The SmartStart network’s landmark new study, shows that early learning programmes run in homes and community venues such as churches and halls are boosting development and learning outcomes for children.
The network comprises 13 implementing partners which, together, support more than 15 000 early learning practitioners to reach over 150 000 children across South Africa each week. With this kind of scale, in 2023 a team of independent researchers gathered data on outcomes for children in SmartStart early learning programmes, to investigate whether the positive impacts identified in a 2018 evaluation, three years after SmartStart’s establishment, were being maintained.
The researchers tracked the progress of 551 children in 325 SmartStart programmes over eight months, using the Early Learning Outcomes Measure (ELOM) – making it the largest study of its kind to date in South Africa. They found that the proportion of children “on track” increased by a remarkable 20 points from 45% to 65%, while the proportion of those “falling far behind” nearly halved. This meant a dramatic reduction in the achievement gap between children from low- and high-income households, falling from 25 points to just six points.
These results tell two stories:
- Every child has infinite potential: Regardless of their background, every child in South Africa can thrive when given the opportunity of quality early learning. It is therefore our responsibility as a society to ensure that this potential is fully released.
- Women are powerful change agents: Thousands of underemployed women in low-income communities are the unlikely heroes – or perhaps the likely heroes – of this study. With basic training, they are delivering powerful outcomes for children.
In some ways, these findings upend conventional notions of “quality” in early learning. Quality is not about shiny infrastructure; it is about simple, everyday practices: nurture, talk, and play. This “alchemy” fuels brain development, physical growth, and emotional wellbeing.
SmartStart’s approach is underpinned by a deep respect for the inherent strengths of communities – and a commitment to make them count. In practice, this means capacitating local, underemployed women in low-income areas, to use available venues to host quality early learning programmes. Most are in homes, often in converted extensions, while some use
These results matter because at a sector leadership summit in March 2025, the President announced that early childhood development was a national priority. The government committed to universal access to early childhood development as far back as 2010, but more than one million new places in early learning programmes are still needed to achieve this. This scale of task requires new solutions, which are pragmatic, affordable and immediate. So, if an early learning delivery platform focused on home and community-based settings in low-income communities can shift outcomes for children as it goes to scale, it strongly signals the path to equitable, quality access. And this understanding should in turn inform more enabling approaches to government regulation and funding.Poverty is not attractive. Our justified rejection of unacceptable living conditions however, should not mean a rejection of the dignity and possibilities that people create for themselves and their communities in these contexts. When we pay attention to the value of what is already there, and focus on assets – such as capable women, home and community venues and informal economic activity – rather than scarcity, the opportunities for transformation are endless. Far from being considered an inferior form of provision, quality early learning programmes in homes and community venues should be elevated as today’s solution for today’s children
