SchoolDif

A playful tool for teachers to provide exercises in class or at home, on a phone, tablet or computer.

SchoolDif consists of 2 complementary apps.

SchoolDif is designed for Teachers to create custom exercises to cover their curriculum and review Students' work in real time from anywhere.

Students use SchoolDif to compose their work on phones, tablets or computers, in the same easy way.

Unlike pen and paper, Students can return to, edit and reorganize their work as they build a more complete picture of what they wish to present.

SchoolDif apps can be used in class for quick tests, for assignments over a few days, or for homework. 

Teachers and Students can make easy use of the devices they already know and like for learning. 

Some of the tasks (we call them Games), offer students of all ages opportunities to gather and organize information from the web on specific topics, and practice critical thinking and the presentation of ideas.

In parallel, students learn how to create usable websites. They acquire an important skillset for themselves, and the ability to help those around them gain a meaningful presence on the web.

The 2 apps in more detail:

• Both Apps works on iOS, Android, and on computers, in the exact same way.

• The Teachers app can be used to securely create student accounts and group them into classes or topics.

• The Students app is a simplified version of our already very easy to use website builder, SimDif. Some schools have used it with 8 year olds... From the beginning, SchoolDif will be available in Thai, Malay, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Filipino, and 12 other Languages.

Lack of access to Education Technology
SchoolDif's simplified design for phones, tablets and computers begins to address some of the problems of access, which COVID-19 further exacerbated. SchoolDif can support both in-class and remote learning in normal and out of the ordinary situations in future. This problem affects millions across the region, especially in areas of Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Poor use of EdTech due to lack of training and digital skills
Ease of use is built into SchoolDif to allow for zero or near-zero training adoption. Both the Teacher and Student apps can be explored and learned as with a game or other non-professional app. It can take years to develop mature software that doesn't place a heavy burden on novice or non-technical users. SchoolDif is built on 12 years of testing on our SimDif platform and will be especially helpful in giving teachers across all countries in the region easy-to-use EdTech with flexible applications.

Lack of tools to take advantage of the widespread use of the smartphone and its ubiquity among the younger generations. It is a tool they master, more than a pencil, and we can better empower them by adapting to their own skills.

Lack of tools to teach around / about social media
In the same way, we have few tools for teachers to let students understand how information is formatted on the web. To make them smarter actors, by organizing their content for diverse readers, we help them understand how content is created.

In 12 years SimDif has seen more than 2 millions accounts opened and 100,000s of sites published. 8 years ago, SimDif became the first website builder App in the world. We have continuously measured and listened to our users needs to improve ease of use and features.

We have witnessed and assisted many schools and teachers who have adapted our website builder, using SimDif to present their courses, or to invite their students to create and present their work.

Inspired by their work, questions and requests, we cultivated the idea to create a dedicated education tool: SchoolDif.

Because SchoolDif is so easy to learn, Teachers can rely on their existing knowledge of the curriculum and educational practices to design class exercises, homework and tests. SchoolDif's flexible templates support teachers in creating the right exercise for the moment.

Simple features bring a new perception of a class, for example by making it easy to organize a quick MCQ at the end of the day. The automatically generate results clearly indicate which points have been understood, and by whom.

From the process of using SchoolDif with their Students, teachers, even the most technophobic among them, can also learn digital and web awareness skills.

Students gain easy access to a flexible in-classroom and remote learning tool. Discovering the app as they might a new social network, or game, they can enjoy getting to know the tool they will use to do their schoolwork. 

They will learn critical thinking from SchoolDif's guidance on organizing information and ideas as content in an actual web creation and web publishing tool.

Students, as they complete the tasks, organizing their ideas, will have the opportunity to realize that most of the content they browse on the web
is designed in a similar way, with an intention.

In this organic way SchoolDif contributes to making Students them safer and more creative internet users.

Simply put, we built our own Social Impact Venture around a set of values, dictated by our vocation to empower users around the world. When we heard about the Challenge, we were thrilled by the hope to to meet like minded professionals.

Follow the links below to see how our work is aligned with the goals of MIT Solve and Octava, specifically for Education Technology in a fast-evolving world, and especially for underserved learners.

• Expertise in UX design

• Ethical relationship to users

• Empowering the underrepresented people on the web ( BabelDif, FairDif)

Improving access to and confidence in EdTech
From the outset, SchoolDif will be equally accessible on all phones, tables and computers. Being a version of SimDif, it is already tested and bug free, and is designed to help its primary users, teachers and students, gain confidence and skills in creating publishable content, in the form of multiple choice quizzes, essays, collaborative tasks, actual websites, and so on.

About SimDif ( SchooldDif's Pilot)
SimDif and its Founders' background in user interface design, and our 12 years of development in ease-of-use software, make our team ready to provide an easy tool for Schools, Teachers, Parents and Students, that will require little to no training. It has been developed above all to support people of any level of digital literacy.

SchoolDif is a flexible system for teachers to use their curriculum materials in a variety of ways for collaborating, learning and testing.

FairDif
FairDif currently offers SimDif website builder through our own global Purchasing Power Parity index. SchoolDif will at a minimum benefit from FairDif in the same way. And, if we are able to find the right partners, SchoolDif could also become a fully not-for-profit social impact venture.

Renaud "Yorick" Vince
CEO founder of Simple Different Co. Ltd.

SchoolDif is built on our SimDif platform, the first website builder to work, with the full set of features, in exactly the same way on phones, tablets and computers.

SimDif was specifically developed to be a platform for related apps and services, one of which is SchoolDif.

SchoolDif will available in 17+ languages. The carefully designed and highly tested user interface makes it game-like to learn and use, and ideal for areas with poor general computer skills.

Because SchoolDif is built like a website builder, it can give learners real-world context in which to think about the organization of information and the presentation of ideas. Providing Students the opportunity to imagine their work published on the web, in the form of a navigable website, offers them a reflective mechanism to see their assignments as more than just "school work" or "homework". This process can lead them to more organically relate and apply the skills they learn using SchoolDif to the real world social and economic situations of their families and communities.

SchoolDif has the potential to demonstrate to other developers of technology that a general tool can be customized and repurposed for a specific use-case, and in so doing have a broad and meaningful impact on society.

Social impact innovation has always been important for us, and we believe that SchoolDif will inspire others to imagine their efforts and technology being impactful in education and elsewhere.

SimDif iOS App
SimDif Android App

SimDif, the Pilot for SchoolDif, is extensively tested and has 8 years of user feedback. The platform for SchoolDif (the v2) and other apps was created 3 years ago and is equally well tested, reported and developed. 

We have an in-house user support team working in more than 10 languages, who are closely involved in the design and planning, testing, reporting and improvement cycle.

SchoolDif incorporates and is established upon all of this work, and will also be managed in the same way.

We are a technology company.

We started 12 years ago by creating a simplified website builder, adding features, and then we created the first Website Builder App in the world.

The apps and software worked well, but we decided to see everything we had done up until that point as a working draft of our current software and services.

4 years ago, we designed and built, using open source software and proven technologies, what we called the V2.
It took us 2 years to complete, as the V1 was still running.

We thought everything out,
From the virtualization of our servers to the User Experience.
From the way we maintain and improve our infrastructure, to the way we translate our services with the help of our own users, inside the Apps themselves...

From the way the websites produced with SimDif are so well optimized for search engines, to the way we calculate the price of our paid version with a Purchasing Power Parity index for 120 countries.

In short, we built a fully featured platform to create and run dedicated "website builder like" services such as SchoolDif.

We rent a few physical servers, hosted in Europe and soon also in Canada, themselves divided in virtual machines, redoubling and backing-up each other for maximum availability and resilience.

To give you an idea, we have 25,000 new users a month, and 130,000 hosted websites, which represent 5% of our current capacity.

We also already know how to scale up all the dimensions of our infrastructure at a predictable and very reasonable price.

Our Theory of Change in 5 points

1 • Teachers and schools need ways to understand what their students have understood of the material given them.
- We have all learned, especially recently, that the context in which Students are met, taught and tested can be challenging.

=> Having tools that are less susceptible to different contexts is more important than ever. Being able to teach and test online is a game-changer for students as much as for educators.

2 • Most students have access to smartphones and a mobile connection.

DataReportal, Digital Youth in South-East Asia, https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-youth-in-south-east-asia-2021. 
DataReportal, Digital 2021: Vietnam, https://datareportal.com/reports/digital-2021-vietnam.
DataReportal, Digital 2021: Thailand, https://datareportal.com/repor...
DataReportal, Digital 2021: The Philippines, https://datareportal.com/repor...
DataReportal, Digital 2021: Malaysia, https://datareportal.com/repor...
DataReportal, Digital 2021: Indonesia, https://datareportal.com/repor...

- The use of phones, however, is still not mature - they are mostly used for social networking, messaging, photos and video.

=> Current smartphones have many times the power of the computers of the '90s. Some companies have concentrated their efforts towards the creation of ergonomic and productive tools for phones: SimDif, the technology platform and the pilot for SchoolDif, is a good example.

3 • Managing evaluation for improved Student outcomes is critical.
- In SchoolDif, Teachers can customize templates for their students.
- Versions of a test can be tailored for different students' needs.
- For a class, or a sub-group - click send, and 5, 50 or 500 students receive the task.

=> SchoolDif is highly adaptable to the needs of Students, helping Teachers be sure that students receive their homework wherever they are, in class, at home, or on vacation.

4 • Pen and paper testing has limits: handwriting legibility, context-induced stress, limited potential for Students to search for and organize information for better communication - a key skill today.
- Students receive tasks on their phone, understanding the format and time limit.
- Students enjoy their phones and can creatively manage their work.

=> Advantages: Students can return to, edit and fine-tune their work, and quickly learn modern ways to organize and present ideas.

5 •  Testing is useful for knowing how well a topic as been understood, but evaluation cycles are slow and painful to manage.
- With SchoolDif, Teachers can quickly manage daily Multiple Choice Tests to see how the main points of the day have been grasped, weekly tests around important topics, or cover a semester's worth of learning on core subjects.
- Review of tasks, for each student, or groups of students, takes place in the same app.
- The app provides statistics that are accessible only by the educator (by default)

=> An easy way to create and review tests not only helps Teachers focus on what is important, but the automatically created statistics give them a better vision of what individual or groups of students need.

Our solution references SimDif as a pilot for SchoolDif. 

SchoolDif will take measure of the same indicators we use for SimDif. We will be in continuous communication with our users and stakeholders, including Schools, Teachers, Students and Parents.

For SimDif we record and measure, among other things:

Numbers of Users: new users, total number of users, returning users.

Conversions: accounts created, conversions to paid versions, renewals, returning paying users.

Feedback: Google Play and Apple App Stores reviews. We monitor and reply to all reviews in all languages.

We also have in-app support and email support, which we use to improve our services.

More broadly, we will measure the success of SchoolDif by the numbers of Schools using the apps. We don't see our role as being directly involved in measuring learning outcomes, but to empower Schools, Teacher and Schools.

Our goal is primarily to prove the usefulness of SchoolDif from its successful uptake by Schools and Teachers. At our current stage we feel it would be premature make longer-term predictions.

Looking at the scale of one year, we would begin consultation with a sufficient number of stakeholders to finalize a design. In 6 months, we can transform SchoolDif into SimDif and release a stable version in Thailand, in real-world conditions.

After completing testing in Thailand we can release in the remaining 4 target countries, within the same year.

We have no fundamental limits on what we can achieve in terms of scalability. We could for example, scale to 5 million Students using the app within a year. Our infrastructure is ready. We already work in all the languages of the region.

We have an excellent base to work from

We are the right team, with the right experience and the right Ethic. We have already built and tested the right technology, which is working well for our current website builder App (SimDif).

We developed not only our own platform and technologies, but also specific tools to translate our Apps and websites. Our ambition is to serve underrepresented languages on the internet as a priority

What are the main hindrances for this project .

• Our vocation is to empower as many people around the planet as possible. Having a good product, with a very usable free version, and happy users, is not enough.
We need the world to know that what we produced and will create are there to be used. It's hard to avoid the need for good marketing. We know how to design and optimize advertising campaigns, but we will need to finance them.

• Schools are a specific market with specific needs. We need to be able to show institutions, schools and teachers our design and plans. We need to hire the right persons to get in touch with these actors.

• We also need to find the right collaborators, with the right experience, to design the details of the Apps in terms of security and possible usage scenarios we have not considered.

Sincerely, nothing impossible. We already have 90 % of what is needed for this special project, but the right contacts and a bit of additional financing would go a long way.

Simple Different Co. Ltd. was founded in 2009. It is a self-funded company based in Chiang Mai, Thailand, with a small and diverse community of talented people from around the world.

The team shares a conviction for building original and useful apps, and also shares the same ethics in serving and helping their users.

Three years ago the team started to rewrite the first version of SimDif, which became “the V2”. It is an innovative technical platform able to support SimDif 2 and other projects of the same nature. The idea for SchoolDif, a version of SimDif dedicated to Teachers and Students, was immediately envisioned.

We see ourselves as a Genuine Social Impact Venture. Along with a strong Ethic to empower our users, we also created BabelDif, a tool to allow the rapid translation of our software and its guides, with the hope to serve underrepresented languages. We are also proud of FairDif, the systematic application of Purchasing Power Parity in the calculation of our Paid versions.

It is in this spirit that we immediately saw, two months ago, a strong  correlation between what we do and the Challenge offered by Octava and MIT Solve.

Our own platform, on which the Pilot for SchoolDif runs today, requires 10 people to be maintained and improved on a daily basis.
SchoolDif will soon see 2 more people added, for liaison with stakeholders and early users, gathering suggestions to be used in the evolution of the User Experience.

We are a core team of 10 people, based in Chiang Mai Thailand, aged between 25 and 54 years old, sharing 7 languages - English, Thai, French, Russian, Spanish, Japanese and the local northern Thai dialect. We also work closely with as many translators and advisors around the world.

At the heart of our work, there is an implicit understanding of the diversity of the world's cultures. We spend most of our professional activity empowering people to organize and present their ideas and services on the web.

It is a natural and long anticipated next step for us to use our unique and respective expertise at the service of Education.

We are convinced that SchoolDif not only allows Teachers to organize their work more effectively using the most widely available existing devices, phones, but we also see, through the prism of our daily activity, that from daily practice of sourcing, composing, and presenting ideas, students will learn that online content is formatted with intention. SchoolDif will help make Students safer and smarter web users.

Yorick Vince is the CEO founder of The Simple Different Company, and has been the main designer of the services and tools we created. He is also the person who has progressively built up what all agree is really nice team of talents and personalities.

His career designing Graphic User Interfaces and User Experience began in 1988. After working on several games and a couple of books with renowned game designer Pierre Berloquin, Yorick created his first software in 1991. In 1999 he recreated the User Experience of the biggest french speaking website of that time, 01net.com. Initially based in Paris, with a year in Silicon Valley, a few months in Singapore, then Japan, and lately, of course, Thailand.

Studying businesses of all kinds, he has created a couple of bespoke Enterprise Resource Planning software solutions and 50+ websites. He also found time to return for 3 years to university to study ergonomics. It was with the idea of making a place for creativity, empowerment and user advocacy that Yorick built Simple Different in Thailand. SimDif, the first website builder App, will soon give rise to SchoolDif, and has already brought about Fairdif and BabelDif.

Our main technical Partner is OVH.fr
They allow us to host our (physical) servers where we need them to be in the World. They also enable us to upgrade and scale up pretty comfortably, when needed.

We are based in Thailand and we have always had a strong social responsibility ethic. See FairDif. See our websites. See our About.

We want to contribute and we believe that we have the skills and experience to contribute in a meaningful way to the improvement of Education Technology for underserved users in the region and globally.

SchoolDif as a version of SimDif has been planned for several years. It will likely launch in any case, but with the help of the advisors or partners we meet through the MIT Solve and Octava network, we will have greater access to the market, and be able to connect more easily with stakeholders for the optimization of our solution.

The expertise that MIT Solve and Octava have in education, in addition to the financial support, will help us realize SchoolDif sooner, and help us realize a better version of it than we might achieve alone.

MIT Solve and Octava can help SchoolDif gain wider use, with more impact on education in the region than we can manage alone.

We hope to meet like minded professionals.

Since our inception we have prioritized empowering our users before thinking about profit, but often when we have expressed our ethics to potential partners, as an essential part of our reason for being, we have not found receptive understanding.

We have refrained from using abusive marketing tricks, have created our own Purchasing Power Parity index for the calculation of our paid version, have spent time and resources on underrepresented languages on the web, languages that are improbable near-term sources of revenue… We have met only incomprehension and doubts.

We still believe there is much to do in the world, by professionals working in our field and related fields, to improve the relationship between people and technology.

Should work for the pubic good be reserved to NGOs and charities ?

We believe not, and we would love to be part of a diverse network of Social Impact Innovators.