In Nigeria, quality education is not cheap, making it difficult for the poor to send their children to good schools. The Bridge International Academy, a group of schools established for low-income families, is changing that. It is giving indigent pupils quality education at low cost, reports WALE AJETUNMOBI.
Eight-year-old Abiola Oduyinka, had spent three years in a fairly expensive private school in Igando, in Alimosho Local Government Area of Lagos State, before her parents discovered she could barely read or write. Her father, Isaac Oduyinka, a carpenter at Iyana Iba, promptly withdrew her from the school and enrolled her at Bridge International Academy, a group of schools established for low-income earners, to save money for other needs. At Bridge Academy in Ijegun, Oduyinka pays less than N8,000 per term on his daughter.
Four months in the school, Abiola’s story has changed for good. Oduyinka was happy when he got a preliminary report sheet that his daughter has picked up in her studies, especially in difficult subjects.
Abiola exemplifies the fact that Bridge Academy is delivering quality education to children living in communities that cannot afford the fees of elite schools.
Co-founded in the United States (U.S.) by Jay Kimmelman and Dr. Shannon May, Bridge Academy’s primary objective is to provide access to quality education to over 100 million children estimated to be living in poor communities worldwide by 2025.
In delivering its mandate, the academy employs innovative technological solutions to bridge the quality gap between indigent pupils and their peers in exclusive private schools at affordable cost.
Its first set of schools was established in Mukuru slum of Kenya six years ago. Last year, three branches of the academy were established in Ikorodu, Ikotun and Igando.
At their inauguration, Dr. May spoke of plans to establish 50 low-cost academies nationwide, especially in the North, where she said quality education is out of the reach of the poor.
She promised that pupils of the academy would receive the best education at low cost.
Dr May said: “Bridge Academy is established to work with parents, who live in very difficult economic conditions. As they struggle to meet up with their families’ daily needs, it hurts on their children in terms of education. We believe every child – rich or poor – should have the best education. We believe that, no matter the condition of parents; whatever situation they go through should not determine the fate of their children. We want to ensure that every child has equal access to the best education that can make them stand out anywhere in the world.”
Engaging community teachers
On landing in Lagos, the academy was confronted with the task of recruiting quality teachers to drive its mission. In line with its aims, it recruited teachers from its host communities.
After their selection, the teachers underwent three-week residential training.
Ms Olu Babalola, the academy’s Expansion Director, said the training was required to deliver individualised learning to each pupil. This, she said, would enable the teachers have one-on-one interface with the pupils to ensure proper understanding of lessons.
Ms Babalola said: “We know that children from low-income families consistently underperform judging from our data. It is not that these children are not intelligent or have potential, but the lack of access to quality education makes most of them to perform poorly in school.
“What we did was to address the problems that affect the delivery of quality education to these children. We chose a model that is at variance with what is obtainable in regular schools, where its mechanism for inspection is not effective. All teachers recruited are adequately trained to deliver quality learning to our pupils and they are constantly monitored to ensure the right lessons are being taught.”
Teachers’ Tech
During the training, the teachers also learnt how to use a smart device called Teachers’ Tech, deployed by the academy to facilitate teaching.
The Teachers’ Tech, a mini-tablet, is used to deliver lessons to pupils and monitor teachers as well. The device, according to the school’s Academic Director, Ms Stacey Nwokeyi, is updated weekly with the lessons to be taught and the methodology to deliver the lessons.
“The Teachers’ Tech is a combination of mini tablet and Wi-Fi enabled smartphone. It allows us to monitor teachers’ attendance, the commencement of the day’s lesson and when it ends, and the lessons delivered by each teacher. The smartphone is connected to our web server and each day’s activities automatically go to our data base. This method helps us to know if the teachers actually delivered the lessons in the way we have spelt out. And it also tells us, which pupil is participating in the class work and who among them is absent.
“We know when each teacher is teaching, because the Teachers’ Tech allows us to do that. Once a lesson is started, the phone automatically sends information to our central office. We monitor the teachers as they go through the page of each lesson. This is done for every subject we teach the pupils. And we have monitored the pupils’ improvement through their scores.”
Daily assessment of teachers and pupils
The teaching technique employed by the academy makes it impossible for any pupil not to participate in class work. At the end of each class, teachers are required to assess them and enter their scores into the Teachers’ Tech which are immediately recorded in the academy’s central database.
If the pupils perform below expectation, Ms Nwokeyi said the technique used by the teacher would be reviewed to detect possible deviation from the established methodology set by management. Through this, she said, teachers’ performances are evaluated, and improvement made where necessary.
The pupils’ assessment scores are sent daily to the academy’s central management office. This enables management to evaluate improvement.
Ms Nwokeyi said: “Our pupils are also taken through mid-term examination to test their knowledge on all the subjects they take in the term. Teachers will capture the pupils’ score into computer and we can use this information to decide who among the pupils is performing better in each subject offered. The scores cannot be altered by the teachers once they are sent to the central server through the Teachers’ Tech.”
Enriched curriculum
Although the academy uses the Nigerian curriculum, Ms Nwokeyi said the school goes beyond the curriculum to include additional subjects and activities that reflect the 21st century teaching standard.
“We created our own timetable and designed the subjects to be taken. We understood what is required of us to teach and we also understand what our children need to learn in the class. As the pupils go to upper classes, the national curriculum requires that they should have exposure to Nigeria’s history. But, we added histories of other countries, such as China and Russia to keep the pupils abreast of what is happening in the world,” she said.
Like in other schools, the pupils attend extra lessons after closing at 2pm daily. The classes are compulsory and free.
“We organise free extra lessons for our pupils to improve their understanding of the lessons taught during the normal hour. The period also allows the pupils to participate in drama and other extra-curricula activities. This is unlike what is obtainable in regular schools, where parents are forced to pay for compulsory extra lessons,” Ms Nwokeyi added.
No corporal punishment
Corporal punishment is not allowed at the academy. Rather, teachers have been trained on alternative methods of correcting errant pupils.
Victoria Nsefik-Eyo, the academy’s Teachers’ Training Manager, said each teacher has learnt classroom management tools without using the cane.
She said: “The reason why we don’t encourage corporal punishment is because we don’t want the children to associate negative feelings to school. We believe a school should be a place where children should be eager to go. We have equipped our teachers with effective and sustainable correction tools in order not to discourage the pupils from coming to school.
“We know children always want to play with their peers. Pupils who put up abnormal behaviour are given warning. But, if such errant pupils do not change, we make them to face the consequences of their actions. This includes preventing them from catching fun with their peers during the break time. They will start to change their behaviour when they are disallowed from playing and having fun. This method is effective and sustainable.”
Parents’ reaction
Parents whose wards attend the school, testify to the effectiveness of its methodology.
Mrs Chidinma Joseph, whose children, Jessica and Goodluck attend the Ijegun, Ikotun branch of the school, said her children now read well.
She said: “I initially had doubts about the school, because of the low fees. But there has been improvement since I changed my children to Bridge Academy. I would have withdrawn them from Bridge if I did not notice any improvement.”
Mr. Kolapo Adenola said his daughter, Ifeoluwa, enrolled in Ikorodu branch of the academy, is now doing well in mathematics and English.
“I am happy I took the decision to change Ifeoluwa’s school. She has improved in mathematics and English. She reads well and does her homework herself. Before now, when she returns home from school, she would play around, but since she was enrolled in Bridge Academy, she takes everything seriously. From the mid-term report I got from the school, my daughter is also doing well in extra-curricular activities.”
Another parent, Mrs Abimbola Awokoya, whose son, Ahmad, is in pre-school class of the Demeke, Ikorodu said: I have noticed great changes since my child started Bridge. He writes very well and can now identify shapes and colours. He even teaches me some of these shapes and colours.”
