The academic incentive program for 2020 is in the books. In fact, the students received their incentives a couple months ago and it was mostly “paperwork” after that in the form of surveys, reports, thank you’s, etc. It was a lot of work, but it felt slightly easier than last year. I am still amazed that I was able to do it remotely and there were no major snafus this year. It’s very challenging to do it from a distance and not be able to control / oversee things, but it’s also a good lesson in trust. Trusting that the bonds you have built with the people involved are strong and they will follow through. That also makes me happy, that means that people are invested.
So, how did it all go?
It All Started Off Great
Around January 2020, I started to review the list of suggestions from the previous year and decided to implement the following changes:
- Revised Calendar
- offer two rounds and extend the program to the entire year
- allow more time to develop the projects
- allow a little more flexibility with deadlines
- Interaction with Native Speakers
- offer the use of judges to judge the projects
- send congratulatory videos
- offer a video call with the program director (me!)
- More incentive options, including academic and “fun” incentives
- Simplified forms
- Platform (web app) to manage the program
I obtained a copy of the upcoming school calendar and devised the program calendar around it. I then worked with both program coordinators from the two colegios that participated last year to review all the information and sent them an “offer” sheet to present to the principals. It was a basic agreement outlining all the program details for the upcoming year and confirming their participation. Once I had those, it was off to the races! I was excited.
And then it happened…
By “it”, I’m sure you already know what I’m referring to. That would be good old Mr. Corona. And it hit like a sledgehammer. Boom. At first, classes were cancelled due to the uncertainty of the situation. After that, once it was decided that this thing was serious and here to stay, everything was sent home and classes were done virtually. After consulting with the program coordinators, I made a couple executive decisions:
- Cut out the first round
- Modify the prize options (movie tickets out, online classes in)
It was a no-brainer to continue with the program, but I knew it would require being nimble and adjusting to some things on the fly. Good thing that’s already how most things are done in Colombia, so it wouldn’t be too difficult for everyone involved. Once the dust settled and everyone got into the routine of virtual classes, a few of the project proposals started trickling in. That was a good sign and let me breathe out a little.
It felt smoother this year than the previous year for a couple reasons: 1) the teachers were already used to how the program works, more or less, 2) some of the kinks had been worked out from the previous years, and 3) the website was up and running and the teachers were all using Google Classrooms now which made sharing information and files easier.
So, same process as before: submit a contract, submit your evidences (i.e. presentations, pictures), receive your incentives. Pretty straightforward. It went smoothly, considering the strange circumstances and all the changes that were going on around everyone. It was a difficult year for teachers and students, but everyone managed. We only had one round, so the calendar was condensed which caused some 11th hour issues for a few teachers.
Most of the projects were videos, presentations and audio recordings. Some of the topics were environment, lifestyle, friends and culture. A majority of the teachers requested a native speaker to judge the projects. For those those who submitted their projects in time, I asked a couple friends to help judge. A bunch were submitted last minute, so I took care of those.
Once the grading was done, the teachers submitted their lists of winners and I started preparing the purchase and delivery of the incentives. This year we left a month of lead-time to deliver the incentives, which turned out to be a wise decision. This is what I meant by getting the kinks out. All of the incentives were delivered as expected and ahead of time. That’s always the most stressful part for me, since I can’t physically do anything about it. But once I get the word that everything was delivered, I let out a sigh of relief and could relax a bit.
Results
So, how’d we do? Here are the numbers:
- 1 school
- 9 teachers
- 11 contracts
- 45 classes
- 513 participants
- 137 winners
- 190 incentives
Overall, the numbers were down across the board compared to last year, but this requires a closer inspection. Proportionally, the number of classes that participated went up, which meant the program had a wider reach. Consolidated contracts meant fewer contracts and less paperwork. More expensive incentives (online courses, class readers, dictionaries) meant fewer incentives, but these are more substantive than hamburgers or ice cream. So, most of the drops are not bad, considering some of the changes.
The only metric that concerned me a little is that the number of participants dropped. This could be due to moving to virtual classes and not having the first round. We’ll see how it goes this year. That should help provide more insight
Overall, I felt happy with the results.
More Than Just Incentives
I’ve said it before that the incentives are not the main point of the program. The main point is to motivate the students and get them excited about learning English. This year, I was really happy and proud about two aspects in particular:
- Academic Incentives
One of the teachers had a contact at MacMillan Education in Bogotá. She gave me his contact info and we spoke a bit through Whatsapp. We discussed prize options: online classes, class readers and dictionaries. I explained to him the program and what we wanted to achieve and he provided a decent discount. Sweet! Now we had academic incentives and also online ones to go along with the new theme of 2020.
Motivating the students to learn English is one thing, but actually providing them with some of the raw materials needed to do so is even better. Coupling that excitement of being selected as a winner with receiving a Class Reader or an English-Spanish dictionary is beautiful. I see it as a direct tangible reminder of, “Look at how the hard work I did paid off. Now how can I continue along this path?” Whether or not that’s how the students see it is another story, but that is the goal, anyways. - Native Speaker Involvement
Another great way to motivate students is to create a connection with actual native speakers! They see that “wow, learning English is actually useful. I can speak with and understand this gringo/a.” Again, it’s another tangible reinforcement of the importance of learning English. It is very fun for all sides — the students, teachers and the native speakers. This year, I was able to recruit two people to serve as judges for the projects. This way the students got to interact with a variety of native speakers.
I also had a videochat with a handful of classes just to talk about the program and answer their questions. Each time I do this, I have to remind myself that this could be the first time some of the students are interacting with a foreigner, so it may be a big moment for them.
What Else Went Well
Adapting to a changing situation
Normally, the teachers would have no problem handing out the incentives to their students since they see them each week, but that wasn’t the case anymore this year. One of the teachers had a group of 20 or so students that won a gift certificate for a hamburger and fries. It would be difficult to coordinate this hand-off, so she suggested just sending a list of the winners to the restaurant owner and have them verify the students against the list.
At first, I thought this would be a lot of work and the owner wouldn’t go for it, but he was completely flexible and happy to do it! So, that’s what we did and it turned out great. We may just do it again that way next year too. My initial desire was that each student would be able to hold the gift certificate in their hand and that this would also eliminate any potential “fraud” for the pick-ups, but this turned out to be unwarranted worry on my part. You have to trust that the people you are working with will get it done.
New prize options
Last year the prize options were very limited: pizza, movie, hamburger. This year, we had much more variety: academic (class readers, online courses, dictionaries), food (burgers, ice cream), entertainment (sports balls) and participation (mini chocolates). Everyone seemed to be happy with these.
Simplified process
The previous year, a few teachers mentioned that the contracts were complicated and cumbersome. So, I cut out all the boilerplate and simplified it. Contracts could be combined across classes, which reduced the amount of work / paperwork. They could also have digital signatures. Wins all around. I’ve been in that work environment and it gets loco pretty regularly, so my aim is always to minimize the amount of additional work / stress.
La plataforma / Web App
It was great having the web app up and running. I could just point the teachers to it and they could find whatever they were looking for. Last year I would have to individually send them links via Whatsapp and it was a mess. But this year, the web app combined with entrusting more to the program coordinators resulted in a more efficient flow of information. That was a win for everyone as well.
What Didn’t Go So Well
Lower participation
One of the colegios didn’t participate this year and in the other colegio, not all of the teachers participated. So, overall the numbers were down across the board. It’s easy to blame everything on Coronavirus, but I’m curious if there were other factors latent. We’ll find out in the upcoming year.
Business model needs tweaking
This is a social venture, so obviously the goal is not to make money, but at the same time you have to charge something so that people value what they receive and are committed. Skin in the game. My ideal was to have the colegios pay a matrícula (registration) at the beginning of the year and then nobody would have to worry about money anymore. It worked ok last year, albeit with some hiccoughs.
No such luck this year, though. My mistake here was that I didn’t require any up-front payment, it was done in good-faith. If a colegio had delays / problems making a payment, then it would hold up everything else and the students wouldn’t receive their incentives as expected. Well, this is exactly what happened. Once you promise something, you have to deliver it, and I had promised the program participants that they’d receive X on Y date, so it had to be done. They didn’t need to know or be affected by all the behind-the-scenes stuff.
It kind of bugged me, but I should have known better. Lesson learned.
Changes For Next Year
The most important one for me is to fix the “registration” process. This will help on multiple fronts — 1) getting buy-in from students / teachers, and 2) provide some small internal funding. The main reason is the first one. When you pay for something you value it more, at least I know I do. I hate wasting money. So, hopefully getting the actual participants to pony up will do the trick. I’m not talking a lot, but something.
I reviewed all the feedback, both from the teachers and the students. A common refrain from the students was that not everyone received something for their effort, to which my initial thought was, “Well, that’s life. You don’t always get something for your effort.” But there was one feedback left by a student saying that there wasn’t a general message (un mensaje alusivo) for all the participants at the end, and that only the winners received any recognition. So, next year, I’m planning to record a general message for all the participants of a given class. For now, it’s doable with only a couple schools.
And believe it or not, next year is here already. It looks like more virtual classes for at least the first half of the year. I’ve been in contact with the program coordinators to plan and also with some of the teachers to appraise them of the changes and to get their feedback. It’s important to make sure everyone is involved and is part of the process. Skin in the game. Wouldn’t you know, some of the things I learned in business school are actually paying off!
And what about you?
I am Hugh! Well, I feel good about the program. I feel like it’s starting to get some roots, which is good. I still have in my mind the idea to start a formal organization around it, but it’s too early. Let’s get settled first with the processes, the payment and all that. I may subtly float the idea past a few people to gauge their opinions. I’m planning to go back in April, finally. It will have been almost two years since I last visited! It will be strange this time due to the restrictions, lockdown, etc. Either way, it’s important to be there and besides I want to. I miss Colombia. And Duitama. And my friends. And the teachers. And the students. And of course, my beloved yuca frita.
Viva el Falafel 
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