In Focus
Feature Organization: Team4Tech
How the Tech Sector Can Continue to Help Learners in a Virtual World
Written by: Gail Shen, Program Director, Team4Tech
While COVID-19 has been devastating for 90% of learners around the globe, the impact is particularly acute for learners who lack access to digital teaching and learning resources. Without an alternative to in-person learning, education has ground to a halt for far too many students around the world. These are the learners that Team4Tech, a Silicon Valley-based nonprofit, seeks to help.
While there are unique challenges related to virtual tech support for education-focused NGOs, Team4Tech has developed tools and resources over the past seven years that help pro bono tech volunteers overcome the difficulties of different time zones, languages, and cultural norms so that they can deliver meaningful impact. The need is greater now than ever before for the tech sector to help learners around the world continue to develop and grow in this critical time.
For more information you can reach Team4Tech here: info@team4tech.org
Team4Tech works to improve the quality of education for underserved learners through the integration of relevant technology solutions and capacity building for NGO staff and teachers. By engaging and training tech professionals as pro bono consultants, Team4Tech has partnered with 25 NGOs in 18 countries since 2013, enhancing education for over 65,000 learners. In the last few months, the demand for tech support from education-focused NGOs has increased dramatically – Team4Tech has seen a 5x increase in the number of NGOs applying for support. Team4Tech has also pivoted its support model to 100% virtual, providing capacity building and tech support through online training. In the process of delivering virtual pro bono support that delivers impact for both NGOs and pro bono volunteers, Team4Tech has learned three key lessons:
- Scope projects carefully. Before a partnership begins, Team4Tech scopes projects deliberately and ensures that the NGO partner and all key stakeholders have clear expectations and commitments. Using a human-centered design approach, thoughtful project outcomes are clearly defined from the start, and key impact metrics are tracked every six months. NGOs seeking support must have at least foundational tech capacity and resources to implement and maintain solutions and to monitor impact over time. *One of Team4Tech’s NGO partners adeptly shifted during COVID and as a result, their reach has widened to those who speak Hindi anywhere (approximately 60% of India) and they have already reached 5x more users than the originally planned onsite project.
- Provide sufficient training and context for volunteers. By design, Team4Tech projects emphasize the need for pro bono consultants to build empathy with NGO staff so that they can develop and deliver highly tailored, sustainable solutions. Team4Tech ensures that this happens by taking all our volunteers through a leadership development curriculum, which teaches five key capabilities: customer-centric innovation, decision-making amidst ambiguity, growth mindset, communication and collaboration, as well as the importance of advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion. The lessons learned and applied on all Team4Tech projects are now even more important to navigate this rapidly evolving world.
- Build trust through long-term partnerships. Team4Tech builds multi-year partnerships with NGOs, focused on building organizational capacity and resilience. Even as unexpected challenges – a pandemic and global recession, for example – change the needs of an organization, trusted relationships mean all stakeholders are well-positioned to still create maximum impact. *One of Team4Tech’s NGO partners in South Africa was able to provide nearly uninterrupted support for their learners due to Team4Tech’s foundational support across the years: Teachers felt technologically confident from Team4Tech’s previous workshops, the technology infrastructure was in place, and students were already engaged with educational software that was easily accessible during COVID on their phones at home.
While there are unique challenges related to virtual tech support for education-focused NGOs, Team4Tech has developed tools and resources over the past seven years that help pro bono tech volunteers overcome the difficulties of different time zones, languages, and cultural norms so that they can deliver meaningful impact. The need is greater now than ever before for the tech sector to help learners around the world continue to develop and grow in this critical time.
