Labhya

This is about impact and evidence. Labhya has preliminary results from a 2-year, 3rd party Randomized Control Trial, which point to meaningful gains in math and reductions in anxiety. Self-reported anxiety is a complicated metric for young kids and the exact link between improvement in mental health and academic gains is a priority for Labhya to interrogate.

This is about scope. There are 190 million K-8 students in India’s public schools and estimates suggest that at least one in four adolescents experience depression. They’ve made it work to date in 3 Indian states, and success in Gujarat, their biggest state, can be a signal if it can work in the rest of India.

This is about whether governments can deliver the model. Their RCT shows that government can implement with a lot of support from Labhya . But we don’t know how many schools and teachers are currently implementing with fidelity – Labhya estimates just 60%. Before they scale, the priority is to understand what’s actually happening in schools and simplify the model so that teachers will do this and governments can monitor.

This is about what the model costs if delivered by government and whether government is willing and able to pay. States pay ~$0.30/kid in marginal costs to implement. Cost drivers include additional allowance for teachers for 12 days of training/year, meal expenses, training materials, and venue rentals. Labhya still incurs a cost of $0.50/kid for change management, training and monitoring – though this may rise as Labhya improves quality. At scale, these costs are assumed to be baked into government budgets and likely wouldn’t require additional spend.