dTeach - building a donor pool

[IMPACT]

Problem statement (in detail)

Open Educational Resources (OER) have a huge potential to systemically improve access and quality of education and innovate the sector. Nevertheless OER’s struggle with the scarce time of teachers, no remuneration for content creators, and close to no incentives for the educational community to test or evaluate the resources. Therefore, even though there is this huge potential of OER’s, with the lack of scientific and pedagogical proof and proper incentivization for their creation and testing they will not succeed.

In the production process of OER’s public and private donor organizations are highly important for funding and quality assessment (UNESCO 2019). Even though many international donors spend money on education and the creation of OER’s, due to the lack of a systemic approach and a proper funding mechanism there is still relatively little impact on the international education system.

Problem spheres

• Funding for OER’s depends on public and private donors
• There are no appropriate reward structures for creating OER’S yet
• Funding in OER’s is not yet sustainable in the long-term
• Rewards to produce or test OER’s are not ensured for creators and teachers
• Donor organizations invested in the OER movement can’t rely on the diligence of content creators and evaluators
• For donor organizations monitoring and evaluation of OER production and their impact on education is hard to track

Solution to the problem (in detail)

“Ensure that the cycle of OER production and reuse is sustainable over time for those actors involved in their production and reuse” (UNESCO 2019).

To make sure that the OER production process is sustainable and incentivizing dTeach’s creators pool, we want to build a decentralized cash-flow for the OER production by setting up a stable donor pool forming a marketplace responding to the offer and demand of OER’s.

We provide donors with the following monitoring & evaluation structures to enable diligent but unbureaucratic funding for systemic impact on education:

• Proven track record and expertise of project content creators and evaluators
• Transparent funding record of content creators
• Scalable and adaptable OER projects with cascading effects
• Personal relation between donors and funded topics, projects and creators
• Transparent project monitoring and evaluation schemes (budget, process, results, impact)
• Proved impact on education by ensured quality, testing and evaluation through a decentralized and independent production and reviewing process

Target group

• Creators of public tenders (government / international organizations)
• Civil-society organizations, foundations and NGOs
• Private-sector firms (Corporate Social Responsibility)
• Educational, scientific and cultural organizations

The dTeach donor pool will guide international donor organizations to use ADA, the decicion making model of Cardano Catalyst and blockchain in general for their project funding, monitoring and evaluation. dTeach builds an impact oriented use case lobbying for the use of Cardano as a fundamental tool for future philanthrophy and development cooperation.

Unfortunately in F8 there is no campaign directed to education or the integration of traditional donor organizations into the blockchain space and Cardano. As neither of the campaign categories match to this proposal we are delighted that we found a place in the 'Miscallaneous Challenge'. We would be very pleased to see a Campaign on education in the next funding rounds.

Alignment with Challenge KPIs

• Establish Cardano as the preferred blockchain for development service, international tenders, philanthropy and education
• Establish ADA as the preferred currency for sustainable development and philanthropic projects and funding
• Connect Cardano with international donor organizations and the production of high quality and tested OER's

Communication & marketing objectives

• Establish ADA as the currency and state of the art for the production of OER's
• Make Cardano/ADA the first positive association for teachers and students with the world of crypto and blockchain
• Raise awareness that OER's and blockchain are important pillars for a systemic change in education

There are quiet a few challenges in building a donor pool to create a sustainable funding for the production of OER's using a blockchain based incentives structure:

• Traditional donor organizations (of any type) are just starting to get involved in blockchain and crypto
• Even though pioneering is ongoing, there is still an inhibition threshold to fund blockchain-based projects
• The ‘OER movement’ and the production of OERs has a lot of important international patrons (e.g. UNESCO and OECD) but lacks stable and sustainable funding
• Systemic change needs long-term and cross-sector collaboration and investments

Mitigation strategy

The above-mentioned challenges lie in the decentral nature of the project and the key to deal with them is the professional and profound persuasion that decentralization really is the innovation of eduaction and OERs.

• To cope with fear and loathing of crypto and blockchain in traditional donor organizations we will set up a professional pitch deck and provide basic but detailed information on how blockchain-technology can help revolutionize tender mechanisms and funding structures for donor organizations.
• Attract and win over early bird donor organizations that are keen on innovating or at least changing the field they are working in (especially education of course).These ‘change makers’ will create momentum to onboard more institutions.
• Blockchain-based decentralization and incentives for target groups in education will elevate the ‘OER movement’ to the next level. This will raise both, the meaning of / and the attention to OERs.

[FEASIBILITY]

Project milestones (in short)

1. Run an in-depth research and planning process to set up a rational strategy and legal basis to be able to collaborate with donors and accept crypto funding / donations as an NGO.
2. Establish NGO to be able to accept funding/donations (FIAT & crypto) and to commit to collaboration with donor organizations.
3. Conduct research and analysis on traditional donor organizations (vison, mission, funding structures, eligibility criteria, etc.) as well as on crypto funding and donation mechanisms (e.g. DAO’s).
4. Create composed donor pool and establish contextual patronage for high quality education and OERs (e.g. UNESCO)
5. Consolidate funding structures and establish funding streams (ADA cash-flow) for the dTeach creators pool to produce high quality and tested Open Educational Resources.

Project milestones (in detail)

• Foundation of dTeach NGO

* Set up board of members/directors/trustees
* Register NGO and connect all ongoing dTeach activities officially (links)

• Research on traditional donor organizations and crypto funding and donations

* Conduct donor (and thematical patron) research aiming at education in general

• Conduct research and analysis on crypto funding and donation mechanisms

* Conduct research on decentralized credentials for donations and funding (Non Fungible Tokens [NFTs] / Decentralized Identifiers [DIDs])
* Conduct research on ways to establish transparency and compliance in private and organizational (project) funding / donations

• Conduct research and analysis on the challenges of integrating traditional donor organizations into blockchain

• Conduct research on compliance for ADA / crypto donations for traditional private and organizational (project) funding / donations

• Conduct research on transparent and decentralized handling of donations

• Create detailed whitepaper, pitch deck, and communication material to provide target group with detailed and condensed information on dTeach

* Create informative website - www.dTeach.org
* Write and publish dTeach whitepaper on www.dTeach.org
* Create and publish other communication material and publish on dTeach’s social media channels

• Create donor pool (community), establish thematical patronage and set up transparent and decentralized funding and donation mechanism for dTeach

• Participate international events on Open Educational Resources

• Gain and onboard traditional donor organizations and tie contextual patronage

• Create and set up transparent and decentralized funding and donation mechanism for dTeach (organizations & individuals) providing innovative donation receipts

• Establish structures and funding streams

• Introduce and integrate donor institutions to the dTeach DApp

• Establish long-term funding via contracts with donor organizations and decentralized funding and donations

Project roadmap

3 months

• NGO registered
• Research and analysis of traditional donor organizations and crypto funding and donations completed [D1]
• Landing page and pitch deck published on www.dTeach.org

6 months

• NGO founded and ready to accept third-party and crypto funding
• dTeach whitepaper published on www.dTeach.org
• Communications campaign on social media and in education- and donor networks running

12 months

• Donor pool and crypto funding/donation mechanism created
• Thematic patronage of at least one international educational entity

2 years

• Donor pool and crypto funding/donation mechanisms are fully integrated in the dTeach DApp (https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/399405)

Project budget

• Project management (10 hours a week during 10 months = 400 hours at $25/h = $10.000)
  • Executive coordination
  • Back office work
  • Content and donor research
  • Legal research
  • Communication activities
  • Project reporting
  • Community management
• Legal advice & consultancy (50 hours at $50 = $2.500)
• Tax advice & consultancy (70 hours at $50 = $3.500)
• Web design (20 hours at $50 = $1000)
• Graphic design (25 hours at $40 = $1000)
• Other expenditures (approx. $2.000)
  • Registration fees (NGO)
  • Event participation fees

$20.000

Badin Borde [proposal co-author and executive coordinator] - https://www.linkedin.com/in/badinborde/

• Network and education manager with background in human geography, climate sciences and education. Current work focuses on strategic and operational international networks in STEM- and Climate Change Education in Africa, Europe and Latin America.
• 4 years of experience in philanthropic project management in the field of international education and networking
• Master’s degree in Urban Geography

Gustavo Pugliese [proposal co-author] - https://www.linkedin.com/in/gustavopugliese/

• 7 years of experience in educational projects management and 8 years of teaching experience.
• Ph.D. in Education
• Author of a schoolbook approved in the Brazilian national textbook program (200,000 copies printed/year).
• Proven experience in the educational resources that will be produced in phase 1: https://dteach.org/steam
• 3 years of experience offering workshops on educational technology to teachers of different backgrounds. Direct contact with more than 3000 teachers across Brazil.
• Author of online (LMS Platforms) and in-person courses, as well as didactic materials for students and teachers all over Brazil.
• Fellow in the German Chancellor Fellowship, a program of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation; and fellow in the Young Leaders of the Americas Initiative, a program of the US State Department

Rebecca Ottmann [advisor in strategy and funding] - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebecca-ottmann-6b7a7369/

• Senior project manager in philanthropic organization with focus on education in Africa
• 14 years of experience in international education programs and projects with an emphasis on STEM education
• Strong expertise in attracting third-party-funds
• Networker between education authorities, universities and civil society
• Master degree in Economic Sciences

[AUDITABILITY]

Key-Performance-Indicators

• Number of donor organizations committed to dTeach and amount of funding for OER production
• Number and amount of crypto donations
• Quantity and quality of social media interactions
• Number of educational projects funded by our pool of donators
• Ability to fully integrate our platform and systems in the Cardano blockchain

Short-term

• NGO is established

Mid-term

• First OER's are funded by donor pool (donor organizations and/or crypto donations

Long-term

• International and sustainable network of donor organizations and crypto donations (donor pool) established
• Donor pool provides stable cashflow for a countinuous production and workflow of the creators pool

dTeach is a decentralized platform for the creation of Open Educational Resources (OER), where independent teachers and educational researchers actively produce high-quality content and bring innovation to their students. The OER production on dTeach is incentivized based on the Cardano Catalyst collaboration model.

***FUNDED PROPOSAL (F7)*** Decentralized Education - dTeach: https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/383112

Our first proposal covers the 1st step of the project, where a pool of teachers, researchers on education, and instructional designers (creators) is created and eleven OERs are produced collaboratively by this pool of experts.

This proposal covers the 2nd step of the project and seeks to create a pool of donors in order to build a sustainable decentralized cash-flow enabling the incentivized OER production mechanism in the dTeach DApp, which will be developed simultaneously. Please find the link to the proposal for the creation of the dTeach DApp here https://cardano.ideascale.com/c/idea/399405

Both pools (and thereby all the proposals of dTeach together) in combination with the OER production process will be the core of the DApp, on which a marketplace generating offer and demand between the two pools as well as the collaboration of the creators will take place.

SDG Rating

• Goal 4. Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all

SDG subgoals:

• 4.4 By 2030, substantially increase the number of youth and adults who have relevant skills, including technical and vocational skills, for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship
• 4.6 By 2030, ensure that all youth and a substantial proportion of adults, both men and women, achieve literacy and numeracy
• 4.7 By 2030, ensure that all learners acquire the knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including, among others, through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development
• 4.c By 2030, substantially increase the supply of qualified teachers, including through international cooperation for teacher training in developing countries, especially least developed countries and small island developing States

SDG key performance Indicator (SDG-KPI):

• 4.7.1 Extent to which (i) global citizenship education and (ii) education for sustainable development are mainstreamed in (a) national education policies; (b) curricula; (c) teacher education; and (d) student assessment

#proposertoolsdg