The United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) has partnered with Service Cops, a FinTech company in Uganda to scale up and mainstream a range of digital education technologies for rural communities in Uganda.

The project will be implemented in Kiryandongo district, West Nile, Acholi and Lango sub-regions. The partnership was launched on 9 April 2021 at Mvara Secondary School in Arua.

During the launch, it was announced that digital technologies, particularly the well-known School Pay, shall facilitate flexible school fees payments and other services to enable parents’ access to finance through savings and loans for education. The School Pay technology shall also enable a range of other solutions, such as a pocket money platform for students and attendance management solutions for teachers. These new services will leverage the existing School Pay infrastructure.

School Pay technology offers an infrastructure that facilitates education management, students’ learning experience and tremendously reduces costs of typical school fees transactions. The technology provides installment payments and access to savings and loans solutions to help keep students in school. In addition, it offers teachers a central repository where they can easily organize and upload learning materials for their students. Teachers can use the platform to develop and deliver lessons, and evaluate students learning.

In light of the ongoing global debate pushing for the adoption of innovative technologies in education and considering the challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic, such partnerships are indeed long overdue. The education sector in Uganda has over the years grappled with challenges related to high dropout rates, under-resourced and over-burdened schools, which have undermined access to quality education. In 2019, UNESCO reported a dropout rate of 42.8 percent in the country with over half the number of female pupils that joined primary not being able to complete school. This partnership is well placed to provide solutions that ease the burden of school fees payment and other operations management for schools.

“UNCDF and partners believe that the school payment technology and the range of new services will enable equitable access to education opportunities by providing flexible digital education services including payment options, savings and loans while at the same time helping schools to better manage their finances and processes using a school management solution,” said Chris Lukolyo, Digital Country Lead, UNCDF in Uganda.

The partnership with Service Cops is also aimed at alleviating the challenges that impede access to education compounded with the current spiraling economic concerns that have widened the gap between the haves and the have-nots. Joseph Ndiho, the Director School Pay Technology reiterated that integrating School Pay technology in the learning process goes a very long way to help students and teachers stay engaged and connected.

“Since we are dealing with schools that are known, we only needed to find a relevant, modern and comprehensive solution that will bridge the connection between parents and guardians, learners, teachers, the Ministry of Education and other relevant stakeholders. The technology directly links critical stakeholders in education with banks, telecom companies and insurance agencies, among others,” Ndiho said.

As part of the strategy “Leaving No One Behind in the Digital Era’, UNCDF with the support of SIDA prioritized and allocated a funding of US$300,000 to support education innovations aimed at contributing to the improvement of quality education and learning in Uganda. The project is expected to serve the specific needs of people in Kiryadongo district, West Nile, Acholi and Lango sub-regions. The initiative is projected to have a significant impact on digital and financial inclusion and deepening as well as improving levels of efficiency in governance and management of over 1,600 education institutions in the regions.

About Service Cops Uganda

Service Cops, the Fintech giant behind School Pay technology, was incorporated in February 2009 and is an ISO 9001:2015 Certified Fintech, Information Communication Technology and Business Processes Outsourcing firm with a wide and vast experience in developing value chain based financial inclusion innovations within the Banking and outside the formal financial sectors. Service Cops is in the final stages of qualifying for ISO 27001. Service Cops has since grown to be one of the leading Financial Technology and outsourcing companies in Uganda currently serving in excess of 3 million customers in the Banking and Financial Services sector in the EAC market, Zambia and Ethiopia are integrated with over 10 commercial banks, 3 telecoms.

The company currently has its presence in Uganda, Rwanda, Zambia, and Ethiopia and is targeting to expand foot print into Ghana, Malawi, Kenya and Tanzania by end of 2022. To ensure excellence, Service Cops continually improves its products and services by setting quality objectives that are reviewed together with the entire Quality Management System.