Kamkalima is an impact startup founded by two educationalists in 2015 to respond to the declining literacy levels and student disengagement in the Arabic language. It offers schools an e-learning environment that enhances teachers’ performance, develops student literacy levels, drives better learning outcomes, and increases children’s confidence and engagement in their mother tongue across the Arab world.
The startup has supported over 100,000 learners and teachers across the Arab region over the past few years, inviting teachers and education leaders to become partners in their mission.
We talked to the Kamkalima Team about the impact of the support received through their participation in the WEEL project, funded by the European Union and implemented by Expertise France.
Growth and Impact
“We applied to the WEEL project and received support in financing our needs of Technical Assistance through 4 pillars. The first helped us in designing the recruitment process for Kamkalima’s sales and marketing teams, the second in developing, deploying and testing the upgraded Kamkalima platform, the third in improving user experience and optimizing the internal design process of the platform, while the fourth was a legal consultancy towards the management of Kamkalima’s next round of investment in order to secure $3M for the next 12-18 months of scaling.
The WEEL grant allows the opportunity to create jobs for 16 full-timers and 4 freelancers while keeping existing jobs, and will increase product range by offering smaller sizes of products for the low purchase power segment. There will be 88% increase in revenues in addition to the injection of hard currencies into the Lebanese economy through exporting. On the environmental side, the e-learning offers paperless education, less commuting and less fuel consumption.
We’ve definitely faced multiple challenges caused by the different crises. Predictable growth was no longer valid in such crises. We radically shifted our channels to accommodate new needs and work around the new constraints. Kamkalima, as an innovation leader, gained long-term advantages by changing its model, creating new offerings, motivating the team and opening a company in UAE.”
About WEEL
WEEL is part of a larger programme, the EU for Women Empowerment (EU4WE), a 42-month programme (October 2019 – March 2023) funded by the European Union and implemented by Expertise France. It aims at promoting full and unconditional equality between men and women in Lebanon. The specific purpose of EU4WE is to reduce gender-based violence through women’s empowerment and enhance existing institutional mechanisms working towards gender equality.
