Edulution is a high-growth African EdTech social enterprise with a social change mission. The business educates children in Africa with an innovative approach in basic numerical and linguistic skills. Edulution has its main operations in Southern Africa and is supported by European and international donors. It is set to expand and grow further to impact many learners.

Founded in Switzerland in 2015, Edulution runs catch-up programmes in Edulution Learning Centres at government and community schools in South Africa, Namibia, and Zambia. The Edulution model is a unique mix of technology, enterprising Coaches, content, and evidence-based analytics that enable Learners to revise and master essential numeracy and ITC skills. The catch-up programme puts the Learner back on track and helps teachers deliver their curriculum. The Edulution model reaches marginalised communities living in inner-city townships, remote rural areas and refugee camps. Edulution is making a positive impact on vulnerable communities by creating jobs and promoting entrepreneurship and innovation. Its Centres are serving over 20,000 active Learners per year, with 169 employed Coaches that were previously unemployed local youth.

Pestalozzi World (“PW”), a leading charitable organisation in various developing countries, has supported Edulution since its foundation with substantial annual donations and is also a co-founder and significant minority shareholder of Edulution. PW is now looking for an external non-executive board member to support the development of Edulution's business model, the further build-up of the management and operational team and ultimately the business’ accelerating expansion throughout Africa.

Edulution is a not-for-profit educational charitable company and its governance structure ensures that it meets its requirements to ensure probity, good governance and outstanding performance.

The successful candidate will:

• Take a key role in a team that includes the founder and majority shareholder, and a very experienced Chairman as well as a minority shareholder (all acting in non-executive capacities)
• Take a key role in selecting the management team of Edulution
• Advise and guide Edulution and its operational management in pursuing its growth strategy, focusing on the business becoming more scalable in order to impact ever larger numbers of learners
• Together with the colleagues on the board, help steer Edulution’s finances

As it continues to grow, Edulution seeks a new Member to join its Board of Directors, with a background in education and / or technology. The ideal candidate will bring a deep cultural knowledge of the education sector in Africa, the tech sector, or both.

The ideal candidate could come from a wide range of backgrounds, whether a founder of an EdTech business, an investor in the sector, an academic with a research interest in the space, or a practitioner leveraging EdTech as they work directly with learners. Edulution is especially interested in hearing from candidates with expertise in software and similar business models. Prior board experience is not a requirement for this role.

Above all, candidates will be aligned with Edulution's mission to empower young people, and make a positive impact on vulnerable communities by creating jobs and promoting entrepreneurship and innovation.

You can read more about the team here. 

There are four Board meetings per year, which take place in a hybrid format (being held in Southern Africa or Europe) on a quarterly basis, and tend to typically last about three hours. The successful candidate will also engage in short monthly management update video calls or conversations with management. Edulution is an impact business and social enterprise, and this is a non-paid role. However, expenses incurred can be reimbursed and a modest ex gratia fee is available should it be required for the right candidate. The expected term length for this role is between three to five years, and can be renewed at the discretion of PW.

Candidates will either be based in Africa or have a personal connection to Africa.

Edulution welcomes applications from everyone regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, faith or disability. As women and those from global majority ethnic backgrounds are currently under-represented on the Board, applications from those candidates would be particularly welcomed. All appointments will be made on merit, following a fair and transparent process.