Success stories: leveraging Chalkboard Education to upskill teams in multiple countries with E-Quality Partners
Britta Ranade is the director of E-Quality Partners, a technical assistance organization within the medical supply chain. They are contracted by FHI 360, the prime contractor for the USAID Global Health Supply Chain-Quality Assurance Program (GHSC-QA), to deliver training content to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Rwanda. She uses Chalkboard Education to train staff members within medical organizations. For this conversation, she sits down with us to talk about her experience upskilling teams across countries with Chalkboard Education.
Ayeyi: Hi Britta, how are you doing?
Britta: I'm doing well, and you?
Ayeyi: I'm also doing well. Can you please introduce yourself to anyone reading this interview?
Britta: My name is Britta Ranade, the principal director of E-Quality Partners. E-Quality Partners is an organization that provides technical assistance in quality assurance management for different organizations involved in the medical supply chain. We work to provide technical assistance to these organizations using Chalkboard Education's training platform to deliver training content. Since most of these organizations are in Africa, it is a wonderful fit with Chalkboard Education.
Ayeyi: You mentioned that you provide technical assistance. Can you explain technical assistance to anyone who wants a clearer picture?
Britta: We provide a baseline assessment of the organization's quality management system. This includes policies, procedures, work instructions, training systems, deviations management, and overall document management system. Each division in the medical supply chain has different standards to implement. We provide a roadmap assessment of where the firm is and how to get to where they need to be. Then we provide guidance, tools, examples, technical reviews, and consultation to improve the organization's management.
Ayeyi: Interesting. And when did the relationship with Chalkboard Education begin?
Britta: We’ve been working together for about a year. The first project we did was in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The second project is now in Rwanda.
Ayeyi: How has this relationship with Chalkboard Education been so far?
Britta: It’s been wonderful! The team is responsive whenever we have questions. Initially, I had to move the training from a different platform to Chalkboard Education. The team was so responsive and helped me to make that transition. It’s been a pleasure.
Ayeyi: That’s wonderful to hear! Do you mind delving into any specific project you worked on with Chalkboard Education?
Britta: We’ve worked on two projects. First, we delivered training on inspection practices for good storage and distribution in pharmaceutical establishments. We did this with the Democratic Republic of Congo’s regulatory authority. We trained people in Kinshasha and throughout DRC. The offline capability of Chalkboard Education was so important, especially working with people in the interior of DRC, where the internet is spotty. The second project is ongoing. It is with the Rwandan Medical Supply, the parent organization responsible for procuring medical products and devices in Rwanda. We are training them to comply better with the World Health Organization standard on medical quality assurance and procurement.
Ayeyi: With the training you did in DRC, how did the users receive Chalkboard Education’s solution?
Britta: I surveyed the participants after the training, although it’s not a huge sample size. Forty-three people registered for the training, twenty-six completed it, and nine did the survey. Generally, the response was favourable. There were a few instances where they had trouble initially downloading the program and couldn’t upload their quizzes. However, for the most part, it was pretty positive feedback. A nice feature was I deployed that survey using Chalkboard Education’s platform. I also sent the survey as a Word document. Of the nine respondents, eight used the survey platform on Chalkboard Education, and only one sent back a Word document response. So they were comfortable using the platform.
Ayeyi: I think it’s quite a good indicator that eight out of the nine survey respondents used Chalkboard Education’s platform to respond to the survey.
Britta: Yeah, the people who responded to the survey were people who had completed the course (both laugh).
Ayeyi: How do you track the people using the course, their progress, and engagement?
Britta: I can view each user’s profile to see their course progress. If it was a green bar across, it showed that they had finished the course. I knew they’d only read a bit of it if it’s a partially green bar. I could also see their quiz submissions and results.
Ayeyi: Did the ability to track their performance help your work in any way?
Britta: Absolutely! The training is a course, so they must complete it to gain certification. Without the analytics, I could have no insight into what they learned, their takeaways, and whether they completed it. That is a key feature that I appreciate. One thing I’ll say in terms of improving that function is that it’s difficult to see across all of the analytics at once. I had to go into each profile. It would be nice to be able to do a visual of each participant and their progress.
Ayeyi: Thanks for the feedback. I’ll relay this to the design team. Are there plans for any future collaboration with Chalkboard Education? Or is there any way you see how Chalkboard Education can help you scale?
Britta: Yes! I have at least two more organizations I plan to work with in Uganda this year, and I want to work with Chalkboard Education on the course delivery. The nice thing about the courses is once I develop them, it’s easier to roll them out to other organizations. One of my goals is to translate the same course materials into different languages to make them more useful to the end-user. Also, I like the idea of using Chalkboard Education courses to onboard an organization before we dig into the technical assistance.
Ayeyi: Amazing. These are all the questions I have. Do you have any last words for anyone who might be reading this?
Britta: Yes, I’ll say that I love that Chalkboard Education designed this platform for the African environment. It is designed to deliver high-quality distance learning for environments where the internet is not great. I appreciate that. As we are both small businesses, working with another small business equally invested in what you deliver is nice.
Ayeyi: Thank you for talking with me; I appreciate it.
Britta: Thank you too.
About Chalkboard Education
Chalkboard Education provides a mobile-based, offline-first Learning Management System tailored for underserved communities' training. Lightweight, inclusive, and complete with full analytics capabilities, Chalkboard Education helps you reach your beneficiaries everywhere in the World seamlessly. Currently used in 12+ countries in Africa, South and North America, Chalkboard Education is available worldwide.
