Mention Bien | Global Junior Challenge

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"Everyone has a gift, a special talent he received from God in order to achieve a purpose in the society". This is what my uncle keeps saying anyway. I incidentally discovered mine when I was young and helping my cousin to solve a difficult problem in Mathematics. With few words and an example I took from the real life I made her self-confident on that topic. People were telling me that I should have been a teacher. At this time, I was a 17 years old high school student in his last year and I was also passionate to give regular lessons in French grammar and Mathematics for free to young students in the township of Libreville, Gabon where I was living. I was happy to see them succeed and have a better chance in their life. Years later I was obsessed to find a way to provide free and relevant pedagogical content in mass in Africa. I decided to use my computer science skills and my managerial experience as Technical Team Leader for various IT companies in order to provide a tool that will gather the best e-content for education and provide it for free to students who really needs it in Africa. I gather 40 of the most brilliant african students I knew and together we built www.mentionbien.com, a tool that integrates the most common open source solutions to manage content and deliver learning solution. Later, we contacted webmasters and teachers around the world in order to share their content on "creative commons" licence on our server. Our aim, our dream is to be able to help any african student to succeed either with an Internet connection or a mobile phone for just the cost of his communication. Now we want to make our solution popular in Africa and we are working hard on the mobile version of our website. So do not hesitate anymore, let's connect on Mention Bien ! (www.mentionbien.com)

1. Project summary

Summary:

www.mentionbien.com is the first educational social network. It aims to provide free pedagogical educative content to students in African french speking countries. The philosophy of the website is to provide the best free content available in an ergonomic way and in to respect most of the African curriculum for high school. A special attention has been done to provide a more than complete content for students in last year of high school (Terminale): more than 3000 questions in English grammar, 700 videos in Mathematics, Geography, Economy etc...The best content and the best format has been chosen for every matter: this website has really been done by students for students !

2. Country (City / Region)

State:

Gabon

City:

Libreville

3. Company/organization/institute presenting the project

Organization:

Capricorn Interactive ltd

4. Type of organization

Select type:

Company

5. Project coordinator

Name and Surname:

David Rokossa Kingbo

E-Mail:

rokossa@gmail.com

6. Website

The website of the project:

www.mentionbien.com

7. Please select the category in which you candidate your project

Youth Education Project. Select Project Users by age:

Up to 29 years

Helping youth step in the job market:

NOT Helping youth step in the job market

Creativity and Social Innovation:

Creativity and Social Innovation

8. How long has your project been running?

From:

01/12/2005

9. Targets and Elements of Innovation

Please explain the targets and the background of your project:

www.mentionbien.com targets high school students in french speaking african countries but we would like to involve also teachers and older students who can share their experience and guide younger students.

We are proud to provide the first educational social network in Africa and are working hard on the mobile version of our website.

What does it try to achieve and how:

We are trying to improve drastically quality of education in Africa by using Internet and the mobile phone. We want also to break the digital divide by letting people experience a tool that will be a bridge between students of the african diaspora and their young brothers in Africa. We want to help teachers teach another way, we want to help students have a new multicultural experience with our facebook like social network that allows people to create their own blog, express themselves on the forum or have a visioconference with more than three people for free !

Which opportunities/problems does it address to:

We adress the problem of lack and inequality of standard of education in Africa. We want to impose a new standard of quality using just free content. We want to permit to students to have a minimum required level only with an Internet connection.

Please explain what is unique or special in your project:

www.mentionbien.com is a project done by students for students. Who better than young students can know and understand the needs of young students anyway ? www.mentionbien.com is also the first african educative social network and maybe the first social network of this kind.

10. Results

Describe the results of your project as per today:

A complete curriculum that covers last year of high school and thousands of content we are integrating everyday in order to complete the curriculum from primary school to high school.

A technical solution that is unique and that is helping people to really succeed.

How does it fulfill the users’ needs:

A student willing to succeed or to make friends will find exactly what he is looking for:

- Succeed in high school by having a very good explanation of tough topics on every matter;

- Make friends, see them and discuss with them wherever they are in United States, Italy, France or Africa;

- Open students opportunity to a new level.

How many users interact with your project per month and what are the preferred forms of interaction:

We have 6000 visitors per month and this number is growing day after day. This number will probably grow again with the marketing campaign we are trying to put in place.

11. Sustainability

What is the full duration of your project:

More than 6 years

What is the approximate total budget for your project (in USD):

From 75.001 to 500.000

What is the source of funding for your project:

Sponsorships

Is your project economically self sufficient now:

12. Transferability

Has your project been replicated/adapted elsewhere:

We are available to help others starting or working on similar projects:

We are available to help others starting or working on similar projects.

Attachment	Size
Mention Bien II.pdf	2.5 MB

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