I created this innovation because, as Trevor Noah said on Teachers’ Day 2025, “One fantastic teacher has the ability to transform thousands of lives.” I am living proof of this. My university lecturer, Olivia Mugabirwe, empowered me, shifted my mindset, and showed me the transformative power a single teacher can have. Growing up at the border of Uganda, Congo, and Rwanda, I witnessed Africa’s richness—its culture, resilience, creativity, and potential. Yet many education systems were not helping young people see, appreciate, or harness this beauty. Learners often felt disconnected from their environment, and teachers felt unseen, undervalued, and isolated.
I founded The African Travelling Teacher to change this narrative. I wanted to celebrate teachers who use very little to create so much, and support them to shift from seeing themselves as “just teachers” to changemakers shaping their communities. Through storytelling, mindset-shift training, and practical CPD, we restore dignity to the teaching profession and help educators recognise their impact.
We also expose learners to modern, relevant education that helps them appreciate what they have, protect it, and innovate around it. Travelling by road to remote schools enables us to understand local realities, inspire learners through real experiences, and connect them with peers across continents. This helps young people value their identity, recognise the beauty around them, and use education to uplift their communities.
The African Travelling Teacher is a mobile, community-rooted model that brings teacher empowerment, global citizenship, and practical skill-building directly to underserved schools. We travel by road to remote communities, spend time understanding their realities, and deliver mindset-shift training that helps teachers see themselves as changemakers rather than “just teachers.” We celebrate their stories, highlight the innovation already happening in their classrooms, and provide practical demonstrations on project-based learning, indigenous knowledge, digital literacy, and offline-first tools like Kolibri.
Learners participate in hands-on sessions that blend culture, creativity, and global awareness. Through our Global Schools Program, we connect their schools with partner International schools across the globe, where they exchange videos, skills, and cultural projects. This leads to real collaborative outcomes such as Ugandan students teaching basket weaving to peers in Beijing, and Beijing students sharing woodcut techniques. Some partners now intend to travel to Uganda for immersive exchanges, deepening the learning experience.
In practice, our innovation is relational, mobile, and deeply context-based: it meets teachers where they are, amplifies their strengths, connects learners globally, and strengthens schools through recognition, mindset support, and meaningful cultural learning.
Our innovation has spread organically through teacher networks, community referrals, and the visibility created by our storytelling. Each school we visit requests follow-up sessions or recommends us to neighbouring schools, creating a ripple effect. Teachers share their mindset-shift experience with colleagues, inspiring new schools to join. Our Global Schools Program has also accelerated spread, with partner schools in China and the USA inviting others to participate in cultural exchanges and CAS projects. The videos shared on YouTube and social media further amplify our work, attracting interest from educators, parents, and international partners. This combination of word of mouth, compelling stories, and successful cross-continental collaborations continues to expand our reach across East Africa and beyond.
We have continuously refined our innovation based on the needs we see in the field and the feedback from teachers, learners, and partner schools. What began as storytelling and school visits has grown into a complete teacher mindset-shift programme that helps educators see themselves as changemakers. We added structured professional development on project-based learning, indigenous knowledge, and offline-first tools like Kolibri to give teachers practical strategies they can use immediately.
Our learner sessions evolved into the Global Schools Collaboration Program, enabling cross-continental exchanges, shared videos, and skills transfer. This later expanded into field immersion visits, with partner schools from China and the USA now travelling to Uganda for joint workshops. These visits revealed a powerful sustainability pathway, an emerging education tourism program that supports cultural exchange, strengthens community ties, builds to sustainable future peace, and helps sustain our work.
We also realised that teachers need ongoing support beyond school visits. To address this, we are developing the Tall Poppies Community, a global teacher community where educators can safely share achievements and challenges, get peer support, find solutions together, and feel genuinely listened to. This community of practice will ensure long-term growth, connection, and professional belonging for the teachers we serve.
If you want to try our innovation, the first step is to reach out either by expressing interest on our website, booking an introductory call, or commenting on our social media. If you are an international school, we ask you to share your goals for the collaboration, the grade levels and ages of learners you want involved, and the topics or themes you hope to explore. This information helps us identify the most suitable local partner school. After that, we guide you through a simple onboarding process that includes a needs assessment, planning for joint projects, teacher mindset-shift training, and learner sessions. You can also join our Global Schools Collaboration Program or the Tall Poppies Community for ongoing support and meaningful global engagement.
