RESPECT Unveiled: How Digital Infrastructure Is Poised to Revolutionise Education Across Africa

Nairobi, Kenya – For decades, the promise of digital education in Africa has often been overshadowed by the realities of fragmented initiatives, unreliable internet access, and a scarcity of locally relevant content.

Now, a groundbreaking initiative aims to turn the tide. Today in Nairobi, the RESPECT™ platform was unveiled, a Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) designed to unlock the full potential of educational technology (EdTech) across the continent.

Developed by the Spix Foundation, RESPECT™ is a direct response to the AUDA-NEPAD’s Africa EdTech 2030 Vision and Plan, announced earlier this month. This ambitious vision sets a clear goal: by 2030, “every African student should have access to the world’s best interactive digital courseware, developed in Africa by Africans, on smartphones already present in their pockets, households, and/or schools.”

Leapfrogging the Global EdTech Race

While the United Nations has only recently begun serious discussions about the need for a Digital Public Infrastructure for Education, Africa has already launched one. “Africa has already released it. Africa is already ahead,” declared John Kimotho, EdTech Consultant for the Spix Foundation and Head of RESPECT Africa Office, during the launch at the STEMtastic Adventures! Africa symposium.

This “multi-year head start” positions the continent to leverage its unique digital landscape to deliver education at an unprecedented scale.

Kimotho highlighted a critical flaw in current EdTech models: “Much of EdTech is pilot-driven and disconnected from education systems, leaving developers without clear growth pathways and teachers with tools that don’t last.” RESPECT™ aims to change this by making it easier for policymakers, educators, and developers to build sustainable solutions aligned with real classroom needs.

The launch of RESPECT™ coincides with AUDA-NEPAD’s sobering statistics about the state of education in Africa:

Only 40% of African primary schools have internet access. This digital divide exacerbates educational inequalities.
An estimated 30 million primary-aged children remain out of school. Access remains a fundamental challenge.
The continent will need 17 million additional teachers by 2030 just to maintain universal access, underscoring the severe teacher shortage.
Billions in education technology investment have often resulted in fragmented, unsustainable pilot projects rather than scalable solutions.

The Paradox of African Innovation

Despite these challenges, Africa has produced world-class educational technology. From Kenya’s innovative classroom management systems to Senegal’s Wolof-language XamXam platform, serving 1.2 million users, African innovators have demonstrated immense potential. The paradox, however, is that these innovations often remain isolated within their countries of origin, unable to scale across borders due to market fragmentation.

The mEducation Alliance’s 2024 report on digital courseware in low- and middle-income countries revealed a critical issue: developers face different rules, requirements, and procurement protocols in nearly every African country. This leads to “small-batch deployment”, a Kenya pilot here, a Senegal project there, each requiring complete retooling, making it unsustainable for developers and frustrating for teachers who experience “tool fatigue” from juggling multiple siloed applications.

AUDA-NEPAD’s Vision and Plan identify two core problems: the lack of real-time, reliable data on effective digital courseware and significant barriers to scale (policy, commercial, and technological). RESPECT™ tackles these head-on:

Data for Impact: All RESPECT Compatible™ apps send data on every learner-app interaction to the relevant authorities, respecting data privacy laws. This data enables critical practices like “Teaching at the Right Level” and “Structured Pedagogy.” Federated at the continental level, this data will allow for courseware ranking and research, helping to identify what works best for different learners.
Lowering Policy Barriers: RESPECT™ implements AUDA-NEPAD’s new Policy Framework for Standards-Based, Vendor-Neutral EdTech, a draft of which was released for public comment today. This framework aims to harmonise regulations, making it easier for solutions to scale across countries.
Reducing Technical Hurdles: RESPECT™ incorporates on-device technologies like data compression, web caching, proxy servers, and mesh networking. This allows developers to create a single app that functions seamlessly online, offline, and intermittently online, a crucial feature in regions with inconsistent connectivity. It also supports systematic text localisation and curriculum standards mapping, ensuring content relevance. Interoperability is enforced through international standards like xAPI, OneRoster, and OAuth.
Breaking Commercial Barriers: Perhaps most revolutionary, RESPECT™ makes all RESPECT Compatible™ apps free for students and intermediaries. Developers and localizers are paid based on app usage (and later, impact), with revenue primarily sourced from sponsorships. Kimotho likens it to “YouTube meets PBS Kids” for EdTech apps, creating a sustainable ecosystem that rewards innovation while ensuring universal access.

“Africa has a unique opportunity to simultaneously drive access to free localised EdTech solutions that can reach all parts of the education ecosystem, even those offline, while making it profitable and sustainable to develop the world’s best interactive digital courseware, right here in Africa,” said John Kimotho.

“The system has been failing the innovators, not the other way around, and RESPECT makes it easy for those innovators to deliver the education technology solutions that Africa’s children need.”

The launch of RESPECT™ is not just a technological advancement; it’s a testament to African ingenuity and a bold step towards an equitable educational future.

As Kimotho concluded, “The opportunity is historic, but time is short. We need to stop lamenting the barriers and start dismantling them systematically.” With RESPECT™, Africa is doing just that, paving the way for a generation of students to access a world-class education developed by their own.