ShikshaLokam

Shikshagraha is working towards transforming one million public schools in India. To do this, it works with a network of 150+ organisations that support and strengthen the government school system. These organisations work in education and operate across different states and districts and work closely with system actors such as teachers, school leaders, cluster and block-level resource persons, teacher training institutions, and district officials to enable student and school improvement. Some organisations are just starting out, while others have been running programs for many years and are leaders in their space.  No matter where they are based or how experienced they are, every organisation has to create a program design document before they start or expand their work. This document is usually called a Logical Framework Approach. In simple terms, it is a set of questions that helps an organisation answer:

1. What is the core problem or challenge we are trying to solve in the system?
   (For example, gaps in teaching practice, student learning, school processes, etc.)
2. What change do we want to see at the student level?
   What does success look like for students if this problem is addressed?
3. How will we know this change is happening?
   What indicators can help measure this student-level impact?
4. What kind of intervention or approach will help create this change?
   What methodology, program model, or strategy will be used to achieve the desired outcomes?
5. Who are the key stakeholders needed for this intervention to work?
   This may include actors at different levels such as:
   • Schools - Students, Teachers, School Leaders (HM)
   • Clusters - Cluster Resource Persons (CRP)/ Cluster Resource Centre Coordinator (CRCC)
   • Blocks - Block Resource Persons (BRP)/ Block Resource Centre Coordinator (BRCC) and Block Education Officer (BEO)
   • Districts - District Education Officer (DEO), District Institute of Education and Training (DIET), District Magistrate (DM)
6. What changes in practice are expected from each of these stakeholders?
   What should teachers, school leaders, mentors, or officials start doing differently?
7. How will these practice changes be tracked or observed?
   What outcome indicators can show whether these shifts are actually happening?

Over time, the Shikshagraha team has worked closely with many organisations and noticed a clear pattern. Even though organisations work in different states, districts, and themes, they are often trying to answer the same core questions while designing their programs.

Based on these commonalities, the team has created a Common Logical Framework (Common LFA). You can find access to the document here. This acts as a base structure that organisations can use to think through their program design. The structure remains the same, while details can be adapted to different themes such as Foundational Literacy and Numeracy (FLN) or Career Readiness. As Shikshagraha continues to work in more areas, more such themes will be created.

The goal now is to make this Common LFA easily accessible to organisations through a platform. Instead of starting from a blank page, organisations should be able to interact with this structure, understand the logic, and build their own LFA as a first draft. One possible way to do this is through a gamified experience, where users can move step by step, make choices, and gradually build their framework. Other simple, plug-and-play formats can also be explored.

If a shared platform for program design existed, it could solve a problem faced by far more than the 150 organisations in the Shikshagraha network. Across the education and social sector, many organisations struggle to design clear programs. Many organisations are looking for a clearer starting point — a way to begin thinking about their work, organise their ideas, and understand how everyday activities connect to meaningful change. As a result, organisations frequently hire external consultants or design agencies and spend large amounts of money just to create basic program frameworks.

A platform built around a Common Logical Framework could help make program design a widely available skill, rather than something limited to a few experts. Instead of depending on expensive external support, organisations could learn by doing — using structured prompts, examples, and building blocks to create their own program designs. Over time, this could create an abundance of design capability across the ecosystem.

Such a platform could also reduce the effort required to orient organisations, partners, and even businesses working with the education system. Instead of repeatedly explaining basic design concepts, teams could start from a shared structure and move faster to deeper conversations around quality, context, and improvement.

This matters because the current process is highly human-intensive. Today, even creating a basic program design requires multiple one-on-one conversations, reviews, and guidance. This takes time and energy and slows down the work. By offering a shared base structure through a platform, program design effort can be reduced by around 60 percent, allowing organisations to arrive at a clear starting point on their own.

Most importantly, when work is designed through systems — such as teachers, school leaders, academic support staff, and district institutions — the impact goes far beyond individual programs. Strengthening how organisations design work with systems has the potential to improve learning conditions at scale and, over time, support millions and even billions of children who pass through public education systems.

This is where engineers come in. The opportunity is to imagine and build a platform — gamified or otherwise — that makes structured thinking easy, engaging, and scalable, while still allowing space for local context and adaptation.

Summary Problem Statement

Many organisations (NGOs/CSOs) working in education struggle to clearly design their programs before starting or scaling their work. They often know what they want to improve, but find it difficult to clearly define the problem, identify the right stakeholders, decide what needs to change in day-to-day practice, and understand how those changes will be measured. As a result, program design becomes slow, dependent on experts, and expensive. What organisations need right now is a simple, guided way to think through these questions step by step. This can be translated into a digital or gamified platform that helps organisations move from idea to action by clearly walking them through a checklist: define the problem, identify the student-level change, decide the approach, map key stakeholders, specify expected practice changes, and choose simple indicators to track progress. The task is to build a gamified tool that makes this process easy to follow, practical to use, and accessible to teams without technical or design expertise.

Use Case
An organisation working in the public education system needs to design a new program or refine an existing one. The team must clearly articulate what change they want to see for students, how that change will happen through the system, and how it will be measured. However, the team is unsure where to begin, how to structure their thinking, or how to connect student outcomes, interventions, stakeholders, and practice change into one clear logic.

A Common LFA–based platform allows the team to start from a shared base structure instead of a blank page. Through guided steps or a gamified flow, the team works through core design questions, makes choices relevant to their context, and builds a first version of their program design. This enables the organisation to arrive at a coherent, review-ready logical framework before implementation begins, reducing dependence on intensive human support.

Target Audience

1. Education-focused NGOs and CSOs Program Managers and Design Teams;
2. Monitoring & Evaluation (M&E) Teams;
3. Field Implementation Leads and Trainers
4. Funders and ecosystem partners are seeking clearer program logic and accountability.

Suggestive Approaches

1. Guided Program Design Wizard
   Step-by-step, prompt-based flow to build an LFA from a shared structure.
2. Gamified Program Design Journey
   A level-based or scenario-driven experience to build systems thinking while designing programs.
3. Common LFA Template Engine
   Plug-and-play, pre-structured LFA templates adaptable by theme, geography, and system level.
4. Pattern Library of Proven Program Models
   Reusable logic patterns (e.g., FLN, leadership, mentoring) mapped to the Common LFA.
5. AI-Assisted Design Companion
   Context-aware prompts, logic checks, and suggestions embedded within the design flow.
6. Stakeholder & Practice Mapping Tool
   Visual mapping of stakeholders, expected practice changes, and outcome linkages.
7. Indicator & Measurement Builder
   Guided selection and alignment of indicators with outcomes and practice changes.
8. Export & Review-Ready Output Generator
   Auto-generated LFA documents suitable for internal review, funders, and partners.

Key Success Metrics

1. Percentage of programs with clearly articulated impact–outcome–activity alignment
2. Reduction in time required to develop a coherent Theory of Change / Action
3. Improvement in design quality consistency across organisations using the framework
4. User confidence and self-reported capability in program design;
5. Funders’ and partners’ satisfaction with clarity and evaluability of program logic.