By Elizabeth Osayande

An extraordinary Nigerian school on Wednesday was named a Top 10 finalist for the World’s Best School Prizes 2025. The five World’s Best School Prizes, founded by T4 Education in the wake of COVID in 2022 to share the best practices of schools that are changing lives in their classrooms and far beyond their walls, are the world’s most prestigious education prizes.

KEY, which stands for Keep Educating Yourself Academy, an independent primary and secondary school in Lagos, Nigeria, is revolutionising education through its project-based learning model, equipping students with the critical thinking, creativity, and 21st-century problem-solving skills they need to thrive in a rapidly changing world. The Academy was named a Top 10 finalist for the World’s Best School Prize for Innovation.

The winners of the five World’s Best School Prizes – for Community Collaboration, Environmental Action, Innovation, Overcoming Adversity, and Supporting Healthy Lives – will be chosen by an expert Judging Academy based on rigorous criteria. In addition, all 50 finalist schools across the five Prizes will also participate in a Public Vote, which opened today, to determine the winner of the Community Choice Award. All six winners will be announced in October.

The winners and finalists of these global schools prizes will be invited to the World Schools Summit in Abu Dhabi, UAE, on November 15-16 where they will share their best practices and unique expertise and experience with policymakers and leading figures in global education.

Founder of T4 Education and the World’s Best School Prizes. Vikas Pota, has this to say about KEY; “In a world being turned upside down by AI, as technology reshapes the way we learn and renders jobs that have existed for centuries obsolete, amid growing challenges of climate change, conflict, poverty and populism, the world our young people are entering has never felt more precarious. And a good education, with humans at its heart, has never been more important.

“It is in schools like KEY Academy where we find the innovations and expertise that give us hope for a better future. Congratulations on becoming a finalist for the World’s Best School Prizes 2025. Leaders and schools worldwide have so much to learn from this inspirational Nigerian institution.”

KEY (Keep Educating Yourself) academy, an independent primary and secondary school in Lagos, Nigeria, is revolutionising education through its project-based learning (PBL) model, equipping students with the critical thinking, creativity, and 21st-century problem-solving skills they need to thrive in a rapidly changing world. Nigeria has the highest number of out-of-school children globally. Those in school often lack engaging, relevant learning experiences that equip them to achieve in everyday life. Driven by the belief that simply getting children into classrooms won’t solve the problem, but rather the fundamental way they learn must change, the school has refined a structured PBL framework, adapted to suit Nigeria’s culture and context.

To make education accessible and transformative, a balance between creative exploration and academic rigour drives the approach. Teachers acting as facilitators guide students through inquiry-driven projects rather than delivering one-way instruction, and learners take part in projects and collaborate with professionals across varied fields to solve real-world challenges. Student-led projects include a waste pollution initiative where students worked with a riverside community struggling with water pollution, initiatives to develop solutions that address waste and maximise energy use, exploration of renewable energy solutions, and raising money to support the community through an annual charity project, through which students develop empathy and practical problem-solving skills and contextualised learning.

Parents are part of the process to support learners through workshops, open classrooms, and student showcases where they see the model’s impact firsthand. This builds a culture of shared responsibility and co-learning. Teachers receive ongoing training and have adopted innovative assessment models, replacing memorisation-based tests with competency-based evaluations. The long-term vision is to scale the model through a digital platform to include nationwide teacher training, assessment, and accreditation that can support educators across the country, regardless of the socio-economic status of their school or parent community.

Through their model, 95% of students demonstrate higher-order thinking skills like critical thinking, creativity, and problem-solving, and 85% show increased confidence in public speaking, collaboration, and leadership. All students engage in real-world problem-solving, and 100% of parents have seen noticeable improvements in their children’s curiosity and independence. As a recognised thought leader in progressive education, the school actively engages with academia and international networks to share best practices and drive systemic change with over 1,000 educators beta testing its digital platform, which codifies the learning approach and materials.

KEY Academy is proving that world-class, 21st-century, project-based learning is possible in Nigeria and reshaping the entire education system.