Digital school elections that grow student leaders
Grant application dossier for Secure Votes School Edition: school elections, student leadership and digital citizenship, built in Kenya.
Investment snapshot
School elections are important leadership-development experiences, yet many schools still depend on paper ballots, spreadsheets, physical counting and fragmented record keeping.
Secure Votes School Edition provides a structured digital environment for administering school elections while connecting the process to student leadership, election ethics and digital citizenship.
The platform has progressed beyond an idea. It is a working technology product, tested through an initial school deployment reaching 278 students.
The requested KES 3 million will strengthen the technology, improve security and data-protection controls, expand school deployments, train educators and Returning Officers, develop leadership resources and establish a sustainable operating model.
| Applicant | Smart Minds Home Tuition & Skills Hub |
|---|---|
| Innovation | Secure Votes School Edition |
| Sector | Education Technology / Digital Citizenship / Student Leadership |
| Funding requested | KES 3,000,000 |
| Project duration | 12 months |
| Current pilot | Still I Rise International School, Nairobi |
| Students already reached | 278 |
| Target schools | 50 |
| Target students | 20,000 |
| Target election cycles | 50+ |
| Target candidates | 500+ |
| Teachers / Returning Officers | 100+ |
| Leadership & election ethics sessions | 50+ |
| Availability target | ≥99% |
Executive summary
Smart Minds Home Tuition & Skills Hub is developing Secure Votes School Edition, a Kenyan-built EdTech platform designed to modernise school elections and strengthen student leadership.
Secure Votes combines digital election administration with leadership development, election ethics and digital citizenship. It supports the complete school-election journey:
Register school
Create and configure the school's election environment.
Register students
Create participating student accounts and election records.
Nominate candidates
Organise candidates by the school's leadership structure.
Conduct election
Provide a structured digital voting environment.
Generate results
Support efficient results processing and reporting.
Post-election support
Connect the outcome to leadership development and follow-up.
Our initial deployment at Still I Rise International School in Nairobi has reached 278 students, giving us a real-world environment for testing workflows, user experience and school-election requirements.
We are seeking KES 3,000,000 over 12 months to move from early validation to structured scale. Our ambition is to reach 50 schools and approximately 20,000 students, while building a commercial model that continues beyond the grant period.
The grant will support
- Product and feature development
- Cybersecurity and data protection
- Cloud infrastructure and backups
- User experience and accessibility
- School onboarding
- Teacher and Returning Officer training
- Election ethics and leadership resources
- Monitoring and evaluation
- Partnerships and school acquisition
- Legal, compliance and administration
About Smart Minds Home Tuition & Skills Hub
An education-focused initiative working where education, technology, skills development and innovation meet.
Our mission is to help learners develop academic capability, practical skills, creativity, leadership and confidence for a changing world.
Secure Votes emerged from that mission. We saw a chance to use technology not only to improve how school elections are run, but also to make the election a practical learning experience for young people.
Education initiatives Smart Minds has explored
- Home tuition
- Digital learning
- STEM and technology
- Skills development
- Student leadership
- Innovation programmes
- Educational camps and enrichment programmes
School elections deserve better tools
Student elections are more than choosing school leaders. They let young people experience leadership, responsibility, participation, accountability, communication, decision-making, digital citizenship and election ethics. Running them is often difficult.
Manual administration
Paper-based registration, ballot preparation, counting and record keeping can consume significant teacher time.
Counting and reporting
Manual counting takes time and may need several staff members to coordinate results.
Fragmented records
Student lists, candidate information, positions and results can be scattered across different documents or systems.
Limited election learning
The election may happen without a structured programme teaching ethical participation, responsible leadership and digital citizenship.
Limited post-election support
Once results are announced, developing the elected student leaders is not systematically connected to the election process.
Technology gap
Many school systems focus on academic administration and leave student elections largely manual.
School election, student leadership and digital citizenship in one platform
Rather than treating voting as an isolated technical activity, Secure Votes connects the election lifecycle with leadership development.
Election administration
- School registration
- Student registration
- Candidate nomination
- Leadership positions
- Election configuration
- Digital voting
- Results processing
- Election records, administrative controls and election support
Student access
The student experience is designed around simplicity. A student should be able to answer four questions at a glance:
Who am I voting for? What position am I voting for? How do I cast my vote? Has my vote been recorded?
The interface prioritises large buttons, clear instructions, simple navigation, candidate information, mobile-friendly interaction and accessible visual design.
Administration and quick actions
School administrators and Returning Officers get a structured management environment built around high-value actions, so common tasks need less navigation:
The product in pictures
How Secure Votes looks in a school, followed by illustrated renders of the main screens.
Secure Votes School Edition
A digital platform for school elections, student leadership and digital citizenship.
Register your schoolStudent loginSchool Captain
Tap one candidate, then confirm.
| Position | Candidates | Status |
|---|---|---|
| School Captain | 3 | Open |
| Sports Prefect | 2 | Open |
| Library Prefect | 3 | Setup |
Election results
School Captain · sample data
Results are compiled digitally and stored as structured election records.
These are illustrative renders with sample data, prepared for layout. Replace each with a live Secure Votes screenshot before submission, since funders will expect authentic product evidence.
Leadership Architect
From“Students vote.”
towards“Students participate, leaders emerge, and leadership continues after the election.”
One of Secure Votes' differentiating features is the Leadership Architect. It supports the organisation of student leadership structures and lays a foundation for future leadership-development activities, connecting the whole path:
The election ends. The leadership work begins.
Newly elected leaders take up their roles in front of their school. The Leadership Programme gives them structure, training and accountability from that first day, so the vote leads somewhere.
Election ethics and digital citizenship
Secure Votes is not meant to teach students only how to use a voting screen. The election itself becomes a practical learning environment.
Age-appropriate resources can be developed for different learner groups. The aim is for students to understand that leadership is not simply about winning an election. It is about responsibility and service.
Concepts students can be introduced to
What makes Secure Votes different
| Traditional approach | Secure Votes approach |
|---|---|
| Paper-heavy election administration | Structured digital workflow |
| Manual counting | Digital results processing |
| Election treated as an isolated event | Election connected to leadership |
| Limited post-election engagement | Leadership programme opportunity |
| Separate student and admin processes | Integrated school election environment |
| Election administration only | Elections + ethics + digital citizenship |
| Difficult to scale manually | Designed for multi-school deployment |
| Fragmented records | Structured election records |
Secure Votes is positioned not simply as an e-voting product, but as an education technology platform centred on student participation and leadership.
Traction: from concept to a real school
Secure Votes has moved from concept development to early real-world validation at Still I Rise International School in Nairobi, reaching 278 students.
The project is in an early validation stage and has not yet established significant commercial revenue. That is why the grant matters: it helps turn early validation into a secure, repeatable and scalable product.
Pilot documentation, school confirmation and student-reach evidence belong in Annex 2.
The pilot lets us validate
- Student onboarding
- Election workflows
- Candidate management
- Administrative processes
- User experience
- School requirements
- Technical performance
- Support requirements
Why now
Schools are integrating digital tools into administration, learning and communication. Student elections are another practical place to introduce responsible digital participation.
Young people are growing up where digital citizenship, information literacy, responsible participation and leadership matter more each year. Secure Votes gives them a practical setting to experience these skills rather than learn them only in theory.
The pilot means we are building from real school experience, not in isolation.
12-month scale-up goals
These are programme targets, not claims of current achievement.
| Target | What it means |
|---|---|
| 50 schools | Expand from the initial pilot to a broader network of participating schools. |
| 20,000 students | Provide access to structured digital election experiences. |
| 50+ election cycles | Support multiple school election deployments. |
| 500+ candidates | Enable candidate nomination and election administration. |
| 100+ teachers / Returning Officers | Train school personnel responsible for election administration. |
| 50+ leadership & election ethics sessions | Connect election participation with leadership development. |
| ≥99% platform availability | Establish a stronger reliability standard for school deployments. |
Grant funding request: KES 3,000,000
How the funding creates value
Product engineering: KES 700,000
- Continued platform development and election workflows
- Administration tools and leadership features
- Results and reporting
- Performance improvements, school configuration and scalability
Cloud infrastructure: KES 250,000
- Hosting and database infrastructure
- Backups and monitoring
- Reliability and disaster-recovery preparedness
User experience: KES 250,000
A modern, school-friendly interface with simple student navigation, clear voting workflows, accessible and responsive layouts, administrative dashboards, visual reporting and improved usability.
The student experience stays fun, simple and memorable; the administrator environment stays professional, structured and trustworthy.
Cybersecurity and data protection: KES 400,000
Because the platform may process information relating to school communities and minors, responsible data handling is a core development priority. Funding supports:
- Security review
- Access-control review
- Authentication hardening
- Database security
- Encryption review
- Audit logging
- Vulnerability monitoring
- Backup and recovery testing
- Privacy and information-security documentation
- Incident-response procedures
- School data-processing documentation
- Data retention and deletion procedures
- Staff security awareness
The platform will use privacy-conscious identification and authentication. Generated student identifiers will not be described as anonymous where authorised school personnel can link them back to individual students.
Responsible technology and child data protection
Many users are children, so the project takes a data protection by design and by default approach.
Access control
Users receive only the access appropriate to their role.
Authentication security
Student and administrative authentication will be strengthened as the platform scales.
Credential protection
PIN credentials are protected with appropriate hashing and salting rather than stored as plain text.
Auditability
Relevant administrative activity can be logged to support accountability and troubleshooting.
Backups
Regular backups and recovery testing reduce the risk of data loss.
Data minimisation
The platform seeks to collect only the information needed for the service.
School governance
Deployment includes school authorisation, privacy notices and consents where required, data-processing procedures and retention practices.
Security testing
Grant funding enables more formal security assessment as the platform moves from pilot to larger-scale deployment.
Public results and privacy
Secure Votes can support public-facing election communication while keeping private student voting transactions separate from public presentation. A school may choose to display results through a dedicated results or broadcast experience.
The public-facing experience should never expose individual students' private voting activity. This separation matters as the platform moves toward larger school deployments.
Implementation plan
Product strengthening
- Strengthen platform architecture
- Improve authentication, access controls, database reliability and backups
- Conduct security review
- Improve student experience and admin dashboard
- Refine Leadership Architect
- Analyse pilot feedback; set up monitoring
Output: a stronger, more deployment-ready platform.
Structured pilot expansion
- Recruit additional schools
- Train Returning Officers
- Run school election deployments
- Collect structured feedback
- Measure technical performance and user experience
- Refine deployment; validate packages and pricing
Output: a repeatable school deployment model.
Market expansion
- Expand school outreach
- Develop institutional partnerships and channels
- Build case studies
- Convert suitable pilot schools into paying customers
- Strengthen marketing materials
- Expand leadership resources
Output: a growing school network and emerging commercial model.
Scale and sustainability
- Work toward the 50-school target
- Evaluate outcomes and publish impact findings
- Strengthen recurring revenue and retention
- Document operating procedures
- Prepare for wider Kenyan and regional expansion
Output: a sustainable model that continues beyond the grant.
Theory of change
Inputs
- Grant funding
- Technology
- Smart Minds team
- School partnerships
- Education expertise
Activities
- Platform development
- Security strengthening
- School deployment
- Teacher training
- Election ethics sessions
- Leadership resources
Outputs
- More schools using structured election systems
- More students participating
- Trained Returning Officers
- Election cycles completed
- Leadership sessions delivered
Short-term outcomes
- Reduced administrative burden
- More structured elections
- Improved student participation
- Better election records
- Increased exposure to digital citizenship
Longer-term impact
A sustainable Kenyan EdTech model that uses school elections as a practical platform for developing responsible student leaders and digital citizens.
Expected impact
Schools
- Reduced manual election administration
- Faster results processing
- More structured candidate management
- Better election records and easier coordination
- Improved post-election reporting
Students
- Leadership and responsible participation
- Digital citizenship and election ethics
- Decision-making and accountability
- Technology-enabled participation
Educators
- Structured election workflows
- Training and better support materials
- Centralised administration
- Easier results management
The EdTech ecosystem
The project contributes to locally built education technology that answers a practical school-management and student-development need.
Monitoring and evaluation
| Indicator | 12-month target |
|---|---|
| Schools reached | 50 |
| Students reached | 20,000 |
| Election cycles | 50+ |
| Candidates supported | 500+ |
| Teachers / Returning Officers trained | 100+ |
| Leadership / election ethics sessions | 50+ |
| Platform availability | ≥99% target |
| Paying schools | Tracked during scale-up |
| School retention | Tracked |
| User satisfaction | Measured |
| Technical incidents | Monitored |
| Backup / recovery tests | Conducted periodically |
Evaluation methods
Sustainability model
The grant is meant to accelerate Secure Votes, not to create permanent dependence on grant funding.
School election packages
Schools purchase packages covering:
- Election setup and administration
- Voting and results
- Technical support
Premium school packages
Additional services may include:
- Returning Officer training
- Election ethics and leadership resources
- Post-election reporting and analytics
- Technical support
Institutional partnerships
Potential partners include:
- School networks and education organisations
- Youth organisations and leadership programmes
- NGOs and EdTech organisations
- Education-focused corporate partners
Pricing and packaging will be validated during the structured pilot expansion phase rather than assuming an untested price model.
Risk management
| Risk | Mitigation |
|---|---|
| Platform downtime | Monitoring, backups and deployment contingency |
| Unauthorised access | Role-based access and stronger authentication |
| Data loss | Automated backups and recovery testing |
| Cybersecurity threats | Security review, hardening and monitoring |
| User errors | Training and guided workflows |
| Connectivity limitations | Deployment planning and contingency procedures |
| Low school adoption | Pilot feedback and school engagement |
| Scaling challenges | Phased expansion and technical monitoring |
| Sustainability risk | Paid packages and institutional partnerships |
| Data protection risk | Privacy-conscious architecture, governance and security controls |
The team
Fammi Oduor
Founder / Product & Strategy
- Product vision
- Platform development and coordination
- Education-sector engagement
- Product strategy and innovation
- School relationships
Experience in education, ICT, Design Technology, STEM, robotics and educational innovation.
Stephen Kago
Finance & Logistics Director
- Financial planning
- Budget management
- Logistics
- Operational coordination
- Resource management
Claude Makau
Marketing
- Brand development
- Marketing and school outreach
- Communication
- Partnership visibility
Why support Secure Votes
The project brings together several areas that are increasingly important in education, at the intersection of EdTech, youth leadership and responsible digital participation.
Technology
A practical digital platform for school elections.
Leadership
A structured opportunity for students to experience leadership and responsibility.
Digital citizenship
A real-world environment for responsible participation and technology use.
School efficiency
Tools designed to reduce manual election administration.
Local innovation
A Kenyan-built solution developed around real school requirements.
Scalability
A product model that can be deployed across multiple schools.
Pilot-to-scale strategy
Stage 1: Current pilot
Still I Rise International School. 278 students reached.
Stage 2: Structured expansion
Additional partner schools, improved product, training model and security strengthening.
Stage 3: 50-school scale
20,000 students, 50+ election cycles and 100+ trained educators / Returning Officers.
Stage 4: Sustainable growth
Commercial school packages, institutional partnerships, Kenyan expansion and potential regional expansion.
Annexes
1Product overview
- Homepage screenshot
- Student interface
- Administrator dashboard
- Candidate management
- Voting interface
- Results
- Leadership Architect
- Leadership Programme
2Pilot evidence
- School confirmation where available
- Pilot documentation
- Student reach evidence
- Feedback / testimonials
- Deployment screenshots
3Technical & data protection brief
- System architecture
- Database overview
- Authentication model
- Access controls
- Credential protection
- Backup strategy
- Audit logging
- Security roadmap
- Data retention approach
- Incident-response approach
4Detailed budget
- Grant budget
- Cost assumptions
- Implementation costs
- Infrastructure costs
- Training costs
- Security costs
- Monitoring and evaluation costs
5Monitoring & evaluation framework
- Indicators and baselines
- Targets
- Data sources
- Collection frequency
- Responsible person
- Reporting schedule
6Team profiles
- Fammi Oduor
- Stephen Kago
- Claude Makau
7Organisation documentation
- Registration documents
- Organisational profile
- Contact details
- Partnerships
- Supporting documentation
Our funding request
Smart Minds Home Tuition & Skills Hub respectfully requests KES 3,000,000 to support the 12-month development and scale-up of Secure Votes School Edition.
The investment will move the project from an early validated product serving 278 students toward a structured school deployment model targeting 50 schools and 20,000 students. It will strengthen the technology, improve security and data protection, support school onboarding, train educators, develop leadership resources and establish a sustainable revenue model.
Can technology make school elections more organised while making the election itself a meaningful leadership experience?
We believe the answer can be yes when technology is designed around the needs of schools, students and educators. Secure Votes School Edition brings together digital elections, student leadership, election ethics and digital citizenship. The initial pilot has given us a foundation. The next step is responsible scale.
Our ambition is not simply to digitise the ballot. It is to help schools build better environments in which young people can participate, lead, learn and take responsibility.