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Real Indicators of the Positive Impact of JA Worldwide Elementary School Programs

Aug 30, 2020 – Prestasi Junior Indonesia always has, close at hand, examples of qualitative data indicative of the positive impact that our JA Worldwide programs have within classrooms in Indonesian schools. The innovative experiential nature of initiatives is almost always greeted with enthusiasm by the students. This has become even more evident with the adaptation of hard-copy learning tools and their delivery to a 100% digital strategy – no paper is used. Instead, students are engaged in JA Our Family, JA Our City, and JA Our Region programs using education technology in the classroom. Citi Foundation has supported this adaptation from hardcopy, enabling the delivery of 15 JA lessons via tablets with the addition of one laptop and a router for each classroom (to overcome connection difficulties). Over the last two years First State Investment Indonesia has provided the funding to enable the digital JA programs to be delivered via a road show strategy. Schools and students have benefitted from this technology in six of the nation’s largest cities. Qualitative evidence of this is seen on every occasion we deliver these programs – in the pure joy students exhibit when each is provided with a tablet and the lessons begin. They wholeheartedly grasp this opportunity with enthusiasm just as they grasp the tablets in both of their hands throughout the entire lessons. As we target poorly resourced schools this is usually the first opportunity they have had to learn using devices and digital curriculum, so it is always an exciting experience for them.

The recent quantitative assessment of impact is enabled using three digital platforms which capture levels of student understanding whilst beneficiaries are engaged in each of the lessons. We are able to access real time information as to the improvement in knowledge of the students from the time immediately prior to their engagement until after all JA sessions have been completed. This change has proven to be massive and the documentation below illustrates this!

PJI has been able to access and collate the data of 3,012 students from grades 3-5 in four of the six cities (before school closure due to Covid-19). These schools are listed below together with the raw average test scores for each class level and the cumulative average improvement as a percentage for each of these grade levels. As a result of the JA experience students from State Elementary School Duri Kepa 01 at Grade 4 level (JA Our City) improved their knowledge by an average of 150%. Even the average score of 90% indicated for State Elementary School Pejaten Barat 01 is a massive accomplishment and this is the lowest score! Not only do these results indicate the tremendous value of JA elementary school programs for Indonesian students it also identifies elements of current curriculum content which requires attention by local government (elementary school curriculum is administered at regional level). PJI is well placed to help them augment current content and delivery using this digital approach.

Breaking down the results accessed via our digital delivery strategy it is clear a substantial increases in the acquisition of knowledge within our groups of students is evident for all three JA programs.

At grade three level the overall improvement from all students participating in the JA Our Family program was 107.18%.  Similar improvements were evident at each of the additional grade levels. The JA Our City experience at Grade four resulted in an average 112.71% increase and JA Our Region at 99.17%. These improvements in knowledge have been achieved after just five hours of contact in classroom settings representing poorly resourced schools.

The results, as represented below, indicate the greatest improvement in student knowledge of any program we have delivered to date in Indonesia. Delivered via a classroom based digital strategy (not virtual) with a tablet available for every student and programs loaded and ready to go has, we believe, been a significant factor in this achievement. No previous program experiences, using a paper-based delivery, have had the same significant results. In addition, the lessons are interactive and students learn the fundamentals embedded within each lesson through direct engagement.  Each learning experience and online activity is localized. So, in addition to translation, all materials are relatable to the everyday experiences of the students. For example, within all simulations Indonesian Rupiah is used to purchase local food for Indonesian festivities. This blends the normalized with the innovation (digital learning) and provides a means through which each student achieves an understanding of content and is better able to retain this knowledge.

Evaluation result of JA Our Family increase 107.18%

Pre-test Average 43.01%
Post-test Average 89.11%

Evaluation result of JA Our City increase 112.71 %

Pre-test Average 41.73%
Post-test Average 88.76%

Evaluation Result of JA Our Region increase 99.15 %

Pre-test Average 44.93%
Post-test Average 89.48%

Prestasi Junior will continue to promote this digital approach to learning and attempt to replicate the results emanating from our First State Investment Indonesia undertaking. The data representing improvement in student knowledge and understanding of financial literacy (and a little entrepreneurship) using a digital approach is exceptional.

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