Bringing Technology to the African Bush
Project Luangwa is a longtime friend and partner of the Africa Hope Fund, with its focus on helping schools and projects within the Luangwa Valley of Zambia. Back in March of 2022 we highlighted their latest venture, a pilot program that was launched in January of that year, called 'Digitruck – a mobile computer classroom'.
The goal of Digitruck was to have a mobile truck outfitted with electronic tablets, that would move around to different schools, bringing an alternative learning environment to the local children of the Luangwa Valley, while helping to improve the teacher to student ratio, amongst other classroom resources.
Fast-forward to today, and the project is now currently in two schools! Titled 'Digilearn', the innovative program is bringing digital learning into mainstream classrooms in rural Zambia.
Project Luangwa’s CEO, Ian Macallan provided us with an update on how the program has been coming along, “Learning in rural Zambia has always been a challenge. Overcrowded classrooms (with sometimes up to 100 children), demotivated teachers (many of whom are not paid), and a lack of resources from chalk to textbooks, all contribute to the problem. On top of that, as universities and institutions begin to rely more heavily on online learning, children in disadvantaged areas such as South Luangwa are increasingly left behind. With Digilearn, children are given a more innovative way to learn. Utilizing digital tablets allows our dedicated coaches to teach students creatively. Instead of traditional chalk boards, Digilearn provides the flexibility for children to be taught in or outside the classroom, to hook up to projector screens for large class learning, or to individually work through tasks using their own tablet.
With match funding support from African Hope Fund, we were also able to further expand the project this year by not just focusing on digital resources, but also enhanced teacher training. Utilizing Inspiring Teachers new platform we ran a training course for 70 teachers from 5 schools, which we hope will greatly enhance teaching methods. Two of the schools are already on our Digilearn Project, and with additional funding we hope to expand into the other three schools next year”. The program uses an interactive online learning platform called 'Mwabu', which covers the entire Zambian curriculum, and has provided an enhanced learning experience so far to over 350 children!
The Africa Hope Fund is ecstatic about our successful contribution towards this project and witnessing its realization. Through our Digitruck campaign, we managed to raise an impressive sum of over $10,000, which we then matched. As a result, we were able to send an astounding $20,000 to Project Luangwa!
A big thank you to all who donated to the Digitruck campaign!