In this episode, Priten speaks with Ratna Gill, who supports the partnerships team at Rocket Learning, a nonprofit tackling early childhood education in India through WhatsApp. Ratna shares her journey from child safety work to early childhood education and explains how Rocket Learning delivers bite-sized educational content to caregivers and Anganwadi workers serving 600 million children who lack access to early stimulation. The conversation explores their AI-powered personalized tutor, the importance of cultural contextualization, and what ethical ed tech looks like when working with resource-constrained communities—ultimately landing on a hopeful note: technology can expand access to education without replacing the irreplaceable human connections that make learning joyful.
Key Takeaways:
- Meet communities where they already are. Rocket uses WhatsApp because families are already there—no new apps, no tech burden.
- Technology should supplement, not replace, human interaction. APU is capped at 15-20 minutes daily to preserve parent-child engagement.
- Context matters more than content. Effective ed tech adapts cultural references, not just language, for each region.
- Test slowly, learn deeply. Field testing revealed that background noise breaks speech-to-text—rushing would have shipped a broken product.
- Parents are the most transformative tool. AI can model joyful pedagogy, but it can't replace human connection.
About Ratna Gill:
Ratna Gill serves as Lead, Special Projects at Rocket Learning. Previously the Head of Government Partnerships at Mumbai-based child safety nonprofit Aangan, she worked with state governments across the country to train school administrators and police officers to create safer communities for children in hotspots for child trafficking. Ratna graduated from Harvard Kennedy School in 2022, where she studied the impacts of parental labor migration on education and development outcomes for adolescents. She has a B.A. in Economics from Harvard College.
Ratna Gill serves as Lead, Special Projects at Rocket Learning. Previously the Head of Government Partnerships at Mumbai-based child safety nonprofit Aangan, she worked with state governments across the country to train school administrators and police officers to create safer communities for children in hotspots for child trafficking. Ratna graduated from Harvard Kennedy School in 2022, where she studied the impacts of parental labor migration on education and development outcomes for adolescents. She has a B.A. in Economics from Harvard College.