Virtual Academy
The global COVID-19 pandemic forced MindLeaps to suspend its in-person classes for the hundreds of youth we serve throughout Uganda. Schools were closed for the 480 students we sponsor in formal education. To meet the challenge of continuing the education and skills development of our students, we turned to digital tools to create the MindLeaps Virtual Academy.
The MindLeaps Uganda dance programs have had a transformative effect on the ability of vulnerable youth to attend and succeed in school, but formal education does not always enable youth to find a job.
Moreover, in the marginalized communities served by MindLeaps Uganda, youth don’t have access to business and entrepreneurship training applicable to their situations, or, if the training is available, it is not available for low-bandwidth phones.
Enter the MindLeaps Virtual Academy!
A digital safe space, the MindLeaps Virtual Academy organizes youth into WhatsApp groups for business and entrepreneurship trainings, stimulating learning through engaging courses with local and international experts via real-time voice-message lectures.
MindLeaps Uganda provides phones and data-packages to the youth enrolled in the Virtual Academy and offers seed grants to the most promising business plans created during the trainings.
In 2020, the Virtual Academy in Uganda served as an educational and social life-line for our youth, trainers and their communities during the Covid-19 pandemic, with dramatic results:
Annet opened her own chapatti (food) business
Zanni started a reusable charcoal business
One of the most common responses we heard from the young trainers in the program was: “I didn’t know I could create a job by analyzing the problems around me and responding to them!”
Currently:
MindLeaps Uganda has received a grant from the UNFCU to offer the Virtual Academy to even more youth in Uganda (50% girls) through the end of June 2021.
In addition, we have initiated a pilot project that will create Virtual Academy spaces specifically for 40 at-risk women and girls across Uganda.
The Virtual Academy initiative in Uganda is led by MindLeaps Uganda’s Country Director, Martha Bua Peace, one of the creators of the Virtual Academy in 2019.
Outcomes from the Academy include maintaining a sense of structure while schools are closed during the pandemic, subject-area skill development, and active engagement. MindLeaps measures attendance, assignment submission, and classtime participation (the number of Whatsapp messages - akin to raising one’s hand in class) to evaluate these outcomes.
On the qualitative side, MindLeaps examines the growth of hope, long-term vision, and community building. The impact of the Academy is to equip these youth with the skills they can use to be economically independent, as well as become effective youth leaders in their communities. Academy in providing ongoing access to education has made it a permanent feature of MindLeaps that will continue to serve our youth beyond COVID-19.