Bold Idea

One Media Player per Teacher (OMPT)'s bold idea is to build the capacity of teachers in the most under-served places on earth with the innovative use of specialized, portable, audiovisual devices to deliver educational content. Mini-projectors and digital audio devices (Media Players) are coupled with small, but sufficiently loud, audio speakers to enable groups of up to 100 students to share a high-quality learning experience.

The audio video presentations are comprised of educational lessons, which are stored as digital files. These lessons originate from a variety of sources. TV programs from the most developed countries are the highest quality source of educational lessons. The most culturally relevant source of lessons are usually produced locally, so OMPT provides training in audio video production along with training users to operate audiovisual playback devices. The locally produced lessons can be as elaborate as a TV program or as simple as the recording of the voices and visual instructions of gifted educators in larger cities or nearby communities.

The audiovisual devices are high in efficiency and power, but low in cost. For less than $100, the lessons of a country’s most capable teachers can be brought to that nation’s most underprivileged classrooms. Over 2400 hours of audio files can be stored on one PMP. Even those learners in remote places living without electricity can benefit because these devices are battery powered and can be charged by solar panels on sunny days and hand-cranked solution on rainy days.

This technology is extremely versatile, so it can be applied wherever teaching or training is needed. Our intervention works to fortify teachers, whether for elementary age school children, adult education for farmers or health care workers, or to support on-going professional development for teachers and trainers in any field. It is our belief that fortified teachers create lasting social change.

According to UNESCO, promoting equity in education is essential because over 75 million children do not have access to primary school, learning outcomes are poor in many countries and some 776 million adults lack basic literacy skills. Working with NGOs, OMPT intends to dramatically reduce these statistics. 

Teachers are fundamental for the spread of knowledge. In the least developed countries there is often a lack of adequate teachers. Solutions are needed to fortify their efforts by providing them with the most effective, most appropriate educational tools available to transfer knowledge to their students. In many instances this knowledge is broad in scope, such as increasing literacy rates in youth and adult populations. In other situations it is more specific, such as sharing agricultural best practices to increase crop yields or instructions to maintain a pump in a water well. In still other situations, it is highly specific for a particular population at a particular time, such as how to cope with a cholera outbreak or stem the spread the communicable disease such as HIV. In all cases there is a need for particular educational content (lessons) which can augment a teacher’s lack of training and absence of teaching materials. 

Audiovisual technology is a highly effective method to increase retention and comprehension of information, regardless of a student’s age or particular learning style (auditory, visual or tactile) (EdTechMag.com, 2009, p.2). In developing nations, where retention and application of knowledge can have profound and immediate implications for improving the quality of peoples’ daily existence, A/V technology is currently greatly under-utilized as a delivery mechanism. OMPT hopes to change this scenario. We will bring educational content as supportive materials to teachers via low cost audio and video devices, providing value for particular audiences with specific needs even in the most remote places in the developing world.

OMPT intends to empower teachers in classrooms and communities around the world by providing them the power of audio-visual learning tools to deliver diverse content on nearly any topic in a format and within a timeframe that the teacher controls. This promotes better comprehension, better retention and more flexibility to teach larger and more diverse groups of people both young and old on a broad array of critical topics. 

Using audio technology for educational purposes in developing countries is not new. NGOs have been using educational radio since the late 1970s but increasing the quality of education in hard-to-reach locations is a stubborn problem, hence the progress is slow. OMPT is innovative in that we are advocating the use of portable media players with small loudspeakers instead of radios. Our costs are lower and our method allows the teacher to control the lesson schedule, thus having the power to pace the learning. We broaden the geographical reach beyond the limiting boundaries of radio signals or access to electricity. Our solution also includes a video component. Advancements in A/V technology are currently fast moving. There is a distinct need for a liaison between the practitioners in the field and the product designers. OMPT is the only organization playing this role.

OMPT is not only focused upon using updated technology for education interventions, we actively promote the technology and the methodology to any and all other NGOs. Large contractors of USAID have an incentive to keep their methodology secret as this helps them to win the next request for proposal. 
Our plan for content creation is disruptive as it decentralizes the creation of educational lessons. We are working on a web site that will enable NGOs (new to using audiovisuals) to share the content that has been created by other NGOs. We are leveraging new web based technology to empower NGOs to create content in collaboration with each other, across a country, a continent or an ocean.

Over the past 10 years, computers have been perceived by many as the most promising technology for improving teaching capacity. One Media Player per Teacher's (OMPT’s) innovations with audiovisual gear are often a better investment than computers. Our equipment costs less, is easier to operate, can be used by dozens of people at once and since it requires less electricity, can be used in remote locations.

Portable media players differ from radio in that the teacher has control over the audio files. The teachers possess the audio files, not the radio station. As a result, teachers decide what time of day the lesson will start and when and how long to pause it for discussion among the learners. The teacher can decide to repeat a lesson for those students who were absent or to accelerate lessons for the more gifted learners.

OMPT’s innovations include low cost, simplified content creation to serve smaller groups. Radio program production requires expensive equipment and expert scriptwriters to create programs for large segments of a population. OMPT’s solution empowers non-experts to use inexpensive laptops to create audio and video files. This nimble content creation allows for more narrowly tailored programs, aimed at thousands or hundreds of people. The simplest content to create is the recording of a skilled teacher giving a lesson. Not only do the students gain, but also the local teacher observes a skilled teacher presenting lessons and has a virtual mentor to emulate.

The conventional understanding of audiovisual aides is large budgets, with international experts using costly equipment to reach millions of people by radio. OMPT re-frames the opportunity by empowering small or large NGOs, Ministries of Education, Health and Agriculture to practice content creation to serve smaller groups. Technology capacity is increased without the complexities and energy requirements of computers or the limitations of one device (computer) per learner.

Currently OMPT is engaged in two programs: Product Testing/Design and the Trials Program. With Product Testing, we search the worldwide marketplace for products to evaluate in our testing facility. We match products and assemble them into kits. Sometimes we make slight modifications to products to make them more useable in unique environments.

In the Trials Program we are deploying A/V gear in various places around the world in an effort to prove our concept. This program includes several phases. We begin by promoting our A/V technologies to NGOs. We assess their teaching objectives to determine how to best express their curriculum via audio or video. We equip the organization by providing products or simply advise them on purchases. In some cases OMPT will solicit the donation of products from manufacturers to equip the NGOs. In other cases we will act as a vendor selling products to NGOs. Once equipped, we train their staff to manage digital A/V files. We conduct workshops, training the NGO staff and teachers to use A/V equipment for presentations to their students for group sizes of up to 100 learners.

If the NGO wishes to create their own A/V content, we provide audio and/or video production training. While we advocate locally created audio or video files, hence the need for content creation training, we also help NGOs obtain content from other countries. For example, an NGO in India may produce a novel video program on geometry that may be useful in Pakistan or even Haiti. We identify educational video programs produced by the world’s leading TV producers like Discovery Networks and we work to make these programs available for the teachers in hard-to-reach locations.

We facilitate the downloading of A/V content with a video-audio sharing web site, like YouTube. This web site enables the NGOs and the teachers to download the lessons directly onto portable media players and carry knowledge to the isolated places in the world and the students that need it most.

Fewer than 10 non-government organizations specialize in the use of audiovisual technologies in education for developing countries, with Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) being the primary application. OMPT is needed to bring the full potential of portable, powerful, simple-to-use A/V technology to teachers in classrooms and communities around the world.

Since the 1970s, IRI has provided great benefits to people trapped in poverty through interactive lessons delivered through either radio broadcast or audiocassette. Major projects continue to operate successfully with the basic IRI structure and methodology. New A/V technology could vastly improve learning, but existing NGOs have been slow to change. 

What is needed to encourage adoption is a liaison between product designers, manufacturers, practitioners and NGOs. OMPT will fill this role, and its efforts will lead to more appropriately designed products in more hard-to-reach places resulting in meaningful learning gains.

OMPT has ongoing relationships with leaders in the IRI field to encourage and facilitate this adoption. In projects with Education Development Center (EDC), we have hundreds of teachers using our devices in Sudan and Somaliland, and we spent a week in Sudan training teachers and technicians in their use. EDC and Farm Radio have adopted our idea to a limited degree but these NGOs may ultimately be more comfortable using radio to transmit their recordings. Our solution is disruptive, requiring more transparency and a reduction in control over their audio files.
We have relationships with existing IRI researchers and practitioners, including Andrea Bosch, author of the definitive study, “Interactive Radio Instruction: 23 Years of Improving Educational Quality.”

We also have relationships with NGOs working with digital A/V files. Microsoft Research has spawned two NGOs working in this capacity, namely, Digital Green and Digital Study Hall. We are currently working directly with their Executive Directors.

OMPT's long term desired outcome is to equip as many as 10 million teachers with low cost A/V technology to improve education in the most needed places in the world. 

Poverty is a problem for many reasons; however, few doubt that inadequate education is a root cause. OMPT works with NGOs to increase the educational capacity of teachers. We will serve hundreds of NGOs, who in turn serve thousands of teachers, who likewise will affect millions of learners. The lives of these learners will be changed through the wisdom and understanding they will gain as the quality of their teaching and training increases. In some cases, the knowledge needed may be urgent and short term as in a cholera outbreak. Our long-term work leads to improved learning outcomes as expressed in statistical effect size using post test gains as measurement for basic skills (literacy, numeracy, language). A/V technologies help to increase participation of girls in schools. Our intervention also helps improve teacher-training programs, which leads to increasing the quantity and quality of teachers.

Adult learners will develop new long-term entrepreneurship opportunities, innovation, small business development and vocational skills, which will reduce unemployment. NGOs in the health sector will use our technology to help citizens become more aware of sanitation, hygiene, nutrition, HIV, and family planning leading to lower incidence of disease, reduction of maternal and child mortality, the reduction of AIDs cases and promotion of smaller family sizes. Our solution assists NGOs working with farmers to learn how to increase yields which will lead to more food and less hunger.