EAA’s Internet Free Education Resource Bank wins mEducation Alliance award
● The open source learning materials project was selected out of 200-plus nominations as part of a global award ceremony
The Internet Free Education Resource Bank (Iferb), developed by Education Above All Foundation (EAA)’s Innovation Development Directorate (IDD), has been conferred the first award in the Crisis and Conflict Category by the Mobiles for Education (mEducation) Alliance.
Honoured for its contributions to broadening education access through alternative solutions, EAA was selected out of a pool of over 200 nominations on the occasion of the mEducation Alliance 10th anniversary event and 1st annual award show.
The event aims to recognise organisations and individuals working with marginalised and difficult to reach communities across the world.
Designed as an early emergency response to the Covid-19 pandemic and the unique problems posed by long-term school closures, the Iferb makes open source, project-based learning (PBL) materials available to facilitate the education journey.
Iferb’s PBL resources are extended, week-long activities that are interdisciplinary in nature covering several subjects with an additional focus on literacy and numeracy skills.
The projects are designed to be student-led, requiring low parental involvement.
Contextualised and adapted by educators and parents, the projects are relevant to their contexts and learning needs of their children.
Resources are designed for NGOs, schools, educators, parents and students in the nearly half of global households that are not digitally connected and for those that have moved to online schools to supplement their learning.
Janhvi M Kanoria, director of the Innovation Development Directorate at Education Above All, said: “The reality is that millions of students worldwide have been left without distance learning infrastructure and connectivity, and as a global community we must find solutions to ensure their access to learning during and after this crisis.
“We are deeply honoured to be recognised by mEducation Alliance for our contributions and hope that our open source learning materials will prevent learning loss to provide students in underserved contexts the opportunity to continue their growth across interdisciplinary projects.”
The awarding body, mEducation Alliance was established in 2010 as a unique, multi-stakeholder convening platform for government and donor policymakers, investors, researchers, and practitioners to work together, particularly in low-resource and developing country contexts.
The Alliance focuses on the role of sustainability and the appropriate usage of technology in education to improve educational outcomes.
Today, EAA’s Iferb is a growing collection of over 122 PBL resources and an Activity Bank for Disabilities that can be implemented using minimal materials while requiring virtually no Internet connection.
All resources within the bank were developed by EAA’s IDD team in collaboration with education experts to cover circa 85% of the international learning standards of the American, British, Qatari, Australian and Indian curricula.
Currently available in nine languages, Iferb resources were piloted with over 113,000 learners through more than 25 pilot partners, ranging from NGOs to schools, across five countries.