Good morning everyone. I am Barnana Sarkar and I'm the content writer here at Moodle. And today we have with us, uh, Tanya from Fabo. Hi Tanya, how are you doing today?

Hi. I'm doing very well. Sun is shining, so that gives me a lot of energy.

That's amazing. The sun is really very bright and it's quite a blessing. So, um, tell us a little bit about you. Who is Tanya, what does she do, what interests her, etc.

Hello everybody. My name is Tanya Tierney. I was born and raised in Italy but currently live in Denmark, very close to the capital city, Copenhagen. I work as the learning platform lead for the FABO community, which is hosted within Dan Churched, a Danish humanitarian and development NGO.

And, uh, yeah.

Did you always imagine yourself working in this intersection of learning and humanitarian aid? Or was it more of a happy accident?

When I was a kid, I dreamt of being a lawyer. So not quite where I ended up or I don't know if this is end, but not quite where I am now. But when I studied my studies, it was um, very clear in my head that I was going to work for an ngo.

I didn't know what profession I wanted to work in, but I did know that that was the field I wanted to work in. I studied development and cooperation. I have a master's in social work and a master's in global refugee studies. So, I think that my choices in academia have been pretty much in that direction.

So, yeah, maybe this intersection and the actual topics I work with are not necessarily what I'd foreseen, but more like one of the many windows that open when doors close.

That's quite lovely. Speaking about NGOs, let's talk a bit about the learning landscapes there. Learning in an NGO can be quite complex, as far as I know. There are diverse teams, global reach, and sometimes limited resources. So, could you maybe walk us through some of the biggest learning challenges you see for humanitarian and development organisations today?

Well, one of the biggest you've mentioned. Right, so limited resources is up there. It's top three challenges. Right. So limited resources are limited budget, but also limited time, budget-wise. We're always very restrained. It's the name of the game. And time is also, um, limited. We have limited man and woman power.

We are very busy professionals. So very often, these time restraints and budget restraints are big challenges that we have faced. But with those challenges in the background, we do have many others. And the biggest ones are also the digital divide. Right. Especially in the field in which we work in.

Right. So, in the e-learning field, the digital divide plays a gigantic role, not only when it comes to Internet connection, but also when it comes to digital tools to access the Internet connection. It raises questions such as, are the learners connected to the Internet? Are the learners provided with devices, what type of devices, what resolution they have, for example?

Right. Or what kind of Internet subscription do they have? Is it a monthly subscription with unlimited packages? Or is it very often, in countries where we work, bundles of maybe 50 mega for seven days? So there is a very limited amount of data that is accessible. So that is also a flag that needs to be raised when we talk about E learning in the humanitarian development field.

Right. There's a question about appropriateness, which I call it appropriateness, but it covers a lot of topics. Right. So, who is the source of this knowledge? Who is the knowledge for? Is there a relevance of what we are trying to teach for those that are the learners? Are we considering the learner's group?

What conditions do the learners have, uh, such as skill set, languages, are we considering translations? Are, uh, we designing, for example, our trainings with accessibility in our mind? Right. Are we thinking to include the learners in early phases of the design of the trainings and the courses? So I think all of these, I'm listening them as challenges because as you can imagine, putting the hat of a project manager or program manager, all of these taken singularly, will increase the costs, increase the budget that is needed to do a course that is well targeted and well thought through.

It then brings us back to limited budget resources. Right. So I think there are many challenges at stake in this field.

I can completely relate to that. Thank you so much for talking about the digital divide and something like appropriateness as well, because coming from India, these two are two of the most important challenges for education there as well. In a country of so many billions of people and such little resources, how do you provide quality education to everyone?

And yes, appropriateness is also a huge thing. When, uh, your knowledge base is not vital enough, how do you provide true source of information to anyone at all? So thank you so much for saying that. And, uh, you know, the contrast here is that while on one hand there's a society, there's a community, there's a society that does not have enough resources.

And on the other hand, the world is moving so very fast. I mean, AI. There's AI now. I mean, and when I go back to India, so many people still don't use AI, they don't know about the transformations, there's remote learning, there's digital transformation, etc. And I really want to understand what do you think that how can NGOs stay ahead or what do they need to do to stay ahead and keep knowledge, like you said, more accessible to learners.

It's such an important topic because yes the world is moving at a very high speed. But um, sometimes we need to stop and ask ourselves what world or where is it going at that speed. Right. Just as you mentioned and with the topic of the digital device, there is a question of of course NGOs and the development and humanitarian aid sector need to be up to date, need to know what's happening, need uh, to know the potentialities and pitfalls of AI.

For example, need to know the law and how to protect, for example human rights defenders. And uh, to avoid that uh, gender based violence is enhanced technology, which is a very uh, known issue and it's spreading across. And um, you know hatred through social media is also getting very widespread because of uh, technology going so fast.

And uh, this system of laws and regulations cannot keep up at the same speed. So the NGO world needs to know all of this and needs to uh, you know, advocate and they're doing a great job. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that we're lacking there, but there is also the component of, is that what we need, for example in specific contexts where our learners do not have access to a smartphone or a tablet?

Right. I am thinking some of our projects, for example, they were targeted to uh, farmers in rural Uganda where there was maybe one smartphone every 300 people. Right. So in that case does it make, is it relevant for these farmers to know that there is something called AI and what does AI mean?

Or there is something called deep learning or there is machine learning. It could be interesting of course, but is it on a must know basis or so I think that um, there is something about relevance and there is something about putting our focus also on who is it we are trying to help.

Right. Or who are we working for and who are we working with and considering those people. And sometimes you know, it sounds like um, it's counterproductive here, but sometimes we realize that the thing that we think like elearning course. Right. In a lot of cases that is not the output we want because it's not the most relevant, even if it's kind of it in ourselves, in a foot because it is what we are trying to push.

But sometimes it just does not make sense.

That's very, very true. Actually more often than not we do forget about relevance a lot. Yeah. And it also again takes back me to India. And because the situation of farmers are same there, I mean do they really need to know what exactly is AI and what is E learning or do you actually give them the basic necessities?

First, let's talk a bit about Fabo, uh, and Fabo's learning ecosystem. So you have been using Moodle for quite some time now. Could you maybe talk a bit through about your experience of using Moodle? The goods and the bads both.

We've done a little calculation and we've been using moodle for almost 10 years now. What brought us to choose Moodle? Let's start there right at ah, the very start of this history and story. The reason we were drawn towards Moodle was that the other LMS solutions, right. So the other learning management systems that were available at the time had different off the shelf solutions.

Right. And their business model, if we can call it that way, was a bit different. So it was typical. One would be, uh, one buys a package which is the learning management system and they go through a whole phase where the company you buy from has architects, implementation managers and so on and so forth that cater for the customer, uh, the customer's uh, needs and tries to adapt the learning management systems as much as possible to the needs of the customer.

Right. And then once that's done, you have this closed box that you can use but you are not owning it. So every time you want to do a change or every time you want to update it or you want maybe your needs change. Because of course, I can just imagine in our 10 years our needs have changed so often.

Um, then that would mean having to have a big budget to go back to the company and say, listen, we have this thought and I worked in skill apps where we have been doing this model and when customers come in with suggestions, it's a suggestion and somebody within that company will prioritize that suggestion and that improvement on the platform based on a broader strategy of the company.

But it's not necessarily the customer's interest in that case that is put on the plate unless they come with a very big budget. Right. That was a very long introduction. But in Muro's case, what we really thought that was uh, interesting and that could benefit us was its flexibility.

The approach of if we own the learning and management system, then we. We can uh, budget and prioritize and say, okay, we know that for the next quarter we're going to get this budget. So what do we think that the improvements should be for our members? What could help them the most?

Access our platform and so on and so forth. And we are able to have as many accounts as we can and we want without our subscription increasing based on that. Because that is another business model that is very common out there, which is packages of accounts. Right. So from zero to a thousand it costs this amount of money.

From 1000 to 5 it costs this amount. Whereas with Moodle we don't have that limitation, which is really fantastic for our approach of democratic and local uh, access for learners. Right. So I think again that was a very long explanation, but that's what drew us to um, Moodle, I think the ownership of uh, being able to do the changes we want when the needs arise because of its flexibility.

Thank you. Actually, I mean, uh, it wasn't at all a long uh, explanation and we needed that because um, while Mood is whole thing is empowering educators, quote unquote, in your case it's more about empowering NGOs. Couple of questions. Can you maybe tell me that how and if the platform has enabled your partners and communities to create and share knowledge and maybe give us some examples of how multi tenancy specifically helped you with the business um, goals.

So I'll start with the multi tenancy, uh, part. Right. So we have uh, taken inspiration from the Moodle workplace and we have uh, tweaked it a bit for our own needs. So we do have one platform which is fabu, within which we have different organizational spaces, we call them, which are closed areas specifically for our member organizations.

And that really works well because our members have a lot of, a lot. They have some trainings that are organization specific and then uh, upon their choice they can open up some courses to be uh, available for the whole community, let's say, within Farboo. Right. So that is how it really works well for us and it really helps to foster this learning community within Farbo.

And the way, for example that our uh, members have benefited from the platform. I have a concrete example of a, um, member that has um, created a course that was targeted to uh, refugee camp, I think it was just outside of Kenya. So the conditions of the learners was the learners were teachers in these refugee camps, primary school teachers.

And the conditions were low Internet connection, unstable Internet connection. So the way they designed the whole course was uh, adding for example YouTube videos. Right. Because Moodle allows for this embedded thing. And the nice thing is that YouTube by definition does the um, auto scale based on the connection that comes in, the quality of the video, which is fantastic.

And this is on YouTube. But it's really nice that Moodle allows for it to for example auto embed and play directly on the course. And then they uploaded some uh, templates and PDFs that were very simple, that could just be printed. So allowing teachers to just access this material that was very simple, very core, but so meaningful because of the content it had.

And one thing that we really helped them with was to make the whole journey from the login to accessing that specific place. We just tried to cut off all the notes so we made a direct URL for teachers so that they could just scan a QR code and go directly on the course page with the registration included, which just allowed for a user experience that was very smooth and easier access to the content, which is the main goal of the whole training.

Right. So yeah, I think this was a very concrete example of how far through Moodle enables our members to use the platform at the best and to find some solutions to challenging contexts as well.

This is really an excellent uh, example. And um, I have a follow up question to this one. You spoke about how it worked. Can you also maybe tell me about two or three challenges that you faced when you were trying to deliver these courses?

The main challenge in general that we're um, we are not facing of course, but our learners are facing is the access. Right. So there is some kind of gatekeeping of creating an account and then accessing the resources so we find it. We've, we've received a lot of feedback that uh, many of our learners that are not necessarily members of our member organizations, that are just human beings interested in NGO development and humanitarian aid work, they get stuck when they have to create an account.

And we knowing, having got that feedback, we also try to bridge that gap with this specific target group in this project, providing them with um, the links directly to access so that they wouldn't get stuck in the first place. And we saw that that really worked. Right. So we are, so we don't have a solution yet for the broader uh, population because we're still trying to figure out how to allow people to create an account because it's important for us to know where people are coming from and uh, to channel them within organizational spaces if that is where they are part of.

But we do see that a lot of times they have challenges getting in.

Yeah, I mean to be Honest. No platform is actually a complete silver bullet.

Right.

And um, so what kind of maybe, if possible, could you name like one lesson that you have learned in implementing and scaling an elements for a global audience as diverse as yours?

Yeah, I think that diverse here is the key word, right? I think that the diversity is what needs to really be used as the lens. Let me spin that and then I'll explain it maybe in a different way. So for me, if, if I take myself as the starting point of every learner's condition, it will start a massive Pandora base of challenges, right?

Because my condition is I live in Denmark, I have a fiber speed Internet connection, I have two big screens, high resolution, uh, headset, I can hear, I, um, am, I can see properly, I don't have any disability. So this is my package of starting conditions, right? So if I assume that everyone we are building courses for is exactly like me, it will fail.

I'm setting myself up for failure because of the diversity of learners that we have and the different places we work, the different cultures, the different languages, the different approaches to the same topic, the different digital access, the different devices people use, right? So I think that what we do within my team is that we always make these Personas which are, uh, stereotypical target group learners so that we can pretend we are them.

For example, uh, let's take the example of the refugee camp, right? So then if it's a teacher, maybe it's a teacher. Uh, we will have for example, two Personas. A teacher that is freshly out of university and a teacher that is experienced. So maybe the experienced one has been teaching for a very long time, but hasn't had access to a tablet or a phone.

So maybe there is a different, uh, starting point with that technology. Whereas maybe the person that just came straight out of university has had a bit more exposure to that technology. So we create these Personas so that we kind of walk them through the course and say, okay, how would this Persona perceive the course that we are about to create?

And if I were that Persona, um, would this uh, interaction be relevant? Would it work for me? And uh, this can also be made. For example, if we have, um, in our office, we have a lot of different, uh, phones, for example, right? Um, to give us that perception and that.

Sorry, perception, a reality of different resolutions, different screen sizes, how do things render when we put them on the um, mobile browser, right? And uh, lower connection, we try to disconnect from the WI fi sometimes and use data and just these kind of things that really help us to broaden what we are experiencing.

Because it is easy to just think that everyone's starting point is exactly like mine, but it's not. And sometimes it's challenging. But luckily there are some ways of, um, bridging that gap.

You know, um, there is something in marketing, I think you might be familiar with it. It's called empathy mapping, where for a day we pretend to be our customers and we tell ourselves that we are walking in their shoes. You guys literally walk in their shoes. I m mean, this is really very similar.

Yeah.

It'S really amazing what you guys are doing and, uh, just to pick your brain, um, a bit, since we are talking about putting on hats and working in other shoes. So let's play futurists for a second. You and I, we are futurists. Where do you see NGO learning heading, say in the next five to 10 years?

I hope that there will be an acceleration towards, for example, in our sector, we do a lot of workshops and a lot of them are in person. Right. And I really wish that in the future we could accelerate this virtual workshop in that is actually meaningful and that works a bit more seamlessly than what we have experienced.

For example, in Corona, which was fine. Um, but we still have some work to be done before it actually gives that same feeling as we are in the same room and we're working together, we're workshopping, we're picking each other's brains. So I think that especially for the sake of the environment and sustainability, um, we can reduce taking all those flights.

And that is what I wish, and I hope that that is where we're going to go in the future where, um, maybe holograms will be there and that will be the helpful way of, uh, really making that workshop a bit more personal. But I think there will be a need of, uh, sustainability, especially when distances are big.

Right. But of course, I don't foresee this big digital divide to be. Uh, solved within five or 10 years. And maybe it doesn't even need to be solved because as we spoke at the beginning. Right. I don't know that we need to all every single person in the world needs to be connected to Internet and have a smart device.

I don't see that as a necessity. Maybe the digital divide will be there and maybe we'll just be better in considering that will just be smarter in considering people's differences and uh, geographic distance, cultural distance and uh, consider power structure. Consider maybe if we're tapping into something that is continuing and perpetrating structures of uh, dysfunctional power.

So yeah, this is, I don't know if it's a futuristic thing, but it's maybe a wish list, let's call it like that. Mhm.

Yeah, that's very true. I mean maybe learning has to adapt to human needs after all, or human preferences. What kind of role do you think, uh, technology especially maybe an open source like Moodle will play in, in this kind of a future, in this kind of humanitarian and development learning?

What are the potentials?

So given the, the world we're living in today where uh, uh, funds are being cut, uh, more and more and political uh, polarizations really make an unstable funding system. I think that open source LMS really play a key and a central role when it comes to digital learning. Insofar as, and I know it's going to sound very far fetched but um, a lot of the solutions, we've been relying a lot on authoring tools, right?

So the most common output would be a scorm package, right. And within our field of humanitarian development, uh, NGOs using these authoring tools has been predominant. So the typical, and I'm not going to say everyone, but I'm um, it's very common. So the typical time frame would go from.

We need a course on this topic. We put out a tenancy where a tenant where we ask for consultants to create this course. We have this corn package, we upload it on maybe our own learning management system or whatever. But SCORM packages have this black box, right? As I mentioned previously with the other um, examples of LMSs, when we are given this package, we are not owners of that.

Even if we are the creators of the content, we are not owning the actual file, source file, if you want. Right. We're allowed to play it. What happens if that content needs to change though? Then we will need a big budget to go back to that consultant, to a consultancy or whatever and then get them to update whatever slide or thing that we need to update.

This requires an uh, awful lot of resources. Budget mainly. Right. So open source LMSs like Moodle would cut that budget down because although maybe the quality of the interactions could be different and it could, you know, what, uh, what you can do with, uh, authoring tools is everything and nothing.

You can really build, uh, a spaceship and go to the moon. With Moodle, of course you have limitations, but the trade off with those limitations is that you have material that you own. You have material that you can edit yourself potentially in the future if that is needed. The initial investment is not in budget, but in time you have to upskill yourself.

You have to get used to the platform. You. But once you are used to that platform, then the input of, uh, budget and time is much, drastically lower, uh, than what you would need when you have these corn packages. Right. So I think that given the world we're living in now with cuts in the development sector, the open source really has a immense potential in this sense.

When we talk about learning management systems.

I can pretty much understand your position here. Like running something so global, A global learning platform like this really sounds intense. Moving our focus slightly from all of this to you quickly, could you maybe tell me what do you usually do to unwind after a long day of problem solving like this?

Yeah, I don't know if I unwind. Um, I am, uh, I have a toddler, so I don't know that there's much unwinding when I come home. But, uh, we do sit and play pretend kitchen. And I drink a lot of fake, uh, coffees out of tree mugs. Mugs, uh, in wood.

So I think that's my unwinding just sitting on the floor and, uh, pretending I'm drinking a coffee from a mug made of wood and painted in random colors with my daughter. I think that is the best unwinding when all the big problems in the world are really reduced to.

Where was that spoon we were looking for?

Yeah, yeah, I remember. And mug made of wood really sounds fascinating. And I'm pretty sure you also get that woody essence when you're drinking.

Exactly. Yeah. There's no coffee taste, but, uh, a lot of wood.

Exactly. Very natural. And um, say if you weren't in this particular field that you're working in, and I can. From the conversations that we are having, I can feel like you're a person who is very, very passionate about education, learning. If you are not in this particular role, where else do you see yourself?

What else would you be doing as a Teenager. I saw myself as a lawyer and it may be because I was a m. Massive fan of Ellie McBeal. It was this American television series about a uh, group of lawyers in some big American city. And I thought they were especially the main character Ellie.

I thought she was so cool and she just seemed like uh, lawyering was the coolest activity. So I thought that was going to be my path. So yeah, maybe I could have been a lawyer if uh, I chose to study law for example. Yeah.

You know, just walk into a room.

And just command everyone because things people just a bossy. Yeah, I think, I think that would, could uh, fit me. Let's uh.

Yeah, I can totally see you in.

That show Next Life.

I'm really enjoying this conversation but unfortunately we are approaching the end and it's time to wrap up. But before we wrap up, I do have a couple more questions for you. For NGOs and humanitarian organizations who are listening to our podcast right now, what's the biggest reason they should consider Moodle as their elements?

What would you tell them about it?

Its open source nature and core? I think that is the biggest selling point. Right. So the flexibility that open source allows for, given the skills, of course. Right. So in order for uh, flexibility and customization of uh, Moodle, one needs to know how to code or one, which I don't but we have a software developer that supports us with that.

Right. But given that kind of first step in accessing, the opportunities are really endless. Anything that one could think of could potentially be done. The only restriction is budget and time. Uh, but again, given limited budgets, I think that open source, uh, learning management systems are really the way to go about fabo.

Where can our listeners connect with FABO and learn more about what you do?

Yeah, so they can just go to Fabo.org there are all our contacts there and then um, follow us on LinkedIn and that's where you can disconnect or you can just drop us an email@infoabo.org and we would love to hear feedback or anything from the listeners. I think it's really a great opportunity to grow and to learn.

Yeah, definitely. And also for all of our listeners. All of these informations will be available on our blog and as well as on our LinkedIn post. So if you do want to reach out to Fabo, then do not delay. Reach out to them today and now and towards the end.

Before we close the call, any final thoughts or words of wisdom for organizations who are looking to build a more collaborative, accessible and diverse learning culture?

When organizations want to create, uh, a buzzword is localization, right? So it's this trying to boil it down to the closest place to the learners possible. And this more democratic approach really needs organizations to rethink how their learning products are made and where they hosted and uh, who is the owner of them.

And really, once that consideration is taken, how are our learners accessing our learning management systems? Can they create accounts without problems? How much are the subscriptions costing and so on, and who is bearing the cost of the content? And these kind of considerations really need to be put into place and all be put into the same page so that those costs are not invisible costs.

Because sometimes we have this tendency of silosing things where things go here and there and then we lose the greater picture. But if we put everything on the same page, then platforms like Moodle really are, um, shining compared to other platforms because of their sustainability and time. The, um, lower cost of maintenance of the content, we put it there.

And the accessibility and the democratic access, we are trying that on Pabo and we see that it really is working and paying off and it's helping also to foster communities of practice and really helping that local access and more, uh, democratic approach.

Does it also help you keep things relevant?

It, it does, it does. Um, it, you know, once you uh, enable a closer access to the learner, then you also allow the learner to choose. Right? So there is that element of relevance. Of course there is. Then the question of who is making that knowledge or who is creating that content.

And the learners should be included in that process of creation. There should be a process of co creation and testing and loops of feedback. Definitely.

Well, thank you so much for that. I definitely had a lovely time interviewing you and I will do that all over again. Congratulations and a huge salute to the kind of work that you guys are doing. We need more people like you guys in this world. Uh, and it's not just about the kind of work that you're doing, but also the quality that you're ensuring.

And Moodle is more than happy to be one of the many things that are probably helping you do these things. So thank you once again.

Thank you for inviting me. It was a really nice chat.