Driving Value for Money when reaching marginalised girls through education technology solutions

• In Event: Delivering Value for Money in girls’ education programming. Approaches and experiences from the Girls’ Education Challenge

Proposal

This presentation provides an analysis of the value for money offered by 10 projects funded through the Girls’ Education Challenge (GEC). The projects focus on education technology in particular. The presentation will discuss which education technology interventions were strong investments, giving rise to good value for money as defined by relevant, cost effective, sustainable and efficiently delivered, giving rise to learning, transition, access and sustainability outcomes. By focusing on value for money this allows us to understand what worked well, within which contexts and at what cost. The projects all work within schools and also out of schools with marginalised girls in Kenya, Uganda, Ghana, Pakistan, Nepal and Tanzania. They each cover a variety of education focused activities, such as teacher training, bursaries, income generating methods, school improvement and systems strengthening. Each project has a technological element. Such elements vary from low tech (phone, SMS, radio, distance learning) to high tech interventions (tablets, orbitals, software, desk tops, internet and TV).

In particular, the presentation explores how technology can still be used in remote areas with patchy connectivity, how it can be helpful and cost effective for including marginalised groups such as children with disabilities or those from remote tribes facing strong barriers to education. The presentation also touches on challenging contexts and situations in which education technology can help adapt much more efficiently and cost effectively and open up access, such as during the COVID-19 pandemic. The GEC projects offer good examples of adaptation of existing interventions aimed at improving the quality of teaching and providing remote education during the COVID-19 pandemic – such as teachers using telephone calls to answer student questions or monitor learning, in-person small group sessions in villages, and the provision of home learning materials. Whilst working on reaching marginalised girls through education technology during the COVID-19 pandemic, the GEC projects found that girls faced particular challenges including poor access to technology, increased domestic responsibilities (domestic chores and agricultural responsibilities), inadequate resources at home (limited access to textbooks or assignments) and limited avenues for feedback from teachers or caregivers.

Early findings emerging from the GEC projects indicate that low tech solutions can be cost effective, especially if combined with no technology solutions in a bespoke way that is mindful of connectivity barriers in very remote areas. High technology solutions need to be careful considered due to their relatively high cost and often sunk investments. For very marginalised groups such as girls with disabilities they can be a good cost effective investment despite the high costs.

Author

• Valsa Shah, VSC-Economics Ltd.