From Earthquake Solidarity to Educational Equity: Conceptualizing a Sustainable, Volunteer-Driven P2P Learning Ecosystem at Scale

Fuente: arXiv
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Auteurs principaux: Kaplan, Öykü, Przybyłek, Adam, Neumann, Michael, Iivari, Netta
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2026
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author Kaplan, Öykü
Przybyłek, Adam
Neumann, Michael
Iivari, Netta
author_facet Kaplan, Öykü
Przybyłek, Adam
Neumann, Michael
Iivari, Netta
contents This study examines the evolution of a grassroots, volunteer-driven peer-to-peer (P2P) educational initiative from an emergency response to the 2023 Türkiye earthquake into a sustainable ecosystem that operated for over two years and supported 300+ middle-school learners with 40+ volunteer tutors. Employing an interpretive case study approach, we triangulated data from participant observation, focus groups, questionnaires, and collaborative visioning workshops to investigate the socio-technical dynamics enabling long-term resilience in a fully online, nonreciprocal far-peer tutoring setting. Our findings reveal that while age proximity fosters trust and open communication, it also poses challenges for tutors who must balance peer rapport with instructional authority. Volunteer engagement is driven primarily by intrinsic motives - educational impact and community belonging - while optional micro-earning is envisioned as a practical enabler for long-term sustainability. Tutees report significant gains in confidence, self-expression, and accelerated comprehension, attributing these outcomes to personalized, interactive sessions within a "family-like" safe space that combines academic instruction with socio-emotional support. Notably, tutees view tutors as aspirational role models and express strong intentions to return as tutors themselves, envisioning a self-regenerating cycle of intergenerational reciprocity that carries knowledge and solidarity from generation to generation. Both cohorts call for a dedicated platform featuring integrated scheduling, personalization, feedback, and quality assurance mechanisms. We synthesize these insights into theory-informed implications and five design principles for sustainable P2P learning ecosystems at scale.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_15432
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle From Earthquake Solidarity to Educational Equity: Conceptualizing a Sustainable, Volunteer-Driven P2P Learning Ecosystem at Scale
Kaplan, Öykü
Przybyłek, Adam
Neumann, Michael
Iivari, Netta
Computers and Society
H.4.0
This study examines the evolution of a grassroots, volunteer-driven peer-to-peer (P2P) educational initiative from an emergency response to the 2023 Türkiye earthquake into a sustainable ecosystem that operated for over two years and supported 300+ middle-school learners with 40+ volunteer tutors. Employing an interpretive case study approach, we triangulated data from participant observation, focus groups, questionnaires, and collaborative visioning workshops to investigate the socio-technical dynamics enabling long-term resilience in a fully online, nonreciprocal far-peer tutoring setting. Our findings reveal that while age proximity fosters trust and open communication, it also poses challenges for tutors who must balance peer rapport with instructional authority. Volunteer engagement is driven primarily by intrinsic motives - educational impact and community belonging - while optional micro-earning is envisioned as a practical enabler for long-term sustainability. Tutees report significant gains in confidence, self-expression, and accelerated comprehension, attributing these outcomes to personalized, interactive sessions within a "family-like" safe space that combines academic instruction with socio-emotional support. Notably, tutees view tutors as aspirational role models and express strong intentions to return as tutors themselves, envisioning a self-regenerating cycle of intergenerational reciprocity that carries knowledge and solidarity from generation to generation. Both cohorts call for a dedicated platform featuring integrated scheduling, personalization, feedback, and quality assurance mechanisms. We synthesize these insights into theory-informed implications and five design principles for sustainable P2P learning ecosystems at scale.
title From Earthquake Solidarity to Educational Equity: Conceptualizing a Sustainable, Volunteer-Driven P2P Learning Ecosystem at Scale
topic Computers and Society
H.4.0
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.15432