INNOVATION ACCELERATION
We support promising solutions with potential to scale with expert coaching and funding. We distill best practices from practitioners and generates evidence on ‘what works’ in education and what makes organisations more effective. Discover more about our programmes to accelerate promising models in education
INNOVATION ACCELERATION
TEST
Guiding organisations to test promising solution with potential to scale
SCALE
Providing flexible funding, expert coaching, and connections with funders and policy-makers to support organisations to scale impactful solutions
DIFFUSE
Distilling best practices from practitioners and generating evidence on ‘what works’ in education, and what makes organisations more effective
The Impact at Scale Labs include:
- Intensive support: The GSF team network works with organisations to build and implement their scale strategy.
- Funding: up to £150,000 towards making the organisation’s scaling action plan a reality.
- Extended duration with no “cliff-edge”: Our intensive support lasts up to 18 months after which organisations continue to engage and learn as part of the GSF community.
- A focus on evidence: We measure and share evidence about each solution’s impact and about the scaling process.
- Relationships for scale: We support organisations to embed solutions in the broader system.
Read more about what informed our program design here
What do participating organisations get from the Impact at Scale Labs programme?
- A solid foundation for scale including a tested and evidence-driven strategy and appropriate financial models for sustainability.
- Enhanced internal monitoring, evaluation, and learning capacity and evidence
- A network of peers, mentors, funders, and scale partners to support their evidence and scaling journey that will continue to grow with their membership at GSF.
What do policymakers and funders get from the Impact at Scale Labs programme?
- Lessons and actionable evidence on the potential of several promising solutions to scale impact in education.
- Practical examples for how promising solutions scale in education, with challenges and opportunities.
- Lessons on policies and partnership modalities that are more conducive to successful innovation in education.
What informed our programme design?
Our programme design is informed by the following key ingredients of scale:
Engage deeply with the key ecosystem partners required for scale. We help align solutions with government priorities and enlist key counterparts in the delivery of the program.
Make funding and support for scale as flexible as possible. We target our funding and support at helping education innovations bridge the “valley of death”, where promising solutions often fail before achieving scale because of a lack of flexible funding support and guidance.
Invest in producing and sharing evidence. We support organisations to test and document as many elements as possible at the pilot stage, leveraging data to provide feedback into the scaled design.
Dignitas (current Lab participant):
"Engaging through the Labs with other participants and with the GSF team has helped us to refine our strategic vision. This happened to be very timely for Dignitas, as we’re also in the process of launching our new strategy for 2023-2028. This means we have been able to align the strategic vision for our innovation, our strategic vision for scale, and our strategic vision for impact in powerful ways."
Read more about our current Labs here:
Impact at Scale Labs - Innovations for Learning Recovery: Dignitas, Gyan Shala and Sabre Education have been selected and are being supported to prepare for scale with a £78,000 grant and coaching for evidence driven scale. Read more here
Impact at Scale Labs - Early Years in Kenya: GSF is working with locally led organisations who are playing an increasing role in improving access and quality of childcare and ECED provisioning in Kenya. Read more here.
Impact at Scale Labs - Foundational Literacy and Numeracy: The Labs will focus on selecting approaches to improve teaching and pedagogical approaches, including structured pedagogy and teaching at the right level, and other proven pedagogical approaches. Read more here.
Impact at Scale Toolkit
The Impact at Scale Labs programme provided GSF with insights into the successes and challenges of scaling solutions. This Toolkit captures some of these learnings, offering valuable insights and practical tools to improve your solution towards scale, whether you are assessing the potential of a new project or evaluating the scalability of a consolidated one.
ECED in Emergencies Evidence Hub
The ECED in Emergencies Evidence Hub is a new initiative intended to support practitioners, to respond to emergencies quickly and effectively, while also building systems and processes that can be institutionalised within existing government frameworks.