Education, Nelson Mandela famously said, is the most powerful tool we can use to change the world. Unfortunately, hundreds of millions of young people worldwide still reach adulthood without the most basic literacy and numeracy skills which seriously limits their ability to be productive and involved citizens. The UN’s fourth Sustainable Development Goal calls for ensuring universal primary and secondary education by 2030. Unfortunately, at the current rate of progress, in 2030 there will be more than 800 million children and young people lacking the basic skills or qualifications for the modern workforce. And in Africa, only 1 in 3 children complete secondary school, setting back an entire continent’s next generation. At Eneza, we recognise this as a classic Wicked Problem – it has multiple mitigating factors and myriad and complex reasons. No one person or organisation can solve it alone and clearly, it’s going to take a long time. However, we have identified one of the key factors hampering the attainment of a decent education as lack of access to affordable learning and revision materials. Therefore, we have set out to increase access to these materials to learners at the bottom of the pyramid via the mobile phone. Ninety percent of African homes own or have access to at least a 1g or 2g mobile phone and so Eneza seeks to leverage this unassuming conduit to empower learners.
