Building a Community

Summary: DSH has been developing and implementing a voice system to address the isolation teachers in village schools face. As a new endeavor, the verdict is still out on how helpful or effective this will be, but potential uses of the system are many.

Teaching is a very complicated profession and cannot be done in isolation. One of the major problems (of many, to be sure) in rural schools is that teachers lack a strong support system or network.

DSH has identified such isolation as a major barrier to our success. As such, we have been developing a voice system that creates a social network for teachers using their mobile phones. Every week, teachers are encouraged to dial into a central server, listen to a 3-minute message, and share their thoughts. The message covers a range of topics, from problems teachers are facing (e.g., I can’t use English in my class because the kids don’t even have a basic understanding of the language) to effective teaching techniques teacher should implement (e.g., incorporating real-world examples into the lessons). Later on in the week, they’re expected to dial in again to share the impact of the new teaching technique or issues they’ve faced.

The goal of the voice system is to provide a platform for teachers to share their experiences with each other, and to give them an opportunity to tap into extensive knowledge existent in their peer network.

Since rolling out the system to teachers two months ago, response has been somewhat promising. The key issue, of course, is finding the right content to fuel a lively discussion and encourage participation. To date, the teachers who have participated are the ones we’d expect; the trick is to encouraging the wider network to engage. (One of the issues that have emerged is the cost of the call; there are numerous potential solutions, and we’re weighing our options before settling on one.)

For a startup to be successful, you need to continually identify and remove the barriers to your success. The question in my mind is: When you’re working in an issue as complex as education, how do you know when you’re spreading yourself too thin?