Downtown Africa
Kigali, Rwanda — Siyavula, an educational technology company headquartered in South Africa, has announced today its partnership with the Mastercard Foundation and the Rwanda Education Board to provide students with access to an online practice platform for Mathematics, Physics, and Chemistry. The global pandemic has had a severe impact on learning, and this partnership provides secondary education students in Rwanda with an effective tool to maintain and improve their learning. Access to the Siyavula platform will be free to all Rwandan secondary school students for the new 2020-21 school year starting on October 1st, 2020.
The Siyavula online platform makes high-quality learning accessible anywhere, anytime, and with any device. All that is required is access to the internet. Students sign up on the platform and can then choose topics to practise. Any questions are answered immediately, with step-by-step solutions given. Students work at their own pace and are able to track their progress. Since its inception in South Africa in 2012, students have answered almost 50 million questions on the platform.
As part of its online platform launch in Rwanda, Siyavula will be running a #1MillionMaths competition for secondary school students throughout the country. Hundreds of students have already registered on the platform and are eagerly waiting for the competition to start. During the month of October, those students who are active will have the opportunity to win prizes from Monday to Friday.
Dr. Mark Horner, Siyavula’s CEO, explains, “While originally created for South African students, we have aligned our content to the S1-4 Rwandan curriculum to make sure that the platform provides a value addition to existing mechanisms designed to support the learning of the students during this difficult time.” “We’d like to encourage all learners studying Mathematics to join #1MillionMaths this October. Even if you feel like you’ve been left behind this year, use the #1MillionMaths challenge to catch up on your work and master the content. We do know that regular and consistent practice in math and science are key to performing well in these subjects.”
“The #1MillionMaths challenge has run successfully in South Africa for the past four years, and we’re excited to be launching the competition in a new country for the first time. We are looking forward to connecting with Rwandan students and rewarding them for their activity on our platform. There will also be national leaderboards so students can compete against one another across the country,” adds Horner.
“Over the last few months, we’ve witnessed incredible innovation and impact among our Mastercard Foundation Ed-Tech Fellows, including Siyavula, as they’ve worked to ensure learning continuity for all amid this pandemic. We’re excited to see these initiatives scaling to support students across the continent, and receiving support from a wide range of partners, including the Rwanda Education Board. It is a great show of solidarity and resilience,” said Joseph Nsengimana, Director of Mastercard Foundation’s Centre for Innovative Teaching and Learning in ICT in Rwanda.
