As one way of scaling up digital education in Malawi, the Malawi Government through the Ministry of Education intends to implement a project called Building Education Foundation through Innovation and Technology (BEFIT) in all the 6000 primary schools in the country.
This was disclosed on Saturday in Lilongwe by the Minister of Education Madalitso Kambauwa Wirima at Kasiya Primary School during a close-out ceremony for the Unlocking Talent Project which was introduced in Lilongwe in 2013 and was scaled up to other districts in 2019.
According to Wirima, through the project the Ministry of Education aims to roll out the program to standard 1-4 learners in 6000 primary schools.
“Having the experienced the gains from the program we now use this as a stepping stone to actually go big to go to all the 6000 primary school in the country with the program. So the Unlocking Talent is what has translated into what we calling the BEFIT, in this project we are going to work with our development partners to make sure that we can actually accelerate this program and also enhance it and make sure that is actually rolled out all in the 6000 primary schools in the country,” said Wirima.
Wirima also noted that the Unlocking Talent Project has produced good outcome in education i.e enrollment in schools that it has been implemented for example dropout rates dropped.
She continued to say that there was more excitement and more interest of children wanting to be in school and staying in school. She added that the project has also improved the numeracy and literacy.
“Our learners are able to do numeracy in much better way using the tablets that have been provided to them. So I am just very happy that we are here and from the unlocking talent we can actually scale up the program, which is very beneficial to our learners, to more schools in order to reach more learners in so many primary schools,” said Wirima.
In her remarks, German Ambassador to Malawi Ute Konig said she is impressed with the achievements made through the project and expressed her government’s commitment to supporting inclusive education.
Since 2019, Voluntary Services Overseas (VSO) in partnership with London-based organisation, One Billion, and ministry of education have been implementing the project with financial support from the German Government through KFW.
The project which reached out to 217,000 standard 1-2 learners in 338 centres in at least 15 districts in the country, focused on provision of digital education through solar powered tablets.
