTICOACH

CERTICOACH (certification of skills in educational and vocational guidance coaching) is an innovative training program producing resources (services and solutions) intended for vocational and psycho-educational support for young Haitians with low resources in times of crisis and mobility restrictions. The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the learning conditions and choice of career path for students. This will have a negative impact on the results and risk leaving deep scars in the educational pathways, before and after the baccalaureate. In order to effectively address these problems and make the most of them, Haitian higher education institutions must develop adequate and structuring para-pedagogical solutions. 

 In response to these upheavals, CERTICOACH® training produces human, educational and information resources intended to support pupils / students as part of their career and their professional project (resources are already produced and used).

Through the CERTICOACH solution, we mainly address the problem of educational guidance and professional integration of young Haitians with low resources. The world is changing, jobs are changing and the world of work is changing. Young people in impoverished countries, like Haiti, have fewer opportunities than those in rich countries. In this case, the CERTICOACH solution proposes to support disadvantaged young Haitians, who constitute the future of Haiti, towards a path of success through judicious, thoughtful, ambitious and enlightened choices.

The CERTICOACH solution aims to:

• co-construct skills and innovative tools intended to support Haitian students in their career path, their professional project and their personal development;
• produce human resources capable of helping Haitian students to increase their resilience (being able to face adversity, overcome hardships, adapt to new and overwhelming situations is fundamental to succeed); 
• develop tools and techniques for remote educational support and continuity in the event of the physical closure of educational establishments and mobility restrictions;
• produce human resources capable of helping Haitian students to overcome representations and stereotypes about jobs and training linked to gender, social origin and disability; 
• develop and implement pedagogical, cognitive and metacognitive strategies to support Haitian students towards judicious, enlightened and ambitious choices.

FIRST STAGE  :Train and certify educational and vocational guidance coaches

We have a partnership with a Haitian public university to continue to provide this innovative training ADAPTED TO THE CONTEXT AND TO HAITIAN EDUCATIONAL NEEDS.

We do research and development: we are working on a new scale for measuring professional interests and skills. We have already developed the 1st ONLINE ORIENTATION TEST IN HAITIAN CREOLE. This tool will allow trained coaches to better help Haitian students : http://FUTURE.career.vision 

Admission to the training will be done online.

SECOND STEP: Implement the training, deploy the first cohort of guidance coaches in schools and develop the online tutoring service platform

THIRD STEP: Sustain the achievements, build quality samples, duplicate the model across the country.

According to the World Bank, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused "the worst education and learning crisis in a century". In Haiti, this education crisis has had and will have profound consequences on the human capital of a whole generation of students (secondary level) and students (higher / post-secondary level). The latter are becoming more and more worried about continuing their education and professional integration. In this time of COVID-19, the upheaval in the conditions of learning and choice of orientation will negatively impact the expected results and risk leaving deep scars in the educational pathways, before and after the baccalaureate. In order to effectively address these emerging problems and make the most of them, Haitian higher education institutions must develop adequate and structuring para-pedagogical solutions.

The mobility restrictions linked to COVID-19 have highlighted the urgent need to develop, over the long term, skills and hybrid tools for educational continuity and psychological support. Because career issues and professional issues occupy a crucial place in the human balance.

In response to the economic upheavals caused by the coronavirus pandemic, and following structural and permanent needs for educational innovation, the CERTICOACH® course, carried by the Faculty of Education Sciences (FSED) of the Public University of the Artibonite in Gonaïves (UPAG), produces human, educational and information resources intended to support Haitian students as part of their career path and their professional project.

This support is aimed both at achieving the full potential of the pupil / student, but also at empowering them and seeking pleasure in their studies.

The problem I am addressing, the solution I have designed, and the population I ame serving by the CERTICOACH solution meet the TPrize Challenge through the following goal :

• "Support teachers and educational institutions with teaching and learning methodologies, tools, and resources that help develop future skills for students"

As you know, my solution constitutes a relevant contribution to the development of education in Haiti in relation to technological changes and economic transformations.

I chose this level of development for my solution, because the service and the products have already been developed, tested and operated at a first level, through different activities, different projects names and different groups. 

• We have already experienced and exploited this in Léogane, a town in the Department of Western Haiti with the "Haitian Volunteer Service (SERVOH)": 

• Below, you can consult the report of another pilot activity implemented in Port-au-Prince, within the "École Supérieure d'Infotronique d'Haïti (ESIH)" : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MnSbiZu-wV56C0HaKD1NVFdupkfqT7G9/view?usp=sharing 
• We have already developed and used the 1st ONLINE CAREER EST IN HAITIAN CREOLE. This tool will allow trained coaches to better help Haitian students : http://FUTURE.career.vision 

My solution is innovative, because it uses educational technologies to train guidance coaches intended to support young people in making innovative career choices.

For Haiti, this is a major innovation, a model.

The solution that I propose uses the Internet because it is above all a question of setting up educational technologies used to train coaches, then to use these technologies to support young Haitians towards new careers.

The solution offered through CERTICOACH partially uses the same technology as TALENTODAY, among others, and by way of example:
https://talentoday.com

The technologies used by CERTICOACH could come up against the risk related to the protection of personal data.

To face this risk and protect personal data, we will:
1) Invest in IT security tools for our digital platform;
2) Train / educate our users on their rights;
3) Request the consent of users when using an application requiring the entry of personal data.

Indirectly and directly, the CERTICOACH solution currently serve about 500 000 young students

We will serve 750 000 in one year and about 2 000 500 in five years.

For next year, our impact objectives will be to mobilize the interests and commitments at the level of the Haitian educational community. One of the means that will allow us to achieve these objectives is to strengthen our partnerships with the local actors involved in the project. This reinforcement will also make it possible to perpetuate the actions and achievements of CERTICOACH.

Here is a non-exhaustive list of the indicators we use to measure the progress and progress of the project:

- The number of young people oriented and integrated by the CERTICOACH program

- The number of coaches trained

- The number of visits and subscriptions to online applications

Full-time staff : 3 

Part-time staff : 8 

Contractors or other workers : Contractualization of people for various services, according to the technical need (example: webmaster, developer, various consultants ...)

We have a multidisciplinary team, specialists and professionals in:

- Education
- IT / Machine learning / Big data
- Psychology / Careerology / Guidance psychology

The main project leaders have more than 10 years of experience in project management integrating educational innovations.

Our approach to building a diverse, equitable and inclusive management team is based on the following measures:

- Respect the position, beliefs and convictions of each member of the team;
- Respect each other's DIFFERENCES
- Constantly exchange / Learn from the other
- Respect gender equity quotas
- Share good practices

We applied for the TPrize Challenge 2021 in order to mobilize the resources and implications necessary for the development of the CERTICOACH program. The networking obtained from our participation, nomination and selection in the TPrize Challenge will allow us to acquire high quality resources for the development and consolidation of our program.

We need partners for, among others:

- Develop online applications facilitating the access of beneficiaries to our services and solutions;

- Promote our program through digital platforms;

- Mobilize funds

- Acquire notoriety

- Give greater access to the program

We wish to develop a partnership with MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology).

It will be a technical partnership through which MIT will provide the CERTICOACH program with teachers to strengthen training and MIT will be, alongside the Public University of Artibonite in Gonaïves (UPAG), a co-certifying institution.

MIT will also help us promote new trades in Haiti to young people.

MIT will also help us raise funds to advance the CERTICOACH program.

These are some of the reasons we are getting closer to MIT.