Profile for the 1st winner of the Innovating Education in Africa Expo 2020

Title of Innovation: BAG – Building A Generation

Organisation Implementing Innovation
BAG Innovation
Country/Countries of Implementation
Rwanda

Short description of innovation
BAG is a gamified platform that offers real-time access to experience-based learning for University students

Need which Innovation Targets
Universities’ curriculums are outdated and do not match the employer’s skills need, leading to most graduates in Rwanda lacking the skills required to pursue employment. This lack of exposure to employers, job preparation, and balance between theory and practice within the university degree results in local employers struggling to identify the right talent and incur expensive entry-level training costs.

How the Innovation functions
BAG, a gamified digital platform that collaborates with Universities and employers in East Africa to offer real-time access to experience-based learning for University students. Through our platform, we are delivering interactive assessments from
employers that build up a trustworthy skills profile for students.

The BAG solution pro-actively analyzes the employer’s skills needs and translates them into short assessments, each representing requirements from the employer, on both the technical or soft skill side, that in return tests the user’s ability to work with that specific company. Traditionally employers can only take on 2-3 interns per year but with the BAG solution, employers can now with no extra effort transfer worklife experience from their company to thousands of students at the same time.

The student signs up on the platform and selects their sector of interest connected to their university major, they choose a local company they would like to work with, They work on short assessments provided by the employer, Then receive a rating,
professional feedback, and career advice from both the employer and BAG, all this is then saved on a talent profile that could potentially substitute the traditional cv.

The Gamification technology, built by the former Candy Crush creator, recreates critical elements of employment during a university student’s life cycle. Students conducting a few minutes a week on the platform will attain the same or greater value if performing an in-person internship and be ever closer to employment ready.

Business Model
BAG is a gamified digital platform that collaborates with Universities and employers in Rwanda, and soon East Africa, to offer real-time access to experience-based learning for University students. Through our platform, we are delivering interactive
assessments for students based upon employers’ skill requirements, and we provide personalized career guidance throughout the student’s journey.

The BAG solution analyzes the employer’s skill needs and translates the skills into short assessments, representing the employer’s requirements, on both the technical or soft skill side, that tests the users’ ability to work with that specific company.
Traditionally employers can only take on two-three interns per year. However, with the BAG solution, employers can now, with limited effort, transfer work-life experience from their company to thousands of students at the same time.

The students can navigate the platform, choosing a company of interest. The student can work on as many short assessments (including company challenges) as possible, where they receive personalized feedback, including a rating, based on each assessment. All the student information is transferred on a talent profile that employers can view and potentially substitute the traditional curriculum vitae.

BAG uses a freemium revenue model to attract all customers. BAG uses a premium subscription for businesses to affordably source and onboard talents and provides universities with a content platform that integrates with their curriculum and supports
students with premium career development.

Sustainability/Scalability
The former CandyCrush creator is building our Gamification technology.
Gamification is growing in popularity amid higher education institutions globally based on evidence-based science of increased student performance, retention, and student engagement. Gamification, within an educational context, is yet to ultimately
establish itself in Africa. Therefore, there is an opportunity to capitalize on gamification – and the reward system The students earn experience points, upgrades in levels, and have an enjoyable experience working on their skills development.

Impact/Success
Amidst our key accomplishments, over 8000 students have used or currently actively engaged on the platform, 200 plus companies collaborated, and over 540 graduates were placed in employment within the past two years. The COVID-19 health crisis has demonstrated that the BAG solution is more important than ever to keep students engaged digitally. Within the past six-months, BAG has been able to secure further university contracts and thereby increase revenue. BAG has also been selected as the best EdTech in East Africa 2019 by EdTechXGlobal and participated as a Seedstars Global finalist in 2020.

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