JET Education

Services, South Africa

About JET Educational Services (JET)

Mona Partner Since 2021

JET Education Services, an educational nonprofit based in Johannesburg, has worked to improve the quality of education in South Africa for over three decades. In partnership with PLT Health Solutions, Mona’s relationship with JET began in 2021 when Educational Initiatives selected it to pilot the Mindspark Learner Education Program in six primary schools in South Africa’s Western Cape.

The Challenge

In 2019, the World Bank estimated that 50-80% of children finishing primary school in low- and middle-income countries suffered from "learning poverty" and could not read or understand a simple text.

In South Africa, 27% of students in Grade 6 were found to be functionally illiterate. This has led to widespread heterogeneity in learning levels of children within a single classroom and across educational systems.

The Solution: Mindspark implemented by JET

Educational Initiatives (Ei) developed a personalized adaptive learning software, Mindspark, that when deployed in after-school centers in lower economic communities showed large gains in Math and Language.

Mindspark draws on a database of over 45,000 questions to finely benchmark the initial learning level of every student and dynamically customize the material being delivered to match the level and rate of progress made by each individual student. It is currently available in 10 languages, with plans for more underway.

A pilot program in South Africa collaborates with a local non-profit to implement the program in schools in 3 provinces - Northern Cape, Mpumalanga and Limpopo. It is actively growing its presence in the country and seeking support for the same.

The pilot successfully concluded in 2023 with high praise from key officials of the Western Cape Education Department. With continuing support from Mona and PLT Health Solutions, JET now plans to expand the Mindspark program to 20 low-income public schools in the coming year.

Mindspark's impact in South Africa

Watch the impact Mindspark is having on the lives of thousands of students in South Africa.

How we help

We have always believed that alone, we are a drop. Together a surging sea. We aim to collaborate with likeminded organizations, institutions, corporations and foundations to collectively level the playing field, scale our reach and impact, and improve quality of teaching and learning for more students.

To this end, in 2021 we welcomed a collaborative partnership with the philanthropist, Paul Flowerman, the Chairman of PLT Health Solutions and JET Educational Services to provide access to Mindspark to disadvantaged students in both India and South Africa. The results speak for themselves. See 2023 achievements below.

Mitigating the COVID19 "Learning Loss"

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused a significant loss of learning for students across the world.

Mona Foundation is committed to leveraging every proven approach including the use of technologies such as Mindspark to enable capacity building at the grassroots to improve the quality of teaching and learning at scale. This includes the August 2023 collaborative initiative with PLT, Ei in India and South Africa (SA), and ACORN Foundation of Capetown, to address the COVID19 "learning loss" for students in Apex high school in SA, and Prerna School in India.

This initiative, funded through partnership with ACORN (50%), PLT (25%), and Mona Foundation (25%) will provide access to device and Mindspark to 377 Apex high school students and 140 Prerna Girls School students at the cost of $50/year/student to improve learning outcomes. With evidence of demonstrated results the initiative aims for large scale implementation of the program. Read our blog for full details.

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The COVID-19 crisis brought education systems across the world to a halt,” said Jaime Saavedra, World Bank Global Director for Education. The loss of learning that many children are experiencing is morally unacceptable. And the potential increase of Learning Poverty might have a devastating impact on future productivity, earnings, and well-being for this generation of children and youth, their families, and the world’s economies. -- World Bank 2021