Learning Equality

Calling all students, educators, parents, and #edtech enthusiasts! We are thrilled to announce that Kolibri v0.15 - the "Take Home" release - has just taken flight! This release is designed to support seamless at-home/in-school #HybridLearning without the Internet, which is a critical step forward to address learning losses resulting from the pandemic. It’s only fitting that this new version of our little bird would fly into the world on the heels of World #SocialJusticeDay, given Learning Equality's focus on equity, access, participation, and rights, which happen to be the same four principles that define social justice. The "Take Home" release enables at-home, self-directed, and hybrid learning thanks to these new features: - Single learner data syncing: Offline data collection now allows teachers to track individual learner progress in classrooms and make personalized recommendations for continued learning at home. The offline data collection continues when the student goes home. - Redesigned learner view: This shorter path to resources helps learners get to work on assignments more quickly and improves the discoverability of materials.  - Improved metadata: Additional details regarding learning resources allow for more relevant search results when exploring materials. The "Take Home" release streamlines learning from home with learning from school without re # #learning #educators ## #data #school #quiring the Internet, while delivering more enjoyable and personalized learning experiences to learners and educators living in low-resource, low-connectivity contexts. We’re so excited to see #KolibriFly into the world with this new functionality! Read about the new features and download today: https://lnkd.in/dsQ5ut25

The landscape for using AI for social good is ever evolving in the nonprofit world, as illustrated by the Stanford Social Innovation Review’s article today, and we’re proud to be a part of it. This new landscape map created by Fast Forward’s Kevin Barenblat and Brigitte Hoyer Gosselink from Google.org focuses on AI advancing impact objectives of nonprofits, and breaks it into three main categories: Advising, Structuring Data, and Translating. Learning Equality, our equity-driven edtech nonprofit, has been using AI to structure data (more specifically to organize digital learning resources via automating the process of curriculum alignment) to ensure that relevant information is easily accessible for learners and educators on Kolibri– our open, free and adaptable ecosystem of products and tools especially designed for teaching and learning with tech but without the Internet. For example, we recently automated the organization of 12,000 learning resources to 2,000+ distinct learning objectives in STEM, for 10 different grade levels in Uganda. This reduced a process that previously took months of work and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, to a matter of days and a few thousand dollars, thanks to equity-driven AI. We’re eager to get these AI data organization tools directly into the hands of ALL disconnected communities and continue to discover new ways that AI can help build equity in education. https://lnkd.in/g5UZBHU9 #AIforGood #AIForHumanity #AI #ArtificialIntelligence #CurriculumAlignment #EdTech #DigitalEducationResources #EducationEquity

Today is World Youth Skills Day, and the theme this year is ‘Youth Skills for Peace and Development’. We believe in an equitable world that empowers youth through access to quality education and digital skills for them to develop their own agency, create positive transformation, and flourish. We agree with the @UN that it’s imperative for youth to have access to necessary skills for employment and entrepreneurship to build a more just, inclusive and sustainable future for all. That’s why we’re proud to be an edtech partner for PROSPECTS– a program that aims to improve the livelihoods of youth in refugee and host communities by: ✅Providing access to education and training through connected learning  ✅Building soft and relevant skills to support the creation of decent employment and livelihood opportunities for youth in the digital job market PROSPECTS is spearheaded by the Government of Netherlands, and is a partnership between the International Labour Organization, IFC - International Finance Corporation, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, UNICEF, and The World Bank. #YouthSkills #edtech #RefugeeEducation #EducationForAll  #Youth #WorldYouthSkillsDay #Entrepreneurship #EmploymentSkills #DigitalJobs #DigitalSkills

At Learning Equality, we prioritize the mental health and wellness of our people, so from July 1-5 our offices will be closed for our annual Rest & Recharge week. Our team has worked hard this year thus far towards our shared mission of building equity in education, and we are honored to give back to them in this way. If you need anything from one of us, we’ll be happy to get back to you after July 8th! Does your work do this too? & Do you think this should be the norm for work culture? #nonprofit #worklifebalance #workculture #mentalhealth #restandrecharge #recharge #edtech #selfcare #TakeABreak #AvoidBurnout #Wellness

Today is World Refugee Day, and this year, UNHCR’s focus is on solidarity with refugees and finding solutions to their plight. That’s why we wanted to take a moment to highlight PROSPECTS, a solutions-based program for refugees that we’ve been a part of. Spearheaded by the Government of Netherlands, PROSPECTS is a partnership between the ILO PROSPECTS, IFC - International Finance Corporation, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, UNICEF and The World Bank. The aim of the project is to transition from humanitarian to development-centered assistance, which can address long-term challenges and needs of the host and refugee communities. The project focuses on providing access to connected learning, soft and relevant market digital skills, and linking youth to digital jobs with a focus on improving livelihoods for youth in refugee and host communities. Learning Equality is an EdTech partner for this project and works closely with ILO East Africa, UNHCR and @UNICEFUganda. We have learned a lot through the PROSPECTS program about supporting and contributing to refugee education, and we will use these insights to strengthen our support in future projects with refugee communities. #WorldRefugeeDay #WRD #edtech #refugees #RefugeeEducation #EducationForAll #InvestinUGchildren Source: https://lnkd.in/gjydvtfm

How many funders not only care about #OpenEducation but also create meaningful spaces for grantees to network, collaborate & think strategically about their collective impact? Our long-time supporter, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation certainly does! Our Head of Training and Impact, Navya Akkinepally, and Global Implementations Project Manager, Revanth Voothaluru, attended Hewlett's Foundation Education Grantee Convening last month, and Revanth shares some of the highlights of everything they saw and learned here: le.fyi/Hewlett-event

Today we are celebrating the inaugural @UN International Day of Play together with The LEGO Foundation. It’s an opportunity for all of us to promote the value that play brings and protect every child’s right to play and learn. An estimated 160 million children around the world are working instead of playing or learning according to UNICEF. The power of play is not lost on us, which is why we started Flying Colors, our tech-enabled, project-based learning initiative for out-of-school refugee learners and educators in Uganda. Flying Colors was developed by HAF Uganda, Amal Alliance and Learning Equality, with support from The LEGO Foundation, where we harnessed the power of edtech, and project and play-based learning materials to build foundational and socio-emotional skills. As a result, we’ve seen significant improvements in learners’ English literacy, numeracy, and socio-emotional skills in participants. Play can instill confidence, help improve learning outcomes, and unleash endless possibilities. What was your favorite childhood game? Read more about Flying Colors here: https://lnkd.in/gRfrsAn3 #InternationalDayofPlay #RightToPlay #ProjectBasedLearning #PowerOfPlay #edtechtools #edtechresources #techforgood

Today we are extending our appreciation for another exceptional open source contributor, named Eshaan Aggarwal. He has provided 6 months of meaningful development contributions to Kolibri, our offline learning platform. Eshaan has improved the stability of our frontend code by submitting many well-crafted and easily maintainable tests. He contributed to user interface consistency and accessibility by introducing some of the Kolibri Design Systems components to Studio. He also brought to our attention a helpful frontend testing library, discussed his vision with us, prepared a proof of concept, and eventually introduced it to Kolibri, along with writing guidelines on best testing practices that are now available in the developer documentation. He did all this with great communication and an innovative spirit! A Note from Eshaan: “Hi! I am a CSE undergraduate from India. I love working with open-source communities as I have never seen more inclusive and helpful communities, and all my skills today are a result of these open-source mentors and maintainers taking out the time to help me. I'll be forever grateful to them. I'm not very sure about my career and future plans, but open-source has got to be a significant part of it. I love music, and chances are you'll never see me without my headphones (they are a part of my attire)!" Contributors like Eshaan donate their time to ensure that our open ecosystem of edtech tools and resources run smoothly, efficiently and continue to be inclusive and equitable. They are a powerful part of our mission to build equity in education! #opensource #developers #EdTech #EducationEquity #Coding #frontend

Check out this Linux Professional Institute (LPI) blog post interviewing Richard Tibbles, Learning Equality’s co-founder and Product Lead. This interview covers the genesis of Kolibri and really delves into how Kolibri is making quality education accessible to all. Thanks Massimiliano Roveri for the opportunity to explore how Kolibri bridges the gap for learners in low-resource and disconnected environments. Read the blog here: https://lnkd.in/gVSYgp49 #EducationEquity #EdTech #DigitalLearning #EducationForAll #OfflineResources #DigitalLearningResources #DigitalLearningTools #EducationGap #DigitalDivide

Artificial Intelligence can have profound impacts for education equity, but it is often designed and deployed in a way that most deeply benefits those who already have the most. Reversing this trend requires proactively co-designing AI with and for those without Internet access, whose fundamental needs are not being met. We recently automatically organized 12,000 learning resources to 2,194 distinct learning objectives in STEM, for 10 grade levels in Uganda. Reducing a process that would previously have taken months of work and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, to a matter of days and a few thousand dollars thanks to equity-driven AI. This builds on a long-term collaboration with UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency to automate this process. Now we want to get these AI tools directly into the hands of ALL disconnected communities, in needs-driven ways that help boost equitable learning. We are excited to announce that, in support of our critical work developing these offline AI tools, our long-time partner and supporter, Endless has made a commitment to match $500k if we’re able to raise another $500k by 6/30/2024. You can help build the future of equitable global access to AI by donating through our website: https://lnkd.in/dnucXzz #ArtificialIntelligence #AI #DigitalLearning #offline #EducationEquity #nonprofit #DigitalLearningTools #AIforGood #EthicalAI #TechForGood #TechForHumanity #CurriculumAlignment https://lnkd.in/gZ2nFnv5