Chalk

Learn, travel and motivate people for employment through education and gaining new skills

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Inspiration

Citizens of Western Balkans countries(especially the youth) are not motivated and don't have an accessible and affordable platform for learning new skills that are most searched for in the labor market according to the Western Balkans Labor Market Trends 2020 by World Market- Across the Western Balkan countries, the lack of participation in the labor market was most acute among young people (aged 15-24), with this age group reporting an inactivity rate of 68 percent in the second quarter of 2019. Strengthening foundational skills should be a priority, as they are necessary for individuals to function in modern societies and are the basis for more advanced skills. Firms complain about the inadequacy of skills developed in the general education system. At the same time, learning outcome assessments in some Western Balkan countries confirm that many children and youth demonstrate substantial weaknesses in basic cognitive skills. Too many years of education are lost because the quality of education is low, resulting in limited actual learning. Later, the TVET and tertiary education systems often fail to impart the technical skills that are sought by employers, and the progression of cognitive and socio-emotional skills that will ensure workers’ adaptability in the future. Automation will also leave a lot of people without their jobs and in the time of COVID they will not be able to gain new skills that fast, unless online.

On the other hand, employers are lacking people with certain skills that can be gained through courses and practical approach. In order to motivate people to gain new skills through courses, companies can sponsor certain courses they need. Also tourism can be boosted by motivating people to learn new skills. Chalk brings education, workforce, companies and tourism together.

What it does

CHALK-Online platform will make knowledge available for the wide specter of users, the platform will consist of

  1. Users
  2. Courses/subjects
  3. Sponsors
  4. Staff
  5. Chalk learning points- CHALKS
  6. The platform will be self-sustainable through sponsorships and course payment

Chalk makes it easier for people from all around the region to have digitally accessible learning resources at their disposal. Each user has the option to attend group courses or to have individual learning sessions with their selected mentor (depending on the study area) that are verified for their skills by the platform staff. By continually studying, the user gains points called Chalks. The more they study, the more Chalks they get which can be then used to claim different kinds of benefits ranging from a discount for a different kind of equipment to discount for traveling. Together with its partners, Chalk allows companies to sponsor different courses based on their needs for their employees or for the general public, thus making them cheaper or free for the selected number of attendees.

Lecturers: Professors, teachers, experts from various fields, Peer educators, successful students Lecturers will need to prove their experience or have an interview with platform staff before being verified as a lecturer account. Lectures will have unique profiles with description, experience, courses held, current courses, and reviews.

Each lecturer is verified by platform staff which ensures that the lecturer have necessary skills required for the course they want to hold. This also ensures that the tutors will follow the predetermined plan and program which enables users to be sure there won’t be any deviations in regards to plan and program itself.

Students will have unique profiles where they will necessary info and info that will be publicly available. Students can be anyone and courses will target multiple groups/types of students Elementary school-younger level(age 8-11) Elementary school-older level (age 12-14), Middle school(age 15-18), Young adult(18-30) Life long learning student(31-).

Courses/subjects will be adjusted for the appropriate age of the users. Courses will cover all categories of education (e.g. math, history, programming, environmental risk assessment). Courses will have both theory and practice with accent on practical learning searched in the today’s labor market. Courses base will be constantly updated. Courses can be free, sponsored or payable. Sponsored courses can be partially sponsored by a certain party for some users or fully sponsored for everyone. Courses will be payable in accordance with user profiles(age, employment status…). Courses for groups are to be more affordable(e.g. course of marketing ).

Sponsors can take part in the platform through sponsoring courses, motivation loyalty option, learn and travel option, ads and individual sponsorship. They can sponsor entire course for all of the users or sponsor individual users They can value platform points(chalks) for discount for their products - motivation loyalty option. They can value platform points(chalks) for discount for visiting certain venues/accommodation – Learn and travel.

Sponsors would be motivated:

  • By sponsoring courses for the skills their company employees are in need of
  • Sponsoring courses that can bring them potential candidates for employment
  • Promoting tourism, touristic venues and accommodation through the platform
  • Motivated by marketing purposes and targeting their target group for the products

Platform staff will be responsible for the maintenance of the platform, administration, support, communication with sponsors, marketing, motivation, and verification of lecturers. Staff will be based in Belgrade, Serbia. Marketing would be executed through the presentation in schools, faculties, universities, through social networks, Marketing through media, Marketing through the platform itself.

Users are gathering points(chalks) through finished courses. Points are used for discounts/handouts in sponsor stores. Users can feature a certain sponsor on their profile if they are using its products/sponsorship. Sponsors will gain the ability to have more visibility the more they are sponsoring/valuing chalks as a discount.

Learn and travel-Users can visit certain venues to gain additional chalks(Museums, science fairs, institutes…) If the users are visiting tourist places and are using accommodation, they can earn more chalks if they are learning during their stay. Chalks can be used for accommodation discounting as well. The platform will be used for networking between users, professors, and sponsors that are interested in certain topics in addition to making a new projects, partnerships, ventures, entrepreneurship…

Potential first courses we are going to start with are: Math, Coding for beginners, First aid course, Self-employability, Practical HR, Data protection and cyber security, Manufacturing, Languages, Auto mechanics, Practical marketing skills and other that will be discussed as well with the experts from the labor market, HR...

The courses will last from one hour to 40 hours for the first phase. Course price vary depending on the length and topic of the course.

Courses will be charged for users depending on their group and courses will start from: Elementary school-younger level- From 10e/course Elementary school-older level- From 15e/course Middle school- From 20e/course Young adult- From 25e/course Life long learning student- From 35e/course (courser in Serbia start from 15e) Subscription model- Like a package discount, get 3 courses from a subject for the price of 2 and with every new subscription they will get better offers.

We plan to have at least 1 000 users in the first year coming from Western Balkans(Serbo/Croatian language speakers). We would leave an option for English speaking lecturers to held courses in English on highly valued skills. So the perceived income from users in the first year will be around 27 000e.

If the users want to have direct contact with the lecturer for a private lesson it will be charged additionally with double the price of the course. Lecturers will be found through open call, recommendation, collaboration with job hubs\educational institutions social networks etc. We plan to have around 50 lecturers in the first year Lecturers will be paid from 20% of course price per user attended depending on the hours and complexity of the course.

We plan to have at least 50 sponsors involved from all industries and tourism. We plan to have at least 5000e from sponsors in first year and have at least 30 sponsors involved in Chalk points system.

The costs of platform will include offices rent in Belgrade(from 500e/month), staff costs(from 1500e/month), platform maintenance(from 500e/month) , Marketing(from 200e/month)

How I built it

Front end stack used in developing Chalk are: - HTML5 for app structure - CSS3 for styling and design - JS/JQUERY

Back end stack used for functionality: - Apache web server - MySQL for DB - Laravel/PHP for functionality

The team behind the platform:

Challenges I ran into

It was challenging to figure out a way to make all sides satisfied, and tunnel it into a platform where everybody gains something. One of the most difficult challenges was to find the optimal model of how to change traditional digital learning that would be innovative and motivate people to learn. By combining traditional learning with the gamification of the learning, we made a platform where people will want to have while learning removing boredom from the process.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

Gathering a team in 5 hours and making a good idea to pitch in 12 hours.

What I learned

How people, employers and tourism are connected. We have learned that we will need an designer as well.

What's next for Chalk

Becoming the most used platform for Non-formal learning in the Western Balkans. We plan to make platform accessible for people with disabilities as we strive for more inclusive and diverse user group.

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