Here’s how to make $10 million through e-learning

Nigel Gambanga Avatar
X PRIZE Foundation
X PRIZE Foundation
image credit: X PRIZE Foundation

Here’s something for all those developers and entrepreneurs keen on taking on a big challenge for a big reward. The Global Learning XPRIZE competition is an opportunity that has come up to solve one of the challenges in education and pocket $10 million in the process.

Why is so much being put into this issue and where is the money coming from? Well the problem that the whole world is facing is that there are huge numbers of illiterate children (250 million children approximately;  60 million don’t have access to formal schooling with half of this total being in Africa)

We however don’t have nearly as enough teachers and the gap between education providers and the numbers in need of education keeps growing. This is largely because the traditional models of education cannot respond fast enough to meet the demand.

One way that the solution needed for this problem can be thought of is through technology and more specifically, e-learning.

Through the $15 million Global Learning XPRIZE competition (which is open to anyone in the world) teams are being challenged to develop an open source, scalable software solution that will enable children in developing countries to teach themselves basic reading, writing and arithmetic.

The five finalist teams with the best solutions will get $1 million each by the judging panel to work on their idea with the overall winner getting the $10 million based on field testing of the ideas.

The competition was an initiative started by entrepreneur Peter H. Diamandis through his X PRIZE Foundation. The foundation has offered financial incentive for other market challenges in oil cleanup technology and car fuel consumption, with the most notable being $10 million for solutions in private space flight.

Through a group of entrepreneurs that include Econet Wireless founder Strive Masiyiwa (he’s spoken about it on his Facebook page), $15 million has been raised as prize money for any developer or entrepreneur that can come up with the Global Learning XPRIZE e-learning solution.

This challenge for an e-learning solution was launched at the United Nations Headquarters at the end of last month and the registration process which is part of the competition’s 3 phase process will last for 6 months.

With such a huge objective it’s not surprising that the entire process will involve extensive development process (18 months) finalist selection and field testing for the top 5 teams which will all take place over 54 months. It’s hardly for chancers.

Are you keen on taking part in this challenge? Do you have an e-learning solution that will have a massive impact on education provision for millions of children? You can get more details on this challenge and how to take part here. 

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2 comments

  1. Zimbo

    *$500.00 registration fee

  2. Evans

    This is really noble idea. I am not a programmer but there is a lot of work here!

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