By Rose Nyzoka, Co-Chair of the Global Digital Health Network and Country Representative at Palladium 

The Global Digital Health Forum is where the world of digital health practitioners, experts, and funders comes together– it’s also one of my favorite times of the year, as co-chair for the Global Digital Health Network. I love reconnecting with friends and colleagues, and meeting new potential collaborators from across the globe. At 2023’s in-person event in Washington D.C., I had the opportunity to give opening remarks with my fellow GDHN co-chair, Carol Kamasaka. I urged participants to take take advantage off the new innovation of live watch parties we were bringing to in GDHF2023 to hear more voices and experiences from country teams in Kenya, Tanzania, St Lucia, Nigeria, Chile, and Indonesia.

GDHF 2023 Opening

The learnings from last year’s event are still fresh in my mind, particularly the exhortations by USAID Assistant Deputy Administrator, Sangita Patel, in her keynote address, where she rallied us as digital health actors to go beyond experimentation and embrace ecosystem-wide interventions that are lasting and sustainable. This was echoed by government leaders from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Senegal, Haiti, Ghana, and Indonesia, who called for an increased focus on digital health goverance and the coordination of donor investments. 

Eco-system wide interventions and proper governance don’t just happen– they will be the direct result of sustained conversation and collaboration between digital health experts from low- to middle-income countries along with high-income countries. GDHF is an essential part of that conversation, and I urge you to join us this year to add your voice. 

Our network, working with TechChange as the operational support partner for the GDHF event, has just announced the location for the 2024 in-person site, and I’m thrilled to share that it’s my home city of Nairobi, Kenya! Digital Health programming in Kenya has come a long way, including development of standards for digital solutions, transitioning from paper to digital patient records, and enactment of Digital Health Act 2023, legislation that provides a framework for provision of digital health services, establishment of a comprehensive integrated digital health information system, data governance and protection of personal health information and service delivery through digital health interventions. The Ministry of Health is excited to co-host this event with GDHN, a testament of Kenya’s commitment to its digital health vision. Hosting the main event in Kenya provides the opportunity to center African expertise and programming, and I can’t wait to welcome our global digital health community to Nairobi.  

When I say the in-person GDHF 2024 , I want to clarify that’s because GDHF is quite intentionally a hybrid event, with virtual programming throughout the entire conference, as well as local watch parties in different countries in key time zones where local leaders and experts can gather together to participate, network, and share their own experiences. So, whether or not you’re able to come to Kenya this year– though I hope you  do!–  that’s not your only option for participating. 

Calls for workshop presentations will go live in a couple of months, we will keep you posted and  welcome you to share your ideas. 

See you in Nairobi, or online. 

By Sylvia Mwelu, Digital Health Technical Lead at KeHIA and Nairobi Watch Party Host

In the fast-paced world of digital health, collaboration is the foundation for innovation. As we navigate the ever-changing digital health ecosystem, the solutions to our complex challenges lie in the engagement of diverse minds working towards a common goal. Recently, the Kenya Health Informatics Association (KeHIA) had the distinct honour of hosting a local watch party for the Global Digital Health Forum from Nairobi, Kenya. This experience exceeded our expectations and demonstrated the transformative power of partnership, as well as laying the ground work for the future of the event itself.

What We Saw at the Kenya Watch Party
One of the most important takeaways from the 2023 Kenyan event was the variety of perspectives that came together under the virtual (and in-person) roof of our watch party. Representatives from various organisations participated in dynamic discussions that went beyond organisational boundaries, each bringing their own unique insights and experiences. The exchange of ideas was intellectually stimulating, and laid groundwork for potential synergies and partnerships that could propel collective progress in the digital health space here in Kenya. 

Participants watching a panel at Kenya Watch Party

The sessions were an immersive experience that deepened our understanding, broadened our network, and fuelled our enthusiasm for future engagements. The event’s seamless organisation and execution was critical. From the engaging panel discussions to the interactive Q&A sessions, every aspect of the event was carefully curated to provide participants with a platform to absorb the latest information on trends in digital health while actively contributing to the conversation.

Reflections on Hosting a Local Watch Party for a Global Event, and GDHF 2024

KeHIA worked with TechChange and HELINA to organise this watch party, and the experience was extremely rewarding. Witnessing our members’ enthusiasm and engagement as they connected with professionals present in the room and those from all over the world reaffirmed the value of such activities. Digital health initiatives don’t happen in a regional or national context only, and it is essential to incorporate global best practices and cross-regional approaches in our work.

Looking ahead, we are excited about other potential partnerships with TechChange and other groups who participated in this global event. I’d like to express my heartfelt gratitude to Techchange, World Bank, and Medic for giving us the opportunity to host this watch party. The synergy displayed during the event has left a positive and indelible impression on our organisation, and we eagerly await future opportunities to work together to shape the future of digital health globally, and here in Kenya, including the main event for GDHF 2024, which will take place here in Nairobi.

By Otse Ogorry, Evans Ondura, Samuel Atanda, and Olo Okoye

The Global Digital Health Forum is a global hybrid event that convenes thought leaders, experts, and enthusiasts from around the world to explore the intersection of technology and public health. One key element of GDHF is local “watch parties,” including the GDHF Nigeria Watch Party, hosted by the Palladium Group, in collaboration with the Health Strategy Delivery Foundation, on December 5th, 2023 at the Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Centre in Abuja. 

Elements of the GDHF Nigeria Watch Party 

  • Virtual participation in live panel discussions from Washington DC, with interactive questions and answers.  
  • Hybrid plenary session on digital-first approaches, streamed to audiences in both Washington DC and virtually.  
  • A panel discussion with senior Nigerian Ministry of Health officials, private sector representatives, and civil society, addressing digital health investments in the country, also streamed to virtual audiences world-wide. 
  • Pop-up studio interviews with attendees. 
  • Networking and side meetings to spur collaboration.

Nearly 50 attendees helped to make the Nigeria Watch Party a dynamic and engaging experience. Stakeholders from Nigeria’s public and private health sector engaged in dynamic discussions across various sessions, generating ideas and significant strategies for action.

Cross section of Panelists and Attendees

Nigerian Watch Party Sessions and Insights 

In an era where digital innovation is reshaping industries globally, there is a widely recognized need for digital health investments in Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation. In “The Future of Digital Investment Coordination,” industry experts emphasized the importance of collaborative efforts in mobilizing resources and coordinating digital health investments effectively. Insights centered on the necessity of strategic partnerships and innovative financing mechanisms to maximize the impact of digital health interventions in Nigeria.


The Plenary session, “Digital-First Approaches to Health in Nigeria,” underscored the transformative potential of prioritizing digital technologies in healthcare delivery. Participants explored the role of digital-first strategies in enhancing access to quality healthcare services, strengthening health systems, and driving efficiencies across the continuum of care. The session illuminated pathways for leveraging technology to overcome barriers and accelerate progress towards universal health coverage in Nigeria.

Participants listening intently

In “Charting the Future: Driving Digital Health Investments in Nigeria“, stakeholders deliberated strategies to unlock investment opportunities and foster an enabling environment for digital health innovation. Discussions revolved around regulatory frameworks, policy incentives, and public-private partnerships to incentivize investment and stimulate innovation in the digital health ecosystem. Participants emphasized the need for targeted interventions to address gaps in infrastructure, capacity-building, and data governance to realize the full potential of digital health in Nigeria.

As organizers, hosting the GDHF Watch Party in Abuja was an enriching experience, offering a platform to amplify the dialogue on digital health investments within the Nigerian context. As organizers, it was encouraging to feel the palpable fervor and commitment of participants to advance the digital health agenda. The exchange of ideas sparked lively debates, formed new partnerships, and inspired creative thinking on leveraging digital technologies to improve health outcomes.

What does the future hold?

We are confident that the momentum, insights, and deeper relationships generated by the Nigerian Watch Party will contribute to a healthier, more equitable future for our country. We are grateful to the GDHF organizers, HSDF, Palladium, and the TechChange team for their contributions, and look forward to hosting more collaborative events in the future. Together, we will continue to drive innovation, investment, and collaboration to realize the transformative potential of digital health in shaping the future of healthcare in Africa and beyond, including at GDHF 2024 in Kenya.

Panelists at GDHF Nigeria Watch Party

By:  Shenal Kotuwewatta

This January, I worked at TechChange as a micro-intern in the tech team. It was a wonderful experience, and I learned a lot from my work during the micro-internship. I also had a blast getting to know the amazing people who work at TechChange and learning about TechChange’s mission of driving social change. I was located in my home country Sri Lanka for the entirety of the micro-internship, but the team made sure that I had no trouble working remotely across time zones.

True to its mission, I found TechChange to be a very human-centered company. This was apparent from my first interaction with TechChange when I underwent a unique interview process that focused less on memorizing technical details and more on looking at the big picture. As someone who has gone through many traditional algorithm-based tech interviews, I found this to be refreshing and was immediately drawn towards TechChange.

Once at TechChange, I was able to quickly ramp up on its tech stack and get started on my project, which was to implement a “message reaction” system (similar to those on Facebook/Slack) for TechChange’s chat application. The tech team members always helped me whenever I needed it, be it for diagnosing a bug or reviewing my code. I was able to get a lot of work done over the four weeks of the micro-internship. I also attended a company-wide sprint demo where I presented my design documentation for the project and received valuable, positive feedback from teams across the company.

Overall, I feel my time at TechChange was productive and educational, and I’m excited to see what TechChange has in stock for the future!

by: Mehek Gosalia, TechChange Tech Micro-intern

A one month internship is not a common thing to do, I’m told. Just one of the many weird and wonderful quirks of MIT: every year, we take January to explore education outside of class, whether through study abroad, research, specialized courses or micro internships. I got the chance to work at TechChange just for the month, as a software engineering intern. As I found, my unusually short internship was unusually rewarding, because TechChange, too, is weird and wonderful.

What makes it weird? Within a technical team of just 4, plus me and my fellow intern, we spanned 4 time zones at any given time. Our daily meetings were midday for some, wake-up calls for me, and burning the midnight oil for others. And instead of coding side by side, we seemed to switch off, PRs and commits coming in at every hour from every corner of the world. Because of this, I spend much of my internship getting to explore the codebase on my own, peeling back layers of files and discovering how much the platform truly had to offer. I also got to work in multiple areas of the codebase, working full stack to implement a new bookmark feature independently. This was my first ever 9 to 5, and yet with the freedom and flexibility I had, I rarely woke up at 9 or put away my laptop at 5. The lack of one set routine could have been demotivating- for us, it was energizing. It was weird, but it worked.

New bookmark feature implemented by Mehek

What makes it wonderful? Somehow, with just a 30 minute daily meeting with my team, continents and oceans between us, the technical team quickly became a family. Honestly, the flexibility and radical differences in our schedules actually created a unique dynamic. Instead of a rigid work structure followed by off time, we got to see each other living our lives. We shared our days, without distinction between work life and our lives- kids at home played off camera, I told them about my classes next month and they told me about the trip they were on to see their family. We pair programmed over Zoom between one lunch break and another, and there was always time for helping each other, even across time zones. When you can bring your life into your workplace, without rigid hours, it breathes life into the workplace. Truly wonderful.

I had four weeks at TechChange. Four weird, wonderful weeks made possible by my weird, wonderful school. I learned many things, but mostly, I learned about people. I learned about the people who work at TechChange, and who they were, and what a pleasure they were to work with. To me, being able to know them, after such a short time, is a career triumph beyond any technical skills gained. For that, thank you TechChange!

Guest Blog Post By: Amanda Livingstone (she/her/hers)

Facilitator, Communicator, and Campaign Strategist for Reproductive Justice

Amanda.j.livingstone@gmail.com | www.amandalivingstone.com

What TechChange’s Gender Data Online Course is all about and why I signed up

TechChange’s Gender Data 101 Edition 2.0 is a 5-week blended online course organized and facilitated by the incredible Natalya Buchwald that featured live events with gender and data experts, online tools and tasks, and provided additional resources that could be used within our professional environments. The course gave participants the skills to:

  • Define best practices needed for gender data at all stages of the data life cycle (collection, processing, analysis, visualization, uptake, and impact)
  • Identify the multiple forms of systemic discrimination that affect the overall efficacy of gender data
  • Evaluate the limitations of the gender binary and how it may affect the phases of the gender data lifecycle
  • Create action-oriented strategies and an intersectional approach to combat gender data inequities and biases

I was keen to sign up to 1. Improve my skills at effectively implementing the data life cycle throughout a project I managed that focused on women’s and girls’ sexual health and rights and 2. Continue to dismantle and unlearn my own internal biases on gender and race and reconstruct more affirming and intersectional approaches for improved organizational strategies and impact.

Why everyone should take this course

The course covers five key topics: fundamentals of gender and data; gender data collection and processing; gender data analysis; gender data visualization; and gender uptake and impact. At first, I was pretty hesitant to dive in – full well knowing my inability to use advanced excel formulas, GIS, and most of the acronym-ed data analysis tools out there – but the course progressed at an accessible pace, offered several engaging guest panels, and included how-to videos for those of us who may have needed a second watch to let a new methodology or tool fully sink in (cough me cough). The course also delved into how systemic discrimination based on gender, race, ability, geography, and more negatively affect the overall efficacy of gender data and how we can work to identify and combat discriminatory practices from the start. The course ends by asking all participants to take actionable steps to employ gender data to create and improve impactful programs within their professional and everyday lives.

My top 3 takeaways

  1. Once you start identifying discriminatory data collection methods and visualizations, you can’t – and shouldn’t – unsee them. From filling out a survey that doesn’t include your race but rather lists “other,” to only offering “male” and “female” gender identity choices, to the color choices used in mapping visualizations – discrimination and biases in data collection, analysis, and visualizations are far too prevalent. I also recognize my privilege and embarrassment that it took a class for me to be fully aware of these systemic types of oppression and how they are directly connected to the harmful ways that information is understood and shared, how choices (like policies and laws) are made, and how resources are allocated. This also extends into and is a foundation of the decolonization of research in the development field more broadly. My ask to readers: When you see a collection method or visualization that – purposefully or not – is exclusive, discriminating, or biased – write to/call/tag the author/organization/etc. calling out the issue and encouraging them to make the necessary changes to make their methods more inclusive, affirming, and respectful.
  1. Everyone can make inclusive adjustments to their gender data collection and visualization methods. Many of the tips shared in TechChange’s class were straightforward, doable, and can be integrated into pretty much any data collection, analysis, or visualization method. Are you about to ask your staff or your organizational members to complete a survey? Make sure to double-check if it could put someone’s privacy or personal information at risk. Ask yourself if it only allows individuals to check “male” or “female” rather than letting folks self-identify. When you’re making a graph visualizing your survey’s results – what colors are you using to represent participants’ responses? Who is asking the questions, and who will see the answers? And how are you portraying the data within your larger contexts? These are just a few questions to ask yourself before, during, and after requesting information from a broad and diverse audience.
  1. TOOLS. I love a good tool – whether it’s a template for a new, integrated workplan or a chart that helps me better decide what type of data visualization tool I should use, I want to see them all. This course offers, dare I say, hundreds of free, easily accessible online tools that can support users in all their gender data needs. I have downloaded many of them and use them daily. Below is a sneak peek of some available tools shared.

All in all, I highly recommend this course to anyone looking for support on a specific project or to folks who are interested in broadening their inclusive data collection, analysis, and visualization skills.

For more information on the next available course, email: info@techchange.org

By: Emma Demers, TechChange 2021 Summer Fellow

Over the last two years I have fielded a lot of questions about my two main areas of interest, education and user experience design. For many curious onlookers, education studies and UX/UI design studies present as two very different pedagogies, and thus, they require an explanation from me about how I can combine two seemingly unrelated areas of work. 

I always appreciate those people who are interested in hearing more about my decision to pursue both interests. The following is a brief explanation of how I plan on leveraging my experience at TechChange to better serve the education community this upcoming year and beyond. 

Following my completion of undergrad in June 2020, I moved from New Hampshire to D.C. to pursue a year of service with AmeriCorps. I worked for an AmeriCorps National partner organization called Literacy Lab, which provides one-on-one reading help to students in DC Public Schools. 

As you can imagine, moving to a new city and starting a new job amidst the pandemic came with a lot of unexpected challenges. But I don’t think anyone at Lit Lab was really prepared for the level of chaos that would befall DCPS, especially Title I schools, and especially during that first fall of the pandemic. It was admirable to watch how DCPS staff and faculty rose to the challenges posed by online learning, but many of the issues they faced were unfamiliar and unrelenting. 

Flash forward to this past summer; I traded in my reading assessments and student data tracking for course evaluation reports and user interviews here at TechChange. Having the opportunity to dive deep into adult online education after spending a year trying to teach kids over Microsoft Teams felt like a wonderful break. For nine weeks, I watched TechChange members put so much of their time and effort into creating engaging and productive experiences for their partners and participants; it was truly a joy to spend my time learning from my new teammates.

A few weeks ago, I started my second year of AmeriCorps. This year I am a VISTA member (meaning I’m sponsored by the national AmeriCorps organization) and I am working at Garrison Elementary as a community partners liaison. Already I can tell that the work is very different from my work last year in that I spend much more time on capacity building and community building, and my work is largely in-person (which is both terrifying and exciting after working virtually for over a year). As I begin my work at Garrison, I can already see how my past work at TechChange can help me solve for gaps and discover new opportunities to strengthen elementary school processes, and also help me reflect on my past year spent online teaching.

An Empathetic Approach

The difference between adult and student education planning that most immediately caught my attention was the extremely high level of empathy and research that went into planning TechChange’s online experiences. I was impressed by how much care and inquisitiveness went into identifying participants’ needs over the course of their time with TechChange. As a UX/UI designer, I appreciated the methodologies that go into creating a TechChange course. And to TechChange’s credit, they really emphasize human-centered design. Meaning that team members interview potential participants, work closely with their partners, and consider every aspect of a participant’s virtual needs (which vary greatly from their in-person needs). As the TechChange Summer Fellow, I spent almost all of my time analyzing the successes and challenges (which were few) of TechChange’s virtual synchronous courses. Much of the successes stemmed from participants feeling like TechChange facilitators could anticipate participants’ needs and adapt throughout the course to make participants feel heard. 

Although I give DCPS a lot of credit for adapting to virtual teaching amidst a pandemic, I must say that more emphasis could have been placed on observing students prior to the start of virtual teaching, or talking to students and gathering their feedback the way people gather feedback from adults. One of my biggest takeaways from online teaching is that elementary students are people too — they deserve the consideration and respect that we give to adult learners. Their learning needs can and should be met. And the onus to be adaptable and engaging shouldn’t rest with classroom teachers; I believe DCPS has a responsibility to create a support system for students and teachers wherein both parties feel comfortable and heard. Too often the focus for classroom teachers is how to maintain a semblance of order in their classrooms (both online and in-person); I can see now that there were opportunities last year for DC educators to intervene and provide teachers with the tools they needed to increase student engagement and passion for learning so that teachers could have focused on teaching.

To put the problem in product development terms: the students should be the users, and their needs should be well-studied and prioritized. While the implementers of the education experience should be familiar with the students’ needs (and the teachers I’ve met definitely are familiar), many other parties have the responsibility to step in with research-backed strategies to accommodate online learning challenges. Education delivery should be a team effort.     

Strengthening Ties with Stakeholders

As the new community partner liaison at Garrison, I spend much of my time listening to community stakeholders; our wonderful principal and assistant principal, the school dean, our head of after school programs, teachers and coaches, non-profit directors, the president of the Parent-Teacher Organization, among many others. 

Emma’s Summer Findings

The relationship between TechChange and its partners is vastly different from the way I work with Garrison’s community partners, but there’s a lot to be gained from TechChange’s co-creation approach to designing experiences with their stakeholders. The open-ended nature of brainstorming with a new partner prior to course design provides so much opportunity to create an experience with myriad benefits. As I’ve begun introducing myself to Garrison’s partners (both old and new) I have found the most productive and creatively-minded conversations with partners are the ones where we spend time discussing our goals for our potential partnership. Framing the partnership with such intentionality really drives us to enthusiastically dive into new programs, new goals, and new opportunities for the students. And for my position in particular, I’m always cognizant that these partnerships are usually pro-bono for Garrison, and that many of our partners are donating their time to help our school (students and teachers alike).

Big-Picture Planning

One of the wonderful aspects of my Fellowship was the opportunity to synthesize a large amount of qualitative data all together; by analyzing feedback and user interviews regarding TechChange’s synchronous offerings, I had the chance to interpret insights across different courses (which were each tailored to a different audience and contained different learning objectives). Making those cross-course connections was key to my understanding of the strengths and challenges of TechChange course development as well as my familiarization with participants’ needs and constraints. If I were to have stayed on after my fellowship, I think I could have used my research to pursue even deeper understandings of both participants and the course development process. 

Emma Utilized Dedoose to Synthesize a Large Amount of Qualitative Data for TechChange

But in my current capacity, I already hope to use that same kind of thinking to approach challenges within Garrison. One of the issues I want to address is a lack of organization within the after school program; there is an incredible amount of work that goes into planning after school care for students, and much of that work is completed by teachers, corps members from places like City Year, and team members from non-profits like Kid Power. With so many actors involved, coordination has been tricky, especially after a year of minimal in-person programming. As the community partner liaison, I’m in a unique position to approach this challenge by combining the expertise and suggestions from a variety of parties involved. I am already prepared to approach this problem using a tried-and-true design methodology (loosely speaking: research, brainstorm, design, test, iterate) and I am confident that I will be able to support my school better having had experience in design research. 

Although I am no longer working in a design capacity, my work in education design research has truly shaped how I approach my work as a member of the DC education community. And while I am no longer teaching virtually or studying virtual teaching, I have learned so much about education and online engagement that I know will help me as I strive to support Garrison students, educators and partners. At the very least, my summer at TechChange has provided me the opportunity to reflect deeply on our roles as education developers/implementers, and for that I am very grateful.

We’re excited to share that the agenda has been posted for first-ever USAID-HBCU International Development Conference! Co-sponsored by the Harry T. Moore chapter of Blacks in Government, this online event is taking place from 15-16 September 2021. This year’s theme is “Increasing Diversity in International Development” and will include announcements of job opportunities and scholarships for conference participants, as well as networking opportunities throughout both days.

Screenshot of agenda on TechChange platform
Screenshot of initial agenda on the TechChange platform

Day 1: Learn more about USAID’s work

  • USAID 101
  • The Black Humanitarian Experience
  • Promoting Peace and Reducing Global Conflict
  • Improving Global Health – Who we are and what we do
  • Supporting a Resilient and Food Secure World for All
  • Advancing Inclusive Democracies Abroad
  • Voices from the field – USAID local field staff provide their perspectives on the impact of USAID’s work
  • Networking session with USAID employees from the field as well as HQ

Day 2: Learn more about how you can work for USAID 

  • “Demystifying USAID Employment” panel discussion on different opportunities within the Agency
  • Student and Recent Graduate Employment
  • Federal resume writing
  • Veterans Employment Opportunities
  • Donald M. Payne International Graduate Fellowship Program
  • Engaging the Next Generation of Agency Researchers
  • Management Bureau recruitment event – Bring your resume and speak directly with a hiring manager!
  • Setting yourself up for future success
  • Navigating USAJOBS.GOV

Please note that while this  event is targeting current students and alumni from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), registration is open to all. Please note that space is limited for some of the sessions, so make sure you register soon

Screenshot of selected speakers

For more information, follow the Event on LinkedIn or register on TechChange now

By: Momoka Keicho, TechChange 2021 Summer Fellow

I have had an amazing time spending this summer learning and growing with TechChange and their Education Team as a Summer Fellow. It has been such a blast, and the Education Team really made us fellows feel welcome and a part of their team throughout the entire summer. For example, one of the great things that the Ed Team did for us fellows was to host casual lunches throughout the summer to connect with one another. These were such great opportunities to chat with other members of the Ed Team and make connections beyond the projects we were working on together. 

In one of these lunches about halfway through the summer, one of the icebreaker questions that came up in the conversation was, “What career advice would you give to someone who was just starting out?” As a recent grad, I was eager to hear what everyone had to say. As everyone shared their opinions, I realized that all of the advice — including my own — had revolved around one central theme: be adventurous and try as many new things as possible. 

Momoka’s summer research questions focused on answering the question of “What is a TechChange blended course?”

Up until this point in my fellowship, I had been devoting most of my time to collecting and analyzing data for my fellowship research project on TechChange’s blended courses. I was fascinated by the insights I was discovering about blended learning, but I definitely was feeling curious about other ongoing course development projects at TechChange. I just didn’t know how I could start becoming more involved in work beyond my research. 

Listening to everyone talk about the importance of putting yourself out there in new situations, though, really reminded me of the mentality that drove me to pursue this fellowship at TechChange in the first place. I came into this fellowship as someone who had experience working in the classroom, but I ended up choosing TechChange because I wanted to explore edtech as a field within education that I had not yet experienced. This entire world was new to me, but I wanted to work directly with the ongoing projects and the Ed Team members, learn all about their online platform, get my hands dirty with my research project, and develop new skills in instructional design. I knew that the only way to see if something is a good fit for me was to try!

I felt reinspired to take the advice that everyone had offered and embrace the mentality that I came into the fellowship with. I started actively reaching out to other members of TechChange to learn more about their projects, and I quickly realized that TechChange was the perfect place to learn with the abundance of opportunities provided. Anytime I reached out to any team member, they were always more than happy to help me explore something new — whether that be letting me sit in on meetings with a client, agreeing to chat with me about their experience on past projects, walking me through their advice on qualitative research methodologies, or allowing me to support ongoing projects. 

And all of this effort of putting myself out there definitely paid off. The interviews I conducted with TechChange’s account managers heavily informed my final report and presentation, and my research would not have been as comprehensive if I had not reached out to them. I learned how to use Dedoose, a qualitative data analysis software that I had never used before, allowing my analysis to encompass multiple types of data. I had the opportunity to help brainstorm and develop different ideation workshop activities to inform the development of one project, and I applied what I had learned about instructional design by revising the quality of another project. If there was something I wanted to do at TechChange, there was a way for me to be involved, as long as I was willing to take the first step to explore. 

I’m coming out of this fellowship having learned so much about instructional design and course development through my research project on TechChange’s blended courses, but my biggest takeaway has definitely been a newfound confidence to try new things. Even if something seems intimidating at first, like it may not be the best fit, or as if it is drastically different from what I’ve done in the past, I think my experience at TechChange has taught me to embrace that uncertainty and run with it. Overall, I am so grateful to the TechChange team for continuing to support me throughout the entire summer and for all the wonderful connections I made. I’m so excited to take this mentality to dive into my next new thing and continue learning in the future. 

4 Online Education Strategies for the COVID Classroom

Author: Marion Comi-Morog


No one was truly prepared for COVID-19 when it hit. As with many crises, however, this pandemic provided an opportunity to recognize pre-existing and fundamental flaws in our national institutions, flaws which ultimately left us even less prepared to adjust and reorganize in the wake of the disease. In the case of our higher education, the tools to address these flaws lay staring us directly in the face.


Before spring break, COVID-19 was a threat. In the week following, it was an all-conquering reality. My return to college from a blissfully-ignorant break of beaches and crowds was marked by a sudden spike in the disease and in the rumors that other universities had shut their doors.

What would happen if our college sends us home? What would happen if it doesn’t?

The questions that buzzed through our campus were ultimately short-lived. Three days after our return, my college sent the same email to its students that had been sent to half the country’s collegiate learners: online instruction would replace the only form of education that we’d known. Chaos erupts as the students from my tiny college spread across the globe and the professors scramble to transition their lectures and lesson plans to an online format. A drastically short period of time was all that was allotted to completely flip in-person courses to online learning and for the teachers themselves to learn the online tools that would help accomplish this. For many professors, learning a foreign language in the same timeframe would have been an easier task.

In no time at all, colleges began to launch their first fully-transitioned classes. Professors struggled to access their own virtual classrooms, while students struggled to comprehend the new workflow. Connections failed; classes were cancelled. On my first day of online college, two lessons were abandoned and one was entirely spent on learning how to use the Zoom chat feature.

In the confusion, my courses were stripped down to their barest form: a means to channel information from teacher to learner, placing the onus on the student to actually learn it. In the wake of a pandemic, with a greater number of distractions and anxieties than ever before, students were provided with less engaging lesson plans while being forced to take up greater responsibility for their own education. This is what I thought online learning was. As my college made plans to continue online in the fall, I struggled to see how I would continue to learn in this environment. I began to question whether I should return at all.

Systems of higher education like my own made the fundamental error of changing their learning format while maintaining the same learning tools and techniques. It is not an online format that fails to educate. Rather, it is the failure to incorporate the advantages and tools of online education that caused the online transition to miss its mark. 

Both collegiate students and its faculty have felt this difference. In an interview, one such college faculty member affirms that the differences between online and in-person teaching were both fundamental and fundamentally overlooked.

He states, “because the pedagogy for remote instruction is so different from the in-person classroom, many colleges and universities like ours were completely unprepared for the initial transition to online learning. As a consequence, the quality of education that we had been able to provide in the first half of the semester took a large hit.” 

My work with TechChange, however, is proof that online education can be just as meaningful as the classroom setting we’d grown used to. Using instructional design principles and knowledge of our users, we are able to convey material to our audience in a way that consistently engages users with the material and with each other. Colleges and universities must look towards pre-existing and well-founded online education platforms as a model for their online methodologies. I firmly believe that a college experience is valuable in more ways than a graduation ceremony and a degree. For it to continue to be so, higher education must incorporate the four online education strategies that I have learned through my time with TechChange.

1. Ask your students.


Even as academic programs struggled to transition and to teach their students, an opportunity for student feedback and problem-solving was never developed. Within my first month at TechChange, I have seen the value of student/user feedback appear multiple times. While it may seem un-intuitive that students could hold the answers, users are often able to catch bugs or oversights that an instructor won’t, merely because they engage with the material in very different ways.

While developing a pilot course with TechChange, we asked two simple questions about each module: to rate how useful and instructive it was to the user’s work, and to provide general comments about their experience. From this feedback, we were able to discover where the students lost engagement or just felt lost, and could make the appropriate changes. It is incredibly important to listen to your target audience’s feedback because, well, this is who the material is meant for.


Fig 1. TechChange user feedback form for the first module of a pilot course. Click the image to enlarge.

2. Utilize a variety of tools.


Much like in-person learning, we should be striving to teach online in various formats. It is not enough to teach solely over Zoom lecture or recorded video.

TechChange, as an online platform, is able to offer a blended model of live events like expert interviews, application-based activities, and Zoom calls, with self-paced tools such as discussion threads and quizzing features.

All of these facilitate direct engagement with the course material and are unique to online learning. With TechChange, I have found that demonstrating information in multiple formats and with multiple tools can facilitate learning, especially with complex concepts.


Fig 2. Image to demonstrate the importance of inclusive energy design for the Mercy Corps course “Inclusive Energy Access 101”.

3. Embrace the advantages of online learning.


When one instructional design door closes, another opens. The online sphere has a multitude of  opportunities that in-person learning can’t or hasn’t yet incorporated. One invaluable advantage of online learning is its global possibility.

People from different countries or continents are able to gather within a virtual classroom and learn together, a feat that would be impossible within a single in-person class. The global possibilities allow for a diversity of experience that adds tremendously to group discussions. TechChange welcomes an international participant-base, and regularly invites guest speakers from around the world. Rather than placing the focus on a single professor’s knowledge base, online education has immediate access to a plethora of experts.

Fig 3. Map of participant locations for the Mercy Corps course “Inclusive Energy Access 101”. Click the image to enlarge.

4. Interaction is fundamental to engagement. Engagement is fundamental to learning.


This grounding principle is one which many professors are familiar with, and which underscores each of the points above. However, in the midst of all the chaos that began with an online transition and which will continue into a wholly new fall semester, this grounding principle of education has been missed. Zoom lectures and pre-recorded videos express information but do not encourage students to think critically, engage metacognitively, or to even remember what they heard.

As TechChange claims directly on its homepage, “the current solutions for online training are broken, as they often leave users feeling bored and isolated.” Instead, TechChange and other successful online education platforms offer the ability to connect over course material. Through discussion, live events, networking, and partner activities, we will increase engagement and, consequently, our quality of education.


Fig 4. Online interactive activity and discussion for the Mercy Corps course “Inclusive Energy Access 101”. Click the image to enlarge.

The question that I am left with: Why had we not incorporated online tools in our higher education already?

We have come to overvalue a traditional education format to such an extent that we have limited the ways we can learn. In the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, this meant that we were wholly unprepared for a forced online transition. However, we should be constantly looking to incorporate new tools that will progress the quality of higher education in the everyday as well.  We should be constantly teaching our university and college professors how to use and incorporate these new tools.

This gap between semesters is more than a respite from the chaos. It has provided us an opportunity to strive towards these goals, one which several colleges have seized. One college faculty member reflects that, “Our college is doing a lot to better prepare professors for the fall. Now it is a question of how and to what extent these tools for online learning will be implemented within each classroom.” 

In March, the world turned on its head, and so we must turn with it. We cannot just rely on the expertise of the standalone professor or on traditional methods of instruction. However, the tools for a new way of learning are available. Institutions of higher education just need to catch up to the world that has progressed beyond them. 

Teachers, it’s time to learn.