Rigel School Innovation Project

To address education disparity in The Gambia, we will center our attention on public schools where the majority of the Gambian student population are educated. Even though education is free for students enrolled in public schools, the high amount of student intake per teacher ratio often puts students at a disadvantage. Students considered average do not receive proper training or guidance for improvement. 

St. Therese's Junior Senior Secondary, one of the best performing schools in the West African Examination Certificate (WAEC) enrolls on average 600-650 seventh grade students with each class size ranging between 42-52 students. By the time the new intakes move to the eighth grade (8th), students are then grouped according to their performance. The best in each class - students with aggregates six to ten are enrolled in Class A. Class B is then occupied by students with aggregate 11-15/18. The best to the average students occupy classes A-F. Classes G-M are occupied by low performing students who fall within aggregates 35-54 (with aggregate 54 being the worst aggregate a student could produce whereby his/her performance is measured across four compulsory subjects: English, Math, Science, and Social and Environmental Studies plus two elective courses each graded on a scale of 1 to 9 with aggregate 54 resulting from 6 Failed subjects *9 = 54).

Considering teacher credibility and student favoritism, even though the curriculum is similarly set for all classes of varying aggregates, eight-grade classes A-F greatly benefit from human and other resources. As a result of lectures being more accessible to this particular group of students, they end up performing better. Whereas students in lower performing classes do not receive high quality education - they are faced with absent teachers, and poor resources. This cycle continues as all eighth grade students irrespective of their academic performance move into the ninth grade. 

Students who graduate grade nine after completing the WAEC Exams with aggregates 6-35 making them eligible to gain admittance into the most renowned Senior Secondary schools. Students with aggregates 6-24 are enrolled in the best Senior schools offering the West African Senior Secondary School Examination (WASSCE), including St. Peters Technical High School, Methodist Senior Secondary School, and Nustrat Senior Secondary School. Students with aggregates 6-35 make it to the Gambia Senior Secondary School, St. Joseph's Girls Senior Secondary, St. Augustine's Boys Senior Secondary School, and Ndows Senior Secondary School amongst many others. Out of over 45 Senior Secondary schools in the country, only 15 are deemed as best-performing institutions providing high quality education to young high-achievers. (Data collected from the Ministry of Basic and Senior Secondary Education)

The problem in the education system in the Gambia is not unique to the nation alone as it affects most countries globally. The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated the disparity in global education especially as learning took place online. However in the Gambia, the majority of the students cannot afford owning personal electronic devices, the high cost of Internet connectivity, or its accompanying low-quality Internet access. These discouraging factors negatively impact student learning. 

Moreover, most students lack digital literacy skills even across schools with fully functioning computer labs. As a result, digital learning cannot be fully integrated into the education curriculum in the Gambia because only a handful of students will be able to access it. 

St. Therese's Upper Basic School is the main partner of the Rigel School Innovation Project. This school does not have a fully functioning computer lab. Receiving high-quality education is a fundamental human right yet vulnerable and disadvantaged children in the Gambia are negatively impacted by the lack of accessibility and inclusivity within the current education system. Students do not have access to basic requirements of educational standards. The curriculum delivered fails to take into account students’ cultural, educational and socio-economic background. It also fails to consider the challenges parents without formal education are faced with as their contributions in their children's academic performance cannot be understated. 

In St. Therese's Upper Basic School the performance of seventh grade students with aggregates 35-54 can be exponentially improved through the Rigel School Innovation Project. In this grade students have not yet been evaluated based on their performance so all thirteen classes have a combination of excellent, average and poor performing studies. The Rigel School Innovation Project will distribute education empowerment opportunities to all students regardless of their academic performance. By utilizing an inclusive approach to solve the educational challenges of poor-performing students, we will see an increased improvement in students’ tangible reading, writing and math skills, including but not limited to the capacity-building of soft skills from problem solving and critical reasoning. The Rigel School Innovation Project promotes the academic performance boost of seventh grade students.  

The Rigel School Innovation Project seeks to reengage learning in public schools to boost seventh grade students’ academic performance in mathematics, and reading and writing through innovation, collaboration and creativity. The Rigel School Innovation Project places key emphasis on developing students’ foundational early childhood development from critical reasoning and problem solving abilities to improve overall performance.

In seventh grade students are exposed to general teaching and learning methods across nine subjects. The Rigel School Innovation Project focuses on shared learning difficulties students face in reading and writing, and mathematics through an intimate mentorship based approach. Paired to paired learning will be conducted in smaller groups of 10-15 instead of the disengaged public schools’ large size class model of 45-50 students per class. The goal of the Rigel School Innovation Project is to improve the performances of seventh grade students who fall within the aggregates of 35-54 in St. Therese's Upper Basic School. 

To re-engage learners and to address current academic challenges, students will be introduced to unconventional learning styles incorporating computational thinking approaches and design thinking through daily lecture modules that cover the current educational curriculum. This interactive model is effective in prompting learners to deconstruct larger problems into smaller units by pairing topics with easily digestible examples unique to their surroundings. 

With the introduction of storytelling and word building, mathematics, reading and writing can be fun! In the Rigel School Innovation Project, students will learn the creative processes and building blocks of storytelling, from design to visualization and to content building one exercise at a time. 

To achieve the goals of the Rigel School Innovation Project, we will introduce students to uniquely tailored modes of learning to improve their processing of academically dense information. This method ensures academic empowerment, and confidence growth as more students improve their academic performances. The Rigel School Innovation Project will partner with students from the University of the Gambia studying mathematics, physics, English and literature who will undergo a six weeks training on the content modules to better understand the methods of teaching to be used. In partnership with the newly established Research Department of the University of the Gambia, alumni mentors will be introduced to design thinking, computational thinking approaches and storytelling development. Following the training, fifty university students will be selected and enrolled as Educators in the Rigel School Innovation Project. We will also have a team of five researchers who will be responsible for conducting monitoring and evaluation throughout project implementation, and developing extensive research on various ways of incorporating efficient teaching methodologies.

The project team alongside selected teachers will design uniquely tailored curriculum based learning modules to meet the existing needs of seventh grade students. 

Both the research conducted and findings collected throughout the duration of the project will be published across our newly-created database and project pages. 

The Rigel School Innovation Project is geared towards enhancing the learning abilities of seventh grade students in public schools. The project will be implemented at St. Therese's Upper Basic School. The mentorship sessions are expected to be conducted on a weekly basis during the late mornings so as not to interfere with seventh grade students’ academic timetables whereby classes run between 1:45pm and 6:00pm from Monday to Friday. 

In the Gambia, middle school and junior high school students prepare for their West African Examination Certificate (WAEC) starting from the seventh and up to the ninth grade. The examination covers academic topics taught throughout these years, and is highly significant in determining one’s entire career path post graduation by their admittance into senior high schools. 

The average class size in 7th grade at St. Therese's ranges between 45-50 students per class. There are thirteen classes of 7th graders at this school. The Rigel School Innovation Project focuses on reengaging poor-performing learners through interactive and innovative curriculum to address the already-existing academic disadvantages they face. The Rigel School Innovation Project challenges the current educational system which groups low-performing students into lower classes with fewer resources, inefficient teaching methodologies and reduced learning opportunities. We at Jokkolabs believe that to tap into 7th grade students’ academic potential, we must foster spaces of creativity, inclusivity and empowerment. 

The large classes at St. Therese's make it nearly impossible for teachers to properly attend to students’ unique learning needs within the set one-hour class period. The Rigel School Innovation Project is a mentorship program which facilitates intimate teaching and learning  opportunities to boost overall academic performance. This project aims to end the disparity in education by creating safe and empathetic learning spaces for poor-performing students who due to unique learning abilities require extra time and care to better compete and create self-enabling futures.

We at Jokkolabs Banjul believe in nurturing creativity and harnessing talent through an innovative skills acquisition approach as a means of promoting Start-Up and Entrepreneurship, ICT and Education, Digital Literacy, Digital Inclusion and Internet Rights and Freedom.

Our focus at Jokkolabs Banjul lies on our core pillars of research, community, innovation and collaboration. As a social change hub, we provide inclusive community-based programming to advocate for gender equality and diversification within the start-up ecosystem and entrepreneurship. This is embedded in our radical innovation approach whereby we utilize the core strengths of our beneficiaries to build a network of collaborators across sectors whilst ensuring that marginalized communities are at the forefront of all we do as a hub. 

Our services include:

• Programs for Start-ups (Pre-Incubation, Incubation, Mentorship and Training)

• ICT For Development

• ICT and Education

• Digital Security

• ICT Training

• Internet Governance

• Internship / Research Programs for Undergraduate and Graduate Studies Communication as a Catalyst for Development

• Youth Entrepreneurship and ICT

• Digital Media for Advocacy

•  Kiddies ICT & Creative Summer Camp Educate and Innovative Monthly Meet up Sessions for Kids.

• Examination Testing Services

• Provision of high-quality tested Information Communication Technology equipment (hardware / Software solutions)                                             

Our vision at Jokkolabs Banjul is to create a digital innovation ecosystem, leading to new ways of collaborating, experimenting and creating. This open and collaborative dynamic aims to contribute to the collective achievement of shared prosperity under the UN SDGs and the Gambian National Development Plan. 

As a team lead, I was once a student at St. Therese's Upper Basic School, class of 2009-2012. I was one of the best students the school produced. By the 9th grade I became the head girl and upon graduating middle school, I was admitted into one of the best Senior High Schools in the country. I recognized the academic benefits I was presented with during my years as an eighth and ninth grade student because of my high-academic performance alongside others who were also grouped in Class A. I am well familiar with the educational system in place and that is why today, I seek to challenge the status quo by providing low-performing students who are often left neglected and at a disadvantage greater learning opportunities. In order to bring about systemic changes to address the disparity in education which cuts across all sectors, we must focus our energies on deconstructing traditional learning methodologies and instead introduce innovative and inclusive methods to renegade the most disassociated seventh grade students. 

At Jokkolabs Banjul, we believe in catalyzing change through innovative solutions. We are built on the four pillars of innovation, community, research and collaboration. Our focus lies in pioneering education development using ICT. Our team for this project runs an After-School Program for kids between the ages of 5 - 15. The program started in 2021 with twenty students admitted every three months. Our focus throughout this program centers on boosting children’s problem solving skills and critical reasoning through creative reading and writing, design thinking and coding. The success of our program continues to be measured by the tremendous progress witnessed across children’s evaluated performances. We are seeing kids write better stories month by month, then using these stories as a basis for codes being developed on scratch programming. Recently, we are making tremendous headway with our introduction of python programming. 

Our program curriculum is designed by the team at Jokkolabs. We strive to create impact and boost children’s learning abilities. Jokkolabs Banjul has contributed immensely in the ICT sector in the Gambia as well as in education, as we have conducted several community based projects in ICT within the context of education development in partnership with the Ministry of Education, The Ministry of ICT, community-led initiatives, local and municipal councils, public schools, NGO's, The Internet Technology Association of the Gambia, and other local and International partners. 

We have successfully set-up and maintained computer labs at St. Josephs Girls High School, facilitating the training of teachers for the Africa Code at St. Josephs, St. Augustine's Senior School, Muslim High Senior School, and the Gambia Senior Secondary School. We have designed inclusive education development curriculum using ICT as a catalyst. We have also conducted several research and training across all six regions of the country.

Our team consists of diverse creatives and education enthusiasts promoting innovative approaches to teaching and learning, as well as pioneering digital literacy curriculum across public schools and communities. We have a strong relationship with the Ministry of Education, ICT, various public schools across the country and with the University of the Gambia.

We are applying to the MIT Solve challenge to generate more resources that will support the Rigel School Innovation Project focused on improving the learning abilities of seventh grade students. The Rigel School Innovation Project strives to increase the academic performances of seventh graders after the registered success of our After School Program where kids between the ages of 5-15 have gained invaluable skills in coding, creative reading and writing, and design thinking. 

Through an innovative and inclusive teaching approach, our after-school program beneficiaries have exponentially improved their learning abilities, problem solving skills and critical reasoning. As a result, we would like to expand our educational initiatives to include St. Therese’s Upper Basic School and work with over 200 kids in the seventh grade. 

Working with children has been one of our greatest strengths as an independent non-profit organization and a social change hub. The Rigel School Innovation Project is an expanded educational initiative derived from our successful After School Program. In our After-School program, over fifty children between the ages of 5-15 have been trained through an innovative and dynamic teaching and learning approach. The Rigel School Innovation Project is innovative because of the introduction of design thinking throughout academic curriculum modules which will be designed, implemented and specifically tailored at significantly improving student academic performance across mathematics, and reading and writing skills. This project is catalytic in that it strives to provide high quality education to the most undeserved, and vulnerable children in the seventh grade. We recognize the importance of establishing strong foundational skills in literacy and numeracy amongst children.

All of our program modules will be thoroughly researched, with all project materials to be uploaded on Jokkolabs’ database. To deliver an effective program, we will partner with the Research Department at the University of the Gambia where high-performing students majoring in math, physics, literature and English will be selected as Educators in the Rigel School Innovation Project. We will also partner with the Alumni community of the university to recruit professionals who would like to volunteer their time and resources in supporting the goals of the Rigel School Innovation Project. The teachers at the school will also benefit from peer to peer review and training whereby all project materials that highlight our innovative teaching and learning methodologies will be shared with all parties involved. This ensures the distribution of knowledge sharing and skills transferring to better support students’ needs as we effectively carry out program deliverables. 

The students in the program will benefit from Jokkolabs’ hub features as our successful Digital Literacy courses will be made available to them. Seventh grade students will have access to our innovation hub at any time to conduct research and complete any other E-Learning initiatives.

We will conduct monthly evaluations throughout project implementation to identify students’ progress in the program:  how well they respond to our teaching methods and how they have been able to improve their overall academic performances, along with foundational problem solving and critical reasoning skills. The quarterly assessments taken after each school term exam will be added to our database for monitoring and evaluation of project success. 

The Rigel School Innovation Project enables broader positive impacts across the academic lives of seventh grade students.

Impact Goals:

• Improve the learning abilities of low performing students in Seventh Grade at St. 

• Introduce creative learning and teaching methods in public schools.

• Strengthen educational initiatives by creating and enabling an environment for students in the public schools to improve. 

• Therese’s Upper Basic School by using an innovative approach to teaching and learning.

• Boost student performance of beneficiaries by 30% in the first year of project implementation.

• Boost student performance in the West African Examination Certificate by 20% after three years. 

• Expand our Project initiative to two more schools after three years so that other students in other public schools can also benefit.  

Project Beneficiaries: 

Directed beneficiaries

- 200-250 seventh grade students attend daily 2hrs long mentorship session facilitated by alumni educators to improve literacy and numeracy skills

- 50 alumni university educators have completed 6-weeks intensive training in unconventional and innovative teaching and learning methodologies 

- 10 selected teachers supervise the mentorship sessions generally assessing students’ overall academic improvements

Indirect beneficiaries

- 1000+ community members, including parents and service stakeholders will positively benefit from seventh graders’ academic improvements as students are well prepared to access higher education in the years to come

- 5 researchers will be hired to support the monitoring and evaluation stages of project implementation 

- 15 additional university volunteers and/or professionals will be present to supervise the project, and further develop their skills in innovative teaching methodologies

List of indicators:

1. By the end of the academic year, ensure that all seventh grade girls and boys have access to high quality paired to paired learning opportunities and care so that they are ready to pursue higher education

2. By the end of the academic year, substantially increase the number of seventh grade students who have developed their skills across mathematics, reading and writing, and as a result have improved their aggregate.

3. By the end of the academic year, eliminate gender disparities in education and ensure equal access to learning opportunities for the vulnerable, including students with disabilities, religious minorities, girls, children from rural areas, and children in vulnerable situations.

4. By the end of the academic year,, ensure that all low-performing seventh grade students have substantially increased their skills in literacy and numeracy

5. Build and upgrade education spaces that are child, disability and gender sensitive and provide safe, non-violent, inclusive and effective learning environments for all

Five researchers will be hired to conduct monitoring and evaluation throughout project implementation, developing extensive research on the improvements witnessed across students’ academic performances. As a result, a report detailing rates of academic improvement pulled from the examination rounds and research findings will highlight the impact and progress made. For transparency and accountability purposes, both the research conducted and findings collected throughout the duration of the project will be published across our newly-created database and project pages. 

Another indicator of progress beyond students’ improvements in their overall academic performances across mathematics, reading and writing, and other subjects, is the visible growth in academic empowerment, and confidence seen across students whose class attendance and engagement outside of the Rigel School Innovation Project improves. 

Generally over the years as our cohort of seventh grade students move into their eight and ninth grades, the number of total dropouts and repeaters has dramatically decreased as a result of the mentorship program developed. 

The project team alongside selected teachers will design uniquely tailored curriculum based learning modules to meet the existing needs of seventh grade students. These academic modules will be evaluated using the following methodologies:

• Feedback forms completed at the end of each mentorship session by seventh grade students 

• Monthly academic improvement reports submitted by alumni educators

• Additional monthly teacher assessments to be provided detailing students’ class engagement

As researchers will be hired to complete a report at the end of the Rigel School Innovation Project cohort to measure the successes, benefits and challenges of the program. These findings will then inform the curriculum design and mentorship mode of delivery for the next cohort. This process will continue on a yearly basis. A final report will be produced that includes an evaluation of the first year of programming using all the data and reports created by the research consultants, the community animators, Jokkolabs Banjul’s database, assessment outcomes and alumni educator reports.

Our Theory of Change: 

It has been assumed that improving children's educational desired long-term outcomes in the Gambia will lead to the community’s ability to utilize innovative cross-sectoral practices driving forward social economy when these children reach adulthood, thereby improving the overall start-up and entrepreneurship economy.

*Any data highlighted below is directly derived from The Gambia Education Fact Sheets | 2020 - UNICEF Data.

To address the disparities in education along urban-rural divides, the Rigel School Innovation Project’s focus on improving literacy and numeracy skills simultaneously tackles issues of poverty. We know that children from poorer areas across the country are disproportionately at a disadvantage whereby their access to high quality education in terms of human, time and energy capacity is nearly impossible. As a result, more than a quarter (around 26 percent) of all children aged 5 - 17 years old are engaged in some form of child labor. The rates of child labor are far higher among rural children (at about 40 percent) than in urban ones (around 18 percent). To drastically reduce the number of dropouts and repeaters, inclusive and safe educational spaces must be fostered amongst those living in the margins in the Gambia.

Moving into the profiling of children ages 7-14 who are not learning, we see that girls constitute the majority (around 55 percent) of children who are not learning, for both reading and numeracy. This would suggest that early marriage, childbirth or other factors which predominantly affect young women may represent additional obstacles to education at this level.

How many children complete their education? Only around 65 percent of children aged 15 to 17 complete primary education in the Gambia. This decrease in completion rates at higher levels of education suggests that compared to primary education, students in lower and upper secondary school are more prone to dropouts or grade repetition. Through uniquely tailored learning, inclusive and welcoming spaces, and tying innovation and creativity, the Rigel School Innovation ProjectIn order addresses the clear disparities in education that seem to grow over the academic years, starting with a narrowed focus on reengaging seventh grade learners.  

Long Term Outcomes:

• Seventh graders living in rural areas are disadvantaged yet through the Rigel School Innovation Project, their foundational reading and numeracy skills have significantly improved, bringing them closer to the academic performances of urban children and those with lower aggregates.

• Seventh graders’ class attendance and engagement within the class and alongside their peers has drastically improved, signifying academic empowerment and confidence growth.

• Dropouts and grade repetitions from senior years have significantly reduced over the years as the Rigel School Innovation Project is implemented on an annual basis.

E-Learning platforms like Coursera, Khan Academy, Future Learn, EdX are technology sites that will be used extensively across our research in drafting and designing curriculum materials to be taught to seventh grade students.

Google Suite apps will be used for the monitoring and managing of all shared project documents. Moreover, we will create a project page on WordPress and Facebook highlighting our ongoing project activities and successes. 

The Rigel School Innovation Project is open to students from all socio-economic, cultural and religious backgrounds. The project aims to target current gender disparities in the Gambian education system by ensuring the fostering of gender-balanced leadership, and inclusive and equitable spaces for participation and engagement for both boys and girls enrolled. The same principle will be applied in recruiting educators, researchers and other project staff and volunteers. We will ensure that students from disadvantageous backgrounds who find themselves in marginalized and vulnerable spaces significantly benefit from the Rigel School Innovation Project. 

Our business model leverages innovation, collaboration and creativity to drive forward large-scale impact and social change in students’ academic performance at public schools. The model centers on leveraging our network of local and international partners, and collaborators including but not limited to the Ministry of Basic and Secondary Education, Ministry of ICT, Catholic Education Secretariat, the University of the Gambia, the Alumni Community of St. Therese’s, The Information, Technology Association of the Gambia. All parties will work together to create equal opportunities for children to access inclusive high quality education. The Rigel School Innovation Project strives to improve the standard of education in the current public school system by strengthening existing methods of teaching and learning through new and improved ways utilizing innovation as a catalyst to address the clear disparities in education. 

Our financial model will be designed in partnership with our core funders, and the Alumni community of the school. We will also create bi-annual fundraising activities to raise donations in-person and online.

So far we charge students a minimum amount for Jokkolabs' After School program. We also have external funders who fund our bootcamps like the Gambia Tech Project and Afri Money. We also have individual donors from our network who donate and maintain several of our most successful hub activities.