Creating innovative learning environment

Studies have shown that learning is affected by the environment by 20%, and we believe this is a large percentage to be over looked,and our case in Africa is worst my state is ranked 9th among states in Nigeria that have bad classrooms,not to talk about upgrading it to smart classrooms,so for us the first phase is remodeling this classrooms and creating models of what an ideal modern day classroom should look like and use that influence to further advocate for innovative and smart designs,the good news is we have started we are almost 3years in, remodeling classrooms and doing a lot of radio and online advocacy.

We design and remodel learning spaces creating a more condusive learning environment for kids,we add new futures to the classroom for example we add a discovery corner that will help kids with problem solving and critical thinking,we include the reading area to encourage kids read on their own,and one of the things we are working on is on how we can have smart classrooms where AI is king ,since we are in a tech compailent generation,this where having MIT s support will go a long way most expecially for us in Africa who are abit backward, having to move classroom design from the traditional setting to a more cozy and tech supported learning environment is what we are about.

Our solution serves learners or students if you may, we have notice most expecially in this part of the world Africa that attention is not paid to the space kids learn in,you find schools where kids seat on stones, broken chairs some even seat on bare floors to learn,this is the narrative we want to change,knowing that even the mental health of the kids is affected if the learning environment is not condusive,and it's had for students to actually properly learn in such conditions,so we are very passionate about making kids have a more condusive learning environment in Africa.

I as the team lead of the better class environment team am an educator by training,I graduated from the national teachers institute Kaduna Nigeria, and am a classroom design consultant,and we have a team of 70 volunteers with relevant skill sets in painting construction,tailoring, fabrication etc, and together we have remodel a 3 classroom block in this short period and was commissioned last year July,  by the chairman government agency in charge of primary school education in our state,we live in the state.

We hope SOLVE will help us with tech solutions and advice on how to design smart classrooms and also funding to support our growth.

The kind of classroom design I am proposing,is what makes my idea innovative,moving from the traditional classroom design to a more AI or smart classrooms if you may,that you can even out source teachers from other countries to teach without them living their countries,this innovative solution will make teaching easier and learning fun,and will expose kids to the new technology trend very early in life.

Creating models of this smart classrooms within the next five years.

Advocating heavily for why this is the future of education,and reasons why it should be embraced 

Partner with relevant stakeholders eg MIT SOLVE to facilitate this movement so it will become the new normal

Evaluations,to help update and upgrade and also solve problems that may arise until this solution becomes seamless.

Through evaluations and appraisals, we go back to the primary school we have worked on every now and again, using the interview method to get feedbacks from the school leadership,teachers and students on the impact of our solution to the teachers the students and the school at large and we use this findings to help us plan and strategies on what our next steps will be and what improvements are there to make ,

So we can prepare for the big picture which is transitioning to smart classrooms 

My theory of change, is the visible impact our solution is bringing to students

From our evaluations after working on the 3class rooms the population of students increased that the headteacher had to open a new class so they can reduce to number of students in the classroom we remodel,its a government owned primary school so the number of children admitted is not regulated here in Nigeria beacuse the school is free, 

We also gathered our solution is building faith in parents to take their kids to this government owned schools beacuse they had lost faith in the schools beacuse the schools were under resourcesed and dilapidated,hence the increase number of students from our evaluations

Teachers find it easier to use other methods of teaching beacuse of our solution which has improved teaching and learning

Students look forward to coming to class which is a direct sign of a better mental state,so we can safely say it's improving their mental health cause they don't feel pressured

Sadly students who are yet to see any transformation in their classes beacuse we are still in the pilot stage will see us and ask when will we be remodeling their own classrooms,this has helped us to know the level of impact we are making and it is part of our expected outcomes to be sure our intervention is needed and useful.

Finally we are meeting the SDG4 need, quality education.

Our solution better better class environment is to have smart classrooms, where AI is king, where a teacher can monitor,class temperature,air quality, attention levels of students, monitoring your class room via screens and smart phones, having class time table digitalized , lesson plan digitalized,and digital classroom assistant that can reduce the teachers work loud like marking scripts sending in assignments etc.

We pay attention to equality,we are a balanced team of both males and females, and we have different demographics and from different ethnicity,we work together as one towards one goal.

We are still in our pilot stage ,so we are working on getting a good business model that will help achieve our goals

Firstly our first phase of intervention is to government owned primary schools so we have worked at getting the agency in charge of primary education in our start to partner with us which was successful, the next thing for us is to leverage on this partnership to get the government to fund more remodeling project with us and when they see the quality of work we are doing then we will send them the proposal for the upgrade of the classrooms to smart classrooms which they will fund and we execute,

Secondly for the private owned primary schools we will have trainings for the heads of those schools sharing our vision for the future classroom we hope for them and the students under their care ,and will give a few of this schools a chance to benefit from our one free class remodel package ,our way of selling the idea in a way the can't say no, beacuse they can't have just one well remodeled class room in a whole school, even the parents of the kids will ask that the project continue so that other kids will benefits so we hope this strategy will work and we will sign remodeling deals that will be fully funded by the schools them selves.

Finally we are putting our eyes out there for grant opportunities so that we could build this initiative into an industrial that will have a vaule chain the alot of people will benefit from

Beacuse this intervention we are bringing is relatively new, we started with crowdfunding,sharing our idea with family and friends,that was how we start and like I stated above we hope to take it a level high by working with relevant stakeholders to help fund the project using our pilot project as evidence.

Within 3years we where able to raise 1 million naira from crowdfunding which was invested in remodeling the 3 classrooms.