ProFuturo is a digital education programme for the improvement of educational quality, using digital tools, in vulnerable environments and does so with a dual strategy: on the one hand it improves teacher training at the techno-pedagogical level and, on the other, it promotes meaningful student learning through motivational digital learning experiences.
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“My name is Nancy Charles Mtui and I want to be a doctor.”
“My name is Nancy Charles Mtui. I am in the sixth grade at Imani Primary School. As has been said, when I grow up I would like to be a doctor. I am grateful to the school for the good teachers I have had during my studies and who have helped me achieve my goal. When I first saw the tablets, I was very happy because I had never used one before. And I was really scared of breaking it, but I starting feeling more secure and, with a little practice, I was able to use it well. I learned how to use it thanks to my coordinator, Mark. I am now able to use it in most subjects, such as English, maths, science and Swahili. I am very happy to be part of the group of children who benefit from the digital class. Thank you, ProFuturo. Thank you, teachers. Thank you, coordinators. On behalf of my colleagues, thank you.“
“According to UNESCO, in Tanzania, 5 million primary school children (33.3% of the school population) will drop out of school before finishing the last grade”
These are the words of thanks from Nancy Charles Mtui. In Tanzania, there are 38,667 children in 47 schools who, like Nancy, are in vulnerable settings in Dar es Salaam, Moshi, Mafinga-Iringa, Dodoma and Morogoro. In all of these places, we offer our integral digital education solution with which the students are being initiated into the 21st century competences education, thanks to the collaboration of the Salesians of Don Bosco. We are working to expand our commitment to education in Tanzania to 30 new schools. But children in this country on the east coast of sub-Saharan Africa, like those in so many places around the world, do not have it easy. UNESCO estimates that nearly 5 million Tanzanian primary school children (33.3% of the school population) will drop out of school before completing the last grade of primary school. The good news is that wherever we bring our educational proposal, absenteeism is reduced and the number of school enrolments increases. No child wants to miss out on digital lessons!
At ProFuturo, we are proud of Nancy and also of her teachers. We have already trained 279 teachers because, although our objective is the children, the key to their educational transformation is the teaching community itself and it is on them that we focus our greatest efforts. The training of teachers, especially regarding information technologies and innovative teaching methodologies, allows us to motivate and train them for the integration of digital technology into their pedagogical practice.
Since we live in an increasingly digital world and most of the jobs of the future do not even exist today, ProFuturo’s education is competency-based rather than content-focused. New technologies allow us to bring quality education to any part of the world, no matter how remote it may be. That is why our greatest hope, our noble aspiration and enormous challenge is that Nancy and all the girls and boys in Tanzania and the rest of the 23 countries where we are working, across the three continents of Africa, Latin America and Asia, have access to the same education as children in Spain, France or the United States.
