Social Emotional Learning for Teachers of Refugees

View our schedule for upcoming opportunities

Overview

Childhood Education International (CEI) is a non-profit that focuses on international development by creating solutions that positively impact pre-primary and primary-aged children’s lives and education. The specific program on which we are focusing is the Refugee Educator Program; this is an initiative that aims to increase the number of qualified refugee educators across a number of countries including Kenya, Niger, Lebanon, and Chad, and to help improve their quality of teaching.

Context

Due to the unfortunate situations that many refugee children find themselves in, it is important for teachers to understand trauma-informed education as well as social-emotional learning (SEL). It is essential that these children receive an education from educators who are not only able to foster positive and safe environments but also teach and support children in their emotional regulation journey, while being mindful of their vulnerable and developing brain.

Challenge

One of the biggest challenges the organization faces in using the mobile technology is that it is not comprehensive, and does not contain all the materials they need. CEI aims to contract teachers with the hope that the teachers could begin teaching fairly quickly; however, CEI does not currently have the tools necessary via mobile technology to provide new teachers with the training and information they need prior to beginning. Another challenge is lack of access to internet or wifi for educators to complete the onboarding portion of the process, as that section is not currently included in the mobile app.

Solution

The work we are doing helps to fight these challenges and provide educators with a smoother onboarding process that can be completed on their own time, as well as assesses their knowledge of the material provided. Our team integrated the whole onboarding process into the mobile app so that new hires have all the information they need at the tip of their fingers. The self-paced learning modules provide the teachers with the opportunity to take in all the necessary information at their own pace while assessing their knowledge. This ensures that when it comes time to go into the field, they are ready. By including the onboarding process in the mobile app, we are alleviating some of the stress of trying to gain access to wifi or internet, as everything is accessible offline. This expands access to more users and therefore helps to increase the number of qualified educators in the CEI program.

Results

Our work has the potential to impact more than just the children and teachers that are involved with CEI. The application we are working on can be fine-tuned and adjusted to tackle the challenges that any company/initiative may face when dealing with children that have faced trauma and are in need of social-emotional learning.

Project Timeline

This project took six months to complete from kick-off meeting to presentation of final deliverables. Click the button below for a detailed timeline.

View Project Timeline