Marlien Herselman, Chief Researcher at CSIR, Recognises ProScola Software in Drive to Enable and Support Teachers
‘The most novel and innovative tool to support teachers and lighten their workload’
Prof. Marlien Herselman, Chief Researcher at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in Pretoria, South Africa, has experienced the technology needs of African Schools first-hand. Having led technology implementation in rural schools across seven of the nine provinces in South Africa and as lead researcher for the CSIR’s study Teachers’ ICT Adoption in South African Rural Schools, Prof. Herselman is well placed to describe the essential requirements for educational technology in the region.
Prof. Herselman’s findings include the need for educational technology to support teachers by reducing their workload and enabling them by allowing lessons to be shared between teachers. Having reviewed the capabilities of ProScola’s software recently, she commented:
‘The ProScola tool will assist teachers in South African schools as it can alleviate the time spent on administration and provide them with the needed infrastructure to share lessons with other teachers. The tool has a wide array of examples and support material to assist teachers in improving their lesson plans for any grade. I believe it is the most novel and innovative tool to support teachers and lighten their workload. Learners have direct access to their marked work as soon as the teacher completes it online, and those who missed lessons can also access these later online without using too much data.’
Professor Herselman also serves in the UN Office of the Special Adviser on Africa (OSAA) and as an adjunct professor/professor extraordinaire at several South African Universities and is well acquainted with the infrastructure needs in the region. She went on to say:
‘The ProScola Educational hub provides teachers with a hub with a local Wi-Fi network suitable for regions with unstable internet and can provide cached access to educational internet libraries (‘internet in a box’) that works well in regions with intermittent power.’
The reduced teacher preparation time and administrative work documented in a ProScola case study in a similar environment also impressed PHD. Herselman. She commented:
‘A case study they conducted in the Philippines with similar challenges as in South Africa revealed that overall teacher preparation time was reduced by 30% in the first year and 80% in the second year, class administrative work was reduced by 60% and lesson plans submitted in advance or on time, increased by 45%.’
In addition to discussing the software and its suitability for regions with intermittent power, PHD. Herselman also commented on what the ProScola team offers to schools:
‘The competent ProScola team supports schools with a consultation process, supports setting up the hardware and software, and provides admin and user training coupled with individual support once the school use their system at a fraction of the price it will take for other vendors currently operating in South Africa.’
ProScola has also conducted an alignment exercise with CSIR, which found a high degree of synergy between the two organisations. From sharing a ‘teachers first’ philosophy to a strong correlation across CSIRs objectives, models and educational ecosystem, ProScola identified a high degree of alignment and the ability to overcome mutually identified barriers.