Insights from A Teachers' Digital Community Experiment in Pakistan
Community-led product development (just like community-led anything, really) sounds fantastic in theory. In practice, however, building and sustaining a digital community in a low-resourced setting, to get to know potential customers and understand pain points, is harder than it sounds.
Here are some key takeaways from the Beaj Education experience of running a Whatsapp community for a 12-week program for Teacher Leaders from low-cost schools across Pakistan:
The Highlight: we got more organic interest than we expected! 1000+ teachers joined the community within the first week. We sent daily content and opened the chat for group discussion for 2 hours every evening. Members were most active in the first week, with ~200 responses per day.
Motivation & Inspiration: many teachers care deeply. Active members of this group will make anyone who questions teacher motivation, really think twice. Their stories, insights and ideas are inspiring. But we don’t know what percentage of total teachers they comprise - all we know is this is a self-selected group that genuinely cares about the profession and wants to improve education quality - that’s why they signed up.
Novelty vs. Sustained Interest: as we got deeper into content and transitioned from more general to specific topics (especially those that required input from participants), interest waned and members started leaving. After 6 weeks, we’ve leveled off at about 770 members. Sustaining interest is hard.
Language is a huge barrier: English issues strike again. We post content in a mix of English and Urdu (and use both Roman Urdu and Urdu script intermittently). Most members have a limited understanding of English, and really struggle to communicate in it. But the English keyboard still reigns supreme, so members communicate in a mix of English and Roman Urdu, with Urdu script only used sometimes.
Voice Notes are Rare: There is a general hesitation to send voice notes in the large group, even though we encourage them and brave members send one every now and then. That is something we didn’t expect, but find interesting.
Active Few vs. Silent Majority: Similar to in-person settings, Whatsapp community members who are more confident in their ability to communicate their thoughts, especially in English, post a lot more than those who are not, even though the latter may have valuable insights to share. This leads to the same handful of active people talking a lot, while the majority remain silent. Lesson: moderating large groups to ensure wider participation is a tough job that requires skill and creativity.
Topics of Interest: Our members have a lot to say about big-picture Teaching & Learning questions, especially those that cover teacher objectives, the greater purpose of Education, the role of ‘tarbiyat’ in addition to ‘taleem,’ and challenges in the classroom. They are far less responsive to more technical topics such as ‘how to design a project-based learning unit’ or ‘practical examples of positive discipline during the school day.’ We speculate that this community’s chief value-add in the lives of most members is as a platform for higher level thinking and discussion, not necessarily practical training on specific aspects of teaching.
Teachers Want Appreciation: one big takeaway is that teaching is a thankless, under-appreciated job, and teachers, just like all other humans, crave appreciation. We ensure that this community provides some of that!
As we think about how to transition from this program to a longer term, wider community of teacher leaders and changemakers, we are grappling with many questions, both about teachers specifically and about digital communities more generally. Two of these are:
Are large digital communities worth the effort it takes to run them?!
Can such a community really add value to the lives of teachers who don’t have other support systems? If so, what value can it add and how should it be structured?
Would love advice from anyone who has run a digital community in a similar setting. Would also love to hear from anyone who has thoughts or ideas on our experience!
By Zainab Qureshi