Meet Mrs A.

Like a mother would her totally helpless child, Mrs A literally carries her entire family on her back. She travels everyday from the slummy part of the city down to the suburb to sell food by the roadside to passers-by. She prepares the food in a medium sized cooler, mounts it on a table beside a tree close to a dumping site, to sell. Mrs A is always stressed and weary as she sits on a broken, backless plastic chair all day long while standing and sitting intermittently to attend to her few customers. She provides a long bench for her customers to eat, the same bench that serves as her children's sitting room as that's where they resume after school. She feeds them (her children) everyday from the same food she sells; note that Mrs A only sells rice and stew, no varieties. This is her daily routine, six days in a week, excluding Sundays. And this is how she solely caters for her family of eight.

No. Mrs A is not a widower, neither is she a divorcee, her husband is very much alive and available, he is just jobless. So she's responsible for him, herself and their six children.

Feeding Not Enough

If food is all that's needed to train a child, maybe Mrs A's story wouldn't have been so special. After all, she's a food-seller, we might say. But it is the 21st century, where education is as crucial to survival as food itself. She understands this. She sees and feels the effects and manifestation of good education and its lack thereof around her everyday. It lays heavily on her mind the imagined, dreamy picture of how differently her life might've turned out were she educated herself. So now, despite the hardship and difficulties, not giving her children sound education is not an option. Already choked, yet she cannot afford to limit her responsibilities to feeding, clothing, commuting and housing her family alone, she must send them to school as well. Because she needs them to turn out well and live a better life totally different from hers. Alas! Schooling comes with a whole layer of responsibilities. Adding to her already laborious life, to send her children to school, Mrs A must buy uniforms, shoes, pay school fees, levies, buy textbooks, bags and lots of other materials needed for schooling for not one child, but for six!

You might want to pause for a sec, and imagine the kind of education Mrs A will be able to afford.

Not So Sound

Your guess is as good as the reality is. It won't be the ideal type of education where the teacher will patiently explain topics in an enjoyable and easily comprehensible manner. It can't be the kind where the teacher will come down to the kids level and break down the topics in bits. It's not likely to be one where the teacher will systematically teach and monitor the progress of the students. It might not be one where the teacher will communicate in the language the students understand best. Can't be so much of what you will describe as Quality Education. With this type of education, Mrs A’s aim of sending her children to school for ‘sound’ education might be rubbished.

This is the struggle of Mrs A and her kids. They’re not alone; it is the struggle of millions of underprivileged kids globally who may never have access to basic education at all or to quality basic education. Some have it worse than Mrs A. There, is the problem; luckily, there’s a solution.

The Oppia Solution

The Oppia solution is a promise of ease, fun, enjoyable, interactive, story-based lessons; free and accessible to all online. With Oppia, that sound and promising education that Mrs A aspires for her children will no longer be just wishful-thinking but a dream birth to life. The Oppia foundation has come up with a solution for every family and hope for every kid possible. Through Technology, Oppia is working to mitigate the problem of extreme education inequality that has plagued the world for so long. With the help of passionate volunteers all-around the world, Oppia is making sure, through User Studies and feedback, that every lesson is personalised for every region and every child.

For the Oppia dream to fully come to fledge, you and I have a role to play. Oppia foundation is an open field for all to volunteer either as an Educator, Researcher, Software Engineer, Artists; there’s room for all to make an impact. You can also participate in our User study as a parent, student, aunt, teacher, head of school or anyone that can read and write.

It feels great to able to give back to my community through the Oppia foundation project. Big shoutout to Outreachy for making this contribution possible.

Thank you for your time,

Temz.🌹