If you ever need a reminder that “inclusive education” isn’t just about what happens inside a school building, Kenya’s DigiTruck is a brilliant place to start. It sits within Huawei’s wider “Skills on Wheels” programme: turning used shipping containers and buses into solar-powered mobile classrooms, equipped with smart screens, laptops, Wi-Fi and training resources.
The “why” is simple. The digital world has become a gatekeeper. Even in Europe, around 300 million people still lack basic digital skills – roughly 44% of the population. In sub-Saharan Africa, only about 10% of adults have basic digital skills, and for many Global South countries the level is below 25%.
When you can’t use a smartphone well, write an email, complete an online form, or handle basic office tools, you’re shut out of jobs, services and learning.
Kenya shows the same tension in a very practical way. More than 65% of people live in rural areas. Although about 97% of the country has wireless coverage, over 60% of the population are still offline. That gap isn’t only about signal. It’s about training, devices, support and confidence not reaching the places they’re needed.
That’s where the DigiTruck stands out. Launched in October 2019, the first Kenyan DigiTruck was delivered through a partnership between Huawei, Close the Gap (a Belgian NGO), local carrier Safaricom and GSMA, with CFSK also listed among partners.
Rather than asking learners to travel long distances or fit into a timetable that doesn’t work for their lives, the classroom comes to them. The truck pulls into a community and creates an instant learning space with power, connectivity and the kit to learn. This aligns with many of the recent keynotes i have delivered, where have I said, given the opportunity to start again with a global education system, I would stary by putting advice in the hand of every child so that they could all access an equitable high quality education. Not surprisingly, I would then also build the places and spaces to bring them together.
From an inclusion point of view, that “we’ll come to you” approach is huge. Distance is a hidden form of disadvantage: transport costs, time away from work, childcare, or simply the confidence hit of walking into a formal training centre. When a DigiTruck arrives locally, it sends a clear message: this learning is for you too.
The programme’s target groups reflect that inclusive intent. Skills on Wheels is designed to support people of all ages, including senior citizens who struggle with smartphones, women, unemployed young people, and K-12 students.
In Kenya specifically, DigiTruck is positioned for underserved remote communities who “urgently need digital skills and connectivity” but find it difficult to access training and services. Zoom out and the wider programme has benefited more than 130,000 people across 21 countries over six years.
What I find compelling is how well this fits an inclusive education mindset. Inclusion isn’t only about ramps, interventions or exam access arrangements (important as those are). It’s about removing the “quiet” barriers that stop people participating: lack of devices, lack of digital confidence, limited local provision, or the assumption that everyone can learn online at home. A mobile classroom is a “universal design” move: build something that works for many different learners, then take it to where it’s needed most. In practice that might mean a teenager picking up CV and spreadsheet skills, a small business owner learning to market online, or an older resident gaining confidence to use digital health services. Those are learning outcomes with immediate, everyday dignity and real agency attached.
Wearing other hats, I have supported projects liked to one device per child in developing regions, this project takes that up another level bringing the classroom with the technology.
So what can we take from this?
First, mobility can be an inclusion strategy. If barriers are geographic, economic or social, move the provision , either in the physical or the virtual sense, don’t just “offer” the traditional fixed model and hope the right people find it.
Second, partnerships matter. Who knew 😉 DigiTruck works because it brings together tech, telecoms and NGO expertise. Inclusion is rarely solved by one organisation acting alone.
Third, keep impact human. The headline numbers are helpful, but the real wins are the person who can now apply for a job online, the parent who can communicate confidently, or the learner who can access resources they previously couldn’t. We are moving into a world where skills and connectivity are the two biggest levers towards agency.
Anyway, I loved find out more about this project, for me, Kenya’s DigiTruck stands out because it’s practical, scalable and respectful. It doesn’t lecture communities about what they lack; it invests in what they can become. We need more of this.