Mobile Academy

Overview

Mobile Academy uses an automated phone-based technology (Interactive Voice Response or IVR) to provide a refresher Maternal, Neonatal, and Child Health training course to Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHA), who are community health workers in India. In response to the lack of regularly scheduled refresher trainings, the tool provides pre-recorded audio modules aimed to promote the knowledge of preventative life-saving health behaviors and improve quality of engagement with pregnant women, new mothers and their families. The implementation of Mobile Academy is currently managed by ARMMAN, a non-profit organization in India, in partnership with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW). Having trained over 300,000 ASHAs across 17 states, Mobile Academy has been recognized as the largest mobile-based training program for frontline health care workers across the world.

Mobile Academy is implemented alongside Kilkari, a complementary service that targets pregnant women and new mothers, and shares tips and resources via recorded voice calls directly to their phones. This ensures continuity of care as the messages mothers receive through Kilkari are reinforced by ASHA workers who use Mobile Academy. More information on Kilkari can be found here.

Active since 2015

Developer BBC Media Action

Technology utilized
- Audio/video assisted Tools that use audio or video-based technologies such as pre-recorded and scheduled phone calls, telephone counseling, and/or video conferencing software.
Target age
Pregnancy – 2 years
Target audience
- Community health workers
ECD Focus areas
- Health and nutrition Support for children’s physical and emotional health and access to diverse nutrient rich food. This also includes maternal health and nutrition including during pregnancy.

How it works

Mobile Academy provides technology-based refresher training to community health workers in India to enable them to support pregnant and new mothers. The pre-recorded course content focuses on maternal, newborn, and child health from pregnancy to 2 years of age.

The course contains 11 audio-recorded modules with 4 lessons each on a range of themes including pre-natal check-ups, nutritional supplements for the mother, breastfeeding, vaccination schedules for babies as well as skills to counsel mothers and communicate with families. Each of the 44 lessons concludes with a short multiple choice quiz to check for understanding. The entire course can be completed in less than 3 hours.

The tool’s design prioritizes convenience and accessibility. With a basic phone and network connectivity, ASHA workers can connect from anywhere and listen to the course content on-demand and free of cost. They can also disconnect at any time and resume from where it was paused when they reconnect. Upon completion of all the modules and quizzes, users receive a final score. Those who score 50 and above receive a certificate from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, which has been a motivating factor for the workers to undertake and complete the course. ASHA workers also receive messages or calls to encourage them to complete the course.

In the coming years, ARMMAN plans to expand the reach of Mobile Academy across all 29 states and 7 union territories in India. In addition, ARMMAN is also planning to launch accessible multimedia content (e.g., videos, images) to complement the existing audio content. The organization is also exploring alternate channels of communication including Whatsapp, Youtube, and other social media platforms to increase its reach and also plans to set-up a call center for ASHA workers to contact if they have any questions or require clarifications about the course content.

Reach and relevance

Users
300,000
As of May 2023.
Country of origin
- India
Active countries
India
Language
Dissemination strategy
All ASHA workers in India are registered in the Reproductive Child Health (RCH) portal managed by the government and receive immediate access to the Mobile Academy course through their registered mobile numbers. Field based teams managed by ARMMAN also conduct trainings on the ground to make ASHAs aware of the support offered by Mobile Academy, how to use the tool, and the advantages of completing the training.

Technology and access

Users require a basic feature phone with cellular service to dial into Mobile Academy modules.

Connectivity requirements
- Cellular service
Device types
- Basic mobile/Feature phone
Cost model
- Free The tool is available at no charge to the user.

Measurement

To monitor the use of the service, ARMMAN tracks course trends including the number of ASHAs that have started and completed the course every month. In addition, Computer Assisted Telephone Interview (CATI) surveys and an impact evaluation have been conducted to measure impact of Mobile Academy. These found significant improvement in the knowledge and skills of the ASHA workers. A paper on the lessons learnt from scaling Mobile Academy has also been published and can be found here.

Partnerships

Mobile Academy was initially set-up with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and implemented by BBC Media Action. Currently, the implementation of the service is managed by ARMMAN and funded through a public-private partnership with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

ARMMAN collaborates closely with the Ministry to implement Mobile Academy. In addition to funding existing infrastructure to run the program, the Ministry also provides inputs on program improvement measures and approves program material (e.g., translation of training content). For more information on how governments partnerships have been leveraged to expand reach and impact, see case study on Mobile Academy and Kilkari.