SmartStart

Context

• 1 million children (ages 3 – 4 years) in low income communities in South Africa do not have access to early learning opportunities
• Early Childhood Development (ECD) is often neglected thereby setting children on a back-foot for their entire educational and employment attainment
• Where ECD centers do exist in low-income communities, these are poorly resourced and provide the bare minimum in terms of social, academic, and emotional learning

Solution

• SmartStart aims to achieve population-level change in access to early learning by providing an integrated national delivery platform which builds in the operational structures and systems required for accelerated scale
• Through an innovative social franchise model, SmartStart’s implementing partners (existing ECD service providers and NGOs) license and support a network of early learning practitioners to deliver evidence-based learning programs to 3 – 5-year old children
• Fidelity and quality are safeguarded at the program level through trainings, operational tools, play & learning materials, coach-led quality assurance processes and a network of ‘clubs’ that provide peer support
• Beyond enhancing access to quality early learning, SmartStart is also supporting skills development and micro-enterprise by stimulating economic activities in under-resourced communities and creating additional work opportunities for women in these communities

Impact depth

• Since its inception in 2015, SmartStart has been able to reach over 76’000 children and provided an income-generating opportunity to over 4,000 entrepreneurs (Franchisees)
• An independent evaluation found that 62% of SmartStart learners were achieving the expected standard for their age within 6 months; compared to 32% at baseline
• By 2030, SmartStart plans to provide quality early learning to 1 million children annually across South Africa