Waliku: Address student absenteeism and well-being through the strategic use of technology

Despite high enrolments in schools, student absenteeism is a problem in low-resource contexts. Average attendance rates tracked by school systems mask the extent of absenteeism at an individual level, which can easily be over 10% of school days or a month of schooling during an academic year for a third of the student population. Further, current paper-based systems for recording student attendance do not provide a real-time understanding of the specific reasons for each absent child.

Waliku, or “my guardian” in Indonesian, operates on the principle that every child has the right to attend school to learn and achieve their fullest potential. Tailored to low-resource contexts and children most marginalized, the Waliku suite of digital tools and implementation system ensures that teachers and schools can recognize and act on critical student absences in a timely manner.