hen schools closed during the Covid pandemic, two teachers in Chile learned that their colleagues at Teach For Nigeria were reaching students through radio broadcasts. They adapted the idea, recording 30–minute lessons in five subjects. More than 240 stations broadcast them, creating a lifeline to families in 3,000 rural schools (≈200,000 students). The lesson is simple: local ingenuity grows stronger when informed by global learning.
Yet education lacks the infrastructure to make these connections routine. Across countries, leaders face the same core questions. How do we support holistic development? How do we attract and develop great teachers? How do we connect learning to the world students are inheriting? Workable answers exist, but we have no reliable system to find, assess, and adapt them.
This gap is a system–wide failure to invest in connective tissue. Only 3% of official development assistance (ODA) for education supports global public goods like shared data and research. In health, that figure is 21%. We underinvest in the connective tissue that allows effective approaches to move across borders while respecting local context.
A better architecture would make this cross–border exchange routine. A teacher in Nairobi could compare formative assessment techniques with a peer in New Delhi. A policymaker in Peru could build on a school–improvement tool tested in Vietnam. Communities of practice could form within and across nations. This requires three things:
- Codify and share proven practices. Turn raw evidence and practitioner knowledge into adaptable tools so local leaders can make informed choices.
- Support and guide local adaptation. Offer professional learning that helps teams translate principles into their curricula, timetables, and constraints.
- Build networks that sustain learning. Connect teachers, leaders, and system actors to drive iteration and scale.
This approach already works in pockets. Pratham’s “Teaching at the Right Level” in India has been adapted through the People's Action for Learning (PAL) Network in different countries, for example, Pakistan, to help re-engage learners and reduce dropout risks. The specific tactics vary, but the underlying principles—assess starting points, group by level, teach at the right pace—travel when local educators lead adaptation.
Several efforts are contributing to this emerging infrastructure. Teach For All’s Global Institute for Shaping a Better Future connects educators from diverse countries to surface practitioner insights and highlights the principles that underlie success across geographies. Learning experiences bring together globally diverse cohorts, so knowledge moves in multiple directions and remains grounded in local culture and conditions. Many of Salzburg Global's education convenings share these objectives. This work is amplified by HundrED's global collections, which show the world's most impactful and scalable educational innovations.
Similarly, the newly–launched Education House platform brings together students, educators, and system leaders to interact online throughout the year and particularly alongside global spaces where education is not top of the agenda. Education House will host conversations, collaborations, provocations, and showcases designed to reimagine education so that students are equipped to shape a better future for themselves and for all of us. The platform models how cross–border learning can spark local action without diluting local agency.
The challenges to reshaping education are great — but so is our collective wisdom. It’s time we tap into it together, across borders, and with the shared belief that every student, everywhere, deserves the best of what we’ve collectively learned.
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Crossing borders to reshape the future of education
Image via Adobe Stock.
September 19, 2025
Educators face common challenges, but solutions often remain trapped within borders. A new approach to learning infrastructure can help move systems from isolated innovation to cross–border improvement, write Lasse Leponiemi, Dominic Regester, and Anna Molero.
W
hen schools closed during the Covid pandemic, two teachers in Chile learned that their colleagues at Teach For Nigeria were reaching students through radio broadcasts. They adapted the idea, recording 30–minute lessons in five subjects. More than 240 stations broadcast them, creating a lifeline to families in 3,000 rural schools (≈200,000 students). The lesson is simple: local ingenuity grows stronger when informed by global learning.
Yet education lacks the infrastructure to make these connections routine. Across countries, leaders face the same core questions. How do we support holistic development? How do we attract and develop great teachers? How do we connect learning to the world students are inheriting? Workable answers exist, but we have no reliable system to find, assess, and adapt them.
This gap is a system–wide failure to invest in connective tissue. Only 3% of official development assistance (ODA) for education supports global public goods like shared data and research. In health, that figure is 21%. We underinvest in the connective tissue that allows effective approaches to move across borders while respecting local context.
A better architecture would make this cross–border exchange routine. A teacher in Nairobi could compare formative assessment techniques with a peer in New Delhi. A policymaker in Peru could build on a school–improvement tool tested in Vietnam. Communities of practice could form within and across nations. This requires three things:
- Codify and share proven practices. Turn raw evidence and practitioner knowledge into adaptable tools so local leaders can make informed choices.
- Support and guide local adaptation. Offer professional learning that helps teams translate principles into their curricula, timetables, and constraints.
- Build networks that sustain learning. Connect teachers, leaders, and system actors to drive iteration and scale.
This approach already works in pockets. Pratham’s “Teaching at the Right Level” in India has been adapted through the People's Action for Learning (PAL) Network in different countries, for example, Pakistan, to help re-engage learners and reduce dropout risks. The specific tactics vary, but the underlying principles—assess starting points, group by level, teach at the right pace—travel when local educators lead adaptation.
Several efforts are contributing to this emerging infrastructure. Teach For All’s Global Institute for Shaping a Better Future connects educators from diverse countries to surface practitioner insights and highlights the principles that underlie success across geographies. Learning experiences bring together globally diverse cohorts, so knowledge moves in multiple directions and remains grounded in local culture and conditions. Many of Salzburg Global's education convenings share these objectives. This work is amplified by HundrED's global collections, which show the world's most impactful and scalable educational innovations.
Similarly, the newly–launched Education House platform brings together students, educators, and system leaders to interact online throughout the year and particularly alongside global spaces where education is not top of the agenda. Education House will host conversations, collaborations, provocations, and showcases designed to reimagine education so that students are equipped to shape a better future for themselves and for all of us. The platform models how cross–border learning can spark local action without diluting local agency.
The challenges to reshaping education are great — but so is our collective wisdom. It’s time we tap into it together, across borders, and with the shared belief that every student, everywhere, deserves the best of what we’ve collectively learned.
