“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”

Over the last four years, Jitendra Mane, a 32 year old teacher from a village called Tilwani in Kolhapur, has been inspiring kids with this famous line by Martin luther King Jr.

When his students met him for the first time in 2013, they were curious and concerned, a reaction Jitendra frankly did not expect. What he anticipated was a different reaction – ‘a reaction which has let down many disabled people in society’ as he says.

Disability haunted him even before its signs started to show. It all started when he was a child – every time the weather changed, he would get a fever that lasted a week.

His family decided to take him to a local doctor to understand why the fevers were such a regular occurrence, but the only one available was in a town 7 km away from their village. After the check-up, Jitendra, in class four at the time, was given news he couldn’t fathom. The diagnoses was that Jitendra had Rheumatoid Arthritis, but the doctor did console him and the family saying it cured be completely cured by the age of 18. This restored a sense of home.

The fevers continues to be regular, affecting Jitendra every time the weather changed till he was 22. And it’s here that his health took a turn for the worse.

Jitendra’s struggles got much worse, but it was the story of this struggle that continues to inspire kids in rural Kolhapur. One day, when he was 22, Jitendra caught a fever after getting drenched in the rain. In two days, Jitendra started to feel a stiffness in his body, and was horrified when eventually he could not move.

His family rushed him to a hospital in Belgaum, which is a 115 km from Tilwani. After conducting the required tests, the doctors realised he had Juvenile Ankylosing Spondylitis, a type of arthritis that affects the spine and areas where muscles, ligaments and tendons are attached to the bone. It causes inflammation of large joints and the spine, resulting in stiffness and pain.

“I was disappointed when I got to know about the disability and cried for several months,” said Jitendra.

“A few days before the disability took a severe turn, I remember Jitendra riding his Splendor bike like a normal man,” recalls his 67 year old retired father Sarjerao Mane, who has been a constant source of support in Jitendra’s life.

Doctors suggested a hip surgery to alleviate his condition, but warned there was no cure for the disease. Sarjerao didn’t find this statement convincing enough and decided the best thing to do was get his son some physiotherapy. After a few years, Jitendra began to show signs of recovering.

The disability did not allow Jitendra to attend college regularly – causing him to miss a couple of months while he did his B. Ed. This affirmed the worries of college authorities, who were reluctant to admit him with his condition. Jitendra, however, was not going to stop. He decided to complete his course, never looking back.

Jitendra passed with flying colours and later went on to become a teacher. With a B.Sc in Chemistry, Jitendra went on to finish his B. Ed, and later added M.A. in Hindi to his list of accomplishments!
Jitendra became a teacher because of his passion to teach kids. He started by assisting a teacher who taught science to grade VI students in the local government school. Soon, students from grade X approached him and asked him to take math classes.

Jitendra’s father proudly recalls, “I had to get the first floor of our house renovated for his classes.”
Meanwhile, Jitendra kept giving competitive exams, and filled forms for the post of a teacher.

After applying for several interviews, he got the job of an assistant teacher in Tadasar village of Sangli district, 90 km from his home. While he was ready to take on the job, administrative lapses and ‘senior school authorities’ were not keen. Jitendra fought back and successfully got the job of an assistant teacher in a Government school in Takawade in 2013, 12 km from his village.

Jitendra is permanent faculty member. He commutes to and from school with the help of the local and state buses. Jitendra is said to be 40 percent disabled, and as a result cannot sit properly, so he stands while teaching and correcting papers.

He teaches four secondary classes and interacts with over 300 students. Not only does he teach children the subjects he is assigned, but also about how compassion to those with disabilities.

“Initially, I thought kids would not respect me, but their acceptance came as a surprise. Even my colleagues never make me feel uncomfortable by asking questions related to my trauma. This support has helped me focus on my teaching and becoming a better teacher,” says Jitendra.

Sarjerao is a proud father, who credits his son’s success to the hard work he puts in despite the odds. “My son works for more than 12 hours daily, he also started taking extra classes for kids now. It’s his passion to teach kids, which has kept him alive,” says Sarjerao with a smile.

Since 2005, the Mane family has been spending between Rs 5000 and Rs 10,000 a month on treatment and medicines.
Jitendra was supposed to get his hip replaced on 8th November, 2016, but the demonetisation did not help. “Now, we’ve decided to not go for the surgery, at least till the near future, because there’s no assurance of him coming back to normal. I’ve personally seen a few horrible cases,” explains Sarjerao.

Jitendra spent his share of time grieving about his disability, spending many months in tears. Talking about his earlier days at the school he says, “The kids never made me feel uncomfortable, instead they would praise my teaching in the entire village.”

Looking back at the struggle today, Jitendra inspires a lot of students in rural India to never give up and keep moving ahead, as he says today, “there lies a beautiful territory in a journey called struggle.”

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 Using Technology in Classrooms

It’s true what they say, ‘Technology in the hands of great teachers is transformational’. Using new technology in classrooms piques a student’s curiosity, can make them more eager to learn and opens the doors to a different kind of learning experience. This can especially impact the country’s most underserved children as technology is both an enabler and an equaliser. So why don’t we see more technology in our classrooms?

The biggest roadblocks that schools and teachers face on the journey to digitising the learning process is the lack of resources and infrastructure. However, there are organisations working towards easing these challenges like The Connected Learning Initiative (CLIx).

Technology: Now a CLIx away

CLIx is the brainchild of the Tata Trust, TISS and MIT and was ideated as an initiative to use technology in a manner that boosts secondary education in India on a large scale. The initiative collaborates with government bodies to train teachers and to give children a hands-on learning experience so that they can face the challenges of the 21st century.  

Anusha Ramanathan, member of the English Team at CLIx shares, “The lack of quality education for children motivated us to find ways in which we could provide opportunities to children through meaningful integration of technology.”  

By combining technology and curriculum, CLIx has definitely made learning more fun.

Making learning fun and interactive!

Lalmawipuii, a teacher in Aizawl, Mizoram, would often look to her class for answers after completing a lesson, only to realise that the students weren’t confident enough to raise their hands, let alone form a statement of their own.

“I didn’t see them working together and I knew that they needed a structure for learning that was interactive, and got them more interested in their curriculum while encouraging them to work together.” shares Lalmawipuii.

With her class being introduced to CLIx , Lalmawipuii’s students are now engaging with the curriculum and with each other in a manner that excites them. Through Police Quad, a game developed for geometric reasoning, the students learn concepts, put them to practice through online games and then participate in post-game discussions.

“We can now enjoy and learn Maths at the same time.” says Varsha Sen, a student.

With the implementation of the initiative in their schools, students are not only sharing ideas and thoughts with each other, but are also experiencing an interactive way of understanding their everyday syllabus. Prarthna Sreshtha, a student in Aizawl shares, “I like how we study geometry because we don’t always understand the shapes in our books. The games bring them alive for us.”

The emphasis on regional languages, in the form of student modules and teacher workshops, helps ensure that language barriers don’t affect the form in which students learn. Currently, over 55,000 students in 460 schools, spanning four states are learning better.

Envisioning a change

The project envisions to see a change in the way that teaching and learning are perceived in high schools. At the moment, most schools focus on skills needed to succeed in examinations. In contrast, this model believes that children should be prepared for participation and success in real life situations. Nisha, a student in a government school in Rajasthan, excitedly shares, “We are able to connect the lessons to our everyday lives and maybe, one day, they’ll help us somewhere in life.”

Empowering teachers

The power of collaboration is evident in how the initiative has thrived on strong partnerships developed with the government so far. Presently, the CLIx model is being implemented in four states – Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Telangana, and Mizoram. Learning from their experiences in these four states, they have created a certification course for in-service teachers. Nisha Lal, the headmistress of a government school in Jaipur, says, “The training gives teachers the confidence to use technology in class.” These continuous efforts by CLIx have ensured that there is learning for both students and teachers.

CLIx sees teachers as one of the most impactful stakeholders and has chalked out a clear plan for their professional development.

Using joyful stories and beautiful illustrations!

CLIx is using content from Pratham Books’ StoryWeaver to expose children to joyful English reading material with an Indian context- characters and settings they can actually relate to.

“We were thrilled when we came across StoryWeaver and realised that there are others who release their materials under open licenses.” shares Anusha.

The English Team has built its English beginner unit 1 course around stories from StoryWeaver which have been made into movies with narration. Students are also encouraged to create stories from openly licensed images from StoryWeaver using CLIx’s own Open Story Tool.  The tool allows students to select images, record their voices and write captions for each image. The colourful illustrations make story creation really exciting for children.  Anusha shares, “The chance to create their own stories has really excited students and has led to the rich articulation of their imagination. We are awed each time we visit the schools and see their work.”

What Next?

CLIx comprises of highly motivated and passionate team members who plan to impact 5,000 teachers and over 1 lakh students in the near future. They want to ensure that they leverage the strong partnerships that they’ve established in the four states and alter the way teachers teach and children learn. Nothing seems to be stopping them, so here’s hoping that they achieve their goals and more. Because true transformation needs both – technology and passion.

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Four students from a government school in Bengaluru are passionate about building robots. To the extent that participating in regional level robotics competitions is just “a cakewalk” for them, says their teacher and mentor – Sridhar P.

Aravind Reddy, Ramakrishna, Lawrence Aga and A Ramesh, who call themselves team Master Minds are from the Seva Bharti Government Higher Primary School in Viveknagar.

The team, sans Lawrence, represented India at the 2017 edition of Robo Cup, a robotics competition held in Nagoya Japan too, where they presented a robot that plays the piano!

But the boys, who are children of daily wage labourers, would not have been able to make this journey if it were not for their teacher and mentor, Sridhar.

So, who is Sridhar?

Sridhar P, 33, an alumnus of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), is a teacher who mentors children in class five, six and seven. He collaborated with the Akshara Foundation to mentor children in Seva Bharti in the exciting field of robotics. In a conversation with The Better India, he says, “I was looking to volunteer with government schools, when I learned about the Akshara Foundation. It fit my need to what to teach kids science, using practical and fun ways.”

And what is his method of teaching them?

When the program was launched, Akhsara Foundation together with the Lego foundation, gave the children a robotics kit. Using this, they are able to build and program robots. Sridhar only steps in when they need help.

“I believe the best way to learn a concept is through application. When the kids need my help, I step in, but otherwise they are able to figure most stuff out.”

How did he raise funds for them?

In order to take the four students to Japan, Sridhar needed Rs 5 lakh. As that was not a small sum of money, he decided to crowdfund as much of it as possible. He collected Rs 2.40 lakh through crowdfunding portal Keto, raised funds from friends and the rest it was from his own pocket – this barring his own expenses, which he obviously footed.

You may also like: Meet Jitendra Mane, Who Teaches Rural Children Despite His Crippling Disability

The only disappointing result of this entire project is that the girls dropped out of the team. This was because of the restrictions imposed by the school and their families. Sridhar’s dream is to mentor an all girls team and have them represent the country one day!

Sridhar says that the only goal on the team and his mind is to win an international competition. Even though they did not win the Robo Cup at Nagoya, the outcome has not deterred them from continuing to try harder. Sridhar says their timeline is the next two years and then – it’s world domination!

Here are the Master Minds with one of their creations. The boys watch on as their robot dances to the famous Mission Impossible soundtrack!

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In a small village in Rajasthan’s Dausa district, about 55 km from Jaipur, two government school teachers are transforming the lives of students from economically weaker sections, over the last six years.

The married couple, Vinod (41) and Seema Meena (39) have been training underprivileged graduates to crack competitive examinations, free of cost and earn government jobs in Rajasthan and across India.

Inspired by Anand Kumar’s Super 30, the couple’s ‘Nishulk Guidance Classes,’ has helped over 300 underprivileged students secure government jobs in the police, railways, banks and other Staff Selection Commission recruitments from 2011.

They run the free coaching classes purely on their salaries and sometimes with help from Vinod’s parents.

The couple selects 60 students after a screening process, and they are then trained in subjects like English, mathematics, science, general knowledge and logical reasoning for three months. The classes last for four hours daily – except on Sundays.

They spend over Rs 20,000 per month from their own salary to cover the rent of the premises and stationery.

From an initial batch of 43 students in 2011, the couple has come a long way. Despite the success, they refuse to register their ‘institute’ as an NGO.

Inspiration behind the initiative:

It was Vinod’s own experience as a child belonging to an economically weaker section that inspired him to start the initiative. As a student in class six, he had to borrow a meagre amount of Rs 50 from a moneylender just to buy school textbooks and uniform.

An IAS aspirant himself, Vinod appeared thrice for the interview rounds of the UPSC’s civil service examination, but could not succeed.

Speaking to the Indian Express, Vinod shares, “I appeared in the IAS interview thrice but could not crack it. It was after this that I decided to share my knowledge with the youths who are not able to afford coaching classes.”

Read more: This UP-Based Not-For-Profit is Fighting Malnutrition, One District at a Time

Challenges

When the couple started the coaching class, they were mocked by their villagers. But over the last few years, the perception of the villagers has changed.

“Earlier, villagers would laugh at us for wasting money and time, but later, people realised its importance and more teachers willing to impart education on no remuneration joined the mission. Now, a group of super-30 aspirants and super-60 are formed for select competitive exams,” they told The Tribune.

Even though many of these students get selected to subordinate services, the service is capable of uplifting their poor families.

Impact

It is an absolute delight to see students who made the cut extend their gratitude to the couple’s efforts.

One of the beneficiaries, Nishu Singh who got selected as a government teacher said, “The coaching tips and their simple way of teaching helped in getting the job, which could not have been possible without their help and support.”

Another student, Ajit Singh Gurjar who is posted as a soldier in Indian Army, said, “I, like several others in tribal areas, could not afford coaching classes. The efforts of the couple have made my life. It is a true service to the humanity.”

Connect to Nishulk Classes here or contact them at 09785925827.

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“It all started when I couldn’t clear my grade ten examination,” says Vikas Burungle, 29, from a village called Dahivadi in the Satara district of Maharashtra.

Vikas is from the Nath Panthi Davari – a community of nomads. At 18, he left his home and started to wander around neighbouring villages in search of a livelihood, struggling to make ends meet.
                             Vikas Burungle

“If you look at the history our community, along with several others, we have been migrating continuously and earn a bare minimum amount of money,” says Vikas, concerned about his future.

His troubles started when he had to quit his education because of his family’s poor financial condition. “I came to Gadhinglaj in the Kolhapur district of Maharashtra in 2004, and since then I’ve been on the lookout for an open space. Such spaces are usually where we setup our tents to stay, but this is always at the mercy of somebody else,” explains Vikas.

“The housing conditions are terrifying as rains destroy the tents completely and we have to spend days and nights in the rains without any shelter,” says 23-year-old Sambhaji, a relative of Vikas.

The people of Nath Panthi Davari Gosavi community have been categorized as nomadic tribes since members of the community are constantly migrating. “Independence hasn’t reached us, and we’ve been roaming around the country even after 70 years of Independence,” says Vikas.

Vikas repairs stoves across the countryside. A skill he learned from his father, who was illiterate, and travelled all over Maharashtra in search of work.

“Since, we travel continuously with no fixed place to stay, education always takes a back seat and this is how the vicious cycle of poverty continues,” says Vikas.

In order to find a permanent solution to this problem, Vikas decided that his family must settle down in Satara, and was firm about educating his children.

Remembering his grade ten days, he says, “Had my dad been educated, I would have never become a part of this ‘community’ business. Now, the only thing I can do to stop this is to educate my children.”

Vikas has three sons. The eldest son is in grade one, the second in kindergarten, and the youngest is two and a half years old. However, there are several obstacles in this path. He earns less than Rs 5500 every month – a meager amount of money that makes running his family and educating his children a difficult task.

Pained by his memories, he says, “There are a few good people who give us an open space to stay for a few months, while there are many others who completely ignore us and barely treat us like human beings.”

Vikas has stayed in a lot of villages in Maharashtra owing to his search for work. So far, he has been to Gargoti, Ajra, Ichalkaranji, Kagal, Gadhinglaj and Admapur.

His day starts at 07:00 AM, by carrying a box full of equipment on his old bike and traveling around neighbouring villages. “Now, since the usage of kerosene has stopped, the number of people using stoves has also come down. This has severely affected our services. So now, I am looking for a different job which will help me settle down in Satara,” he adds.

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Vikas is convinced that nobody will fight for him and it’s only his perseverance and determination that can bring about a change- no matter how small. “I’ll give my children whatever they want, but they should keep learning, and never forget the struggle their ancestors had to go through. I won’t let my children suffer and for this I am ready to work more than I can, but this practice of continuous migration will have to stop somewhere.”

Vikas, who cannot avail the benefits of reservation either, says, “My documents aren’t clear and this community barely knows about reservation. Whenever I go to a Government office, the first question they ask is about the registration of my name in any Panchayat across Maharashtra. Since, we keep travelling, there’s no village we belong to and so my name is not found in any Panchayat, which completely discards my application for reservation.”

While the problems are many and the well-off not very helpful, Vikas is channelizing his struggle with the golden step of educating his children!

By Sanket Jain

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Though lack of resources and facilities for providing good education in rural regions continues to remain a pressing issue in India, the village of Alavandi in Koppal district of Karnataka stands out among the rest.

Known to have played a significant role during the freedom struggle, today the village is more famous with each of its household having at least one teacher.

According to Times of India, as many as 900 individuals are involved in the field across Karnataka. While agriculture continues to remain the primary source of livelihood, people in Alavandi have a great regard towards education.

It was post the struggle for independence that made the leaders focus on equipping the village with better educational opportunities.

“After achieving independence, freedom fighter, Shivamurthy Swami Alavandi realised the village was deprived of education. By then, it had a government lower primary school, which had classes till class 4. He floated the Karnataka Vidya Vardhaka Samiti and established a primary school till class 7 in 1955. Then, the Karnataka Vidyalaya High School came up in 1968, and the pre-university college was introduced in 1981,” said A T Kalmath, who is a retired lecturer.

Another teacher from the village, Gururaj Patil, who has been on the field for the past 23 years proudly mentioned that each household in Alavandi has two or three teachers.

Everyone has some sort of inspiration that leads them to the path they eventually build their lives around. For Devaraddi Dambarahalli, inspiration came in the form of his teachers, and today he teaches in a school in Koppal.

Known personalities from the village include Professor Tejaswi Kattimani, who is the vice-chancellor of Indira Gandhi National Tribal University in Madhya Pradesh and writer T V Magalad.

With the younger generation equally driven to pursue the noble profession of teaching, looks like the legacy of Alavandi as the village of teachers will continue to hold.

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India has made progress in raising enrolment rates for primary education. But schools have not been very successful at preventing dropouts. This is an equally, if not more, important measure of education standards.

We can measure educational standards through the 2016 Annual States of Education Report (ASER) survey. This is a household survey of schooling and learning levels in rural India.

The survey was conducted across India and included over 5,60,000 children between three and 16 years, in 589 districts of India. Hence the results of the survey can be taken as a reasonable estimate of the ground reality.

According to the report, 3.5% of 11-14 years old and 13.5% of 15-16 years old children were dropouts. While over 25% of children in grades I to VIII were absent from school on the day a team visited the school.

Such figures could very well have been true for the tribal village of Jhada Aduwa in Udaipur district, Rajasthan. But everything changed thanks to an initiative by two youth from the village.

They used a dilapidated building as a makeshift school and started urging the dropped out students to return to school.

“We make them learn alphabets and counting and tell them stories. Once they are old enough to walk to the government middle school by themselves, they get direct admission in a suitable class depending on their age,” Sonu Meena, 20, told the Hindustan Times.

Meena and her friend run the school and do not charge the students. They say they are doing this only to ensure that they empower children.

This is a stellar example of how an individual or group has the power to bring about positive change. Seeing the enthusiasm of the students in this makeshift school, government officials have come forward and pledged their support to the school.

Udaipur (rural) MLA Phool Singh Meena and Sarpanch Ramesh Damor are leading the effort.

Here are four ways to curb student dropouts from school:

1. Cultivate a meaningful relationship with the student

It is important for the educator not just to teach but also show empathy and care enough for any problem that the student might be facing. This can happen only if the educator builds a rapport with the student.

2. Make learning relevant and up-to-date

While it is essential to get the basics concepts right, educators must ensure that they make learning not just interesting but also relevant and fun.

A student will want to come back to a class in which they get more than just what the textbook states.

3. Work around their schedules

You must remember that the school functions to educate children. Therefore it becomes even more important to schedule classes at times when the students can make it. In some cases, students might be performing daily chores at home and might not be able to make it to class early in the morning. Be open to trying out various schedules.

4. Offer them incentives they can relate to

For a child in the village, a good meal might be a great incentive to get them to come to school. For some other child, a drawing book with colour may be interesting. Ensure that you engage and keep them all motivated.

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In India, many initiatives are dependent on tens of thousands of volunteers who give up their time, and sometimes comfortable lives, to make life better for strangers in need. So why do they do it?

A young reader of The Better India shared with us her thoughts about why she felt everyone should give it a shot. Here’s what she has to say –

If you look around yourself, you’ll find your family members, friends, neighbours and colleagues cribbing about problems.

“There’s so much of pollution”, “India isn’t going anywhere”, “In spite of the Right to Education, the level of illiteracy hasn’t improved”, “The medical facilities are poor”, so on and so forth.

The complaints are endless, but those making them choose to keep their hands in their pockets. Now, it’s your choice. Will you be one among them? Or, will you get your hands dirty and bring some change?

Growing up in a metropolitan city and living in a middle class family provided me with all the good things of life, and till a certain point of time, I never really thought of looking at the other side.

After completing my Masters, I got the opportunity to be a part of an organization which works with government schools in rural Rajasthan. I moved to a tribal part of the state, which seldom appears on the map of India. But thousands of people live there. And they have an otherwise happy life without even basic necessities!

For me, it was an entire process of unlearning, finding out about the ingredients of happiness, and a new meaning to life.

It was during that time when I realized that if I dream of a better India, I can’t be blind to the poor in this country. If we want to grow, we have to all grow together.

Here’s is how volunteering changed the way I look at life. And it can do the same for you as well –

Learn to give without expecting anything in return.

It’s a feeling of unadulterated happiness to see the sheer joy in someone’s face who probably will never be able to repay you for your deeds. If you have problems with the growing illiteracy in the country, call the kids of your house-help and teach them during the weekends.

If you think it’s working, you can slowly pull in the kids of the neighbor’s help as well. For once, take the leap and do something without expecting anything. (This time, you’ll probably get the best returns!)

Change the system, rather than accepting whatever is going on.
Some of us have had the privilege of going to schools and getting a formal education. Now the question is, why do children from underprivileged societies refrain from going to schools, in spite of free education provided by the government?

After visiting several rural schools, I realized they have a poor teacher student ratio (sometimes it is as low as 1:40), the classrooms are in ruins, the mid-day meal is nearly tasteless.

Coupled with reasons such as working on farms and babysitting younger siblings, many children are deprived of an education.

Now, drastic changes cannot happen overnight, but if steps are taken in the right direction, it can be inevitable. There are several organizations like Teach For India, Kaivalya Education Foundation, CRY and Pratham, that are working towards improving the infrastructure of government schools, and you can join them to contribute in whichever way you can.

Appreciating the little things in life.

Waking up every day with a roof over your head, meals to satisfy your hunger, a loving family, and supportive friends – there’s so much in life for which we should be grateful. Yet many of us are unhappy. This entire perspective might change once you walk into the lives of those who don’t even have the basic necessities of life.

According to a study by an international charity for orphaned and abandoned children, the number of orphans in India in 2011 was 20 million, which is expected to increase by 2021.

A majority of these kids become street dwellers and these are the ones you come across at traffic signals. Many NGOs have started Street Kids’ Schools in cities like New Delhi, Mumbai and Bengaluru, where you can volunteer and teach them lessons about how to lead a healthy life.

Being a volunteer in a tribal area of Rajasthan, I realized how difficult life can be, for those who don’t even have a proper meal on a day-to-day basis. It was then that I learned not to waste food, because there are many in my country who goes to sleep, hungry.

It’s only when you get to see some things closely, you’ll appreciate the bigger things.

Know that there are still good people in this world.

There’s war and hatred – but there’s love as well! When you volunteer, you’ll meet several inspirational people.

I met a group of Dutch students who volunteered at a slum school in New Delhi through an organization called Volunteering India and got to know that they visit India every year, to work in slum schools, and it’s something that gives them immense satisfaction.

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They were all High School students, accompanied by two teachers. We worked together and our main goal was to ensure that the kids take interest in the lessons and don’t drop out of the school.

During my interaction with one of their teachers, I got to know that they had organized ‘Fundraising Dinners’ in their country to raise money. With that they got blackboards, carpets, water purifiers and air coolers for slum schools.

The way we get inspired by reading others’ stories, we can also inspire people to follow our footsteps and take up a cause.

I learned it was very easy to to complain about the problems, but much harder to be a part of the solution. Find a cause that you feel the most strongly about, and take a step towards resolving it.

By Riyanka Roy

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Four-year-old Lokesh is the son of a blind father who has a government allowance of Rs.350 a month. Ayush’s father, a cobbler, wishes his fate doesn’t befall on his child. Jhanvi’s mother, a cook, struggles to make ends meet and by no means could she afford the fees of a good school.

More than 5500 children like Lokesh, Ayush and Jhanvi are now going to the most reputed schools of Raipur.

Raipur’s efforts to change the poor implementation of The Right to Education Act (RTE) in the city have helped children from underprivileged families have a fair chance at a good education, which is also free of cost.

The RTE Act reserves 25% of seats in private and government aided schools for children from poor and disadvantaged backgrounds – a fantastic provision that opens the doors for inclusive education.

But as promising as it sounds, the on-ground implementation of this provision has suffered thanks to corruption. When IAS member, OP Choudhury, took charge as the District Collector in Raipur last year, he started evaluating its effectiveness in the capital city.

“We found that many schools were indulging in malpractices to avoid the intake of poor children. They showed fake admissions to avail government grants, claimed they did not receive applications for RTE category, showed favouritism in allotting the reserved seats, and hijacked the seats from the truly deserving.

The recorded data of RTE admissions was completely fudged and we did not know how many children actually got admissions through RTE. The saddest part was that these malpractices compromised the future of many poor children who could otherwise have got a chance at good education. We wanted to change this forever so that the every child gets an equal opportunity at education”, says OP Choudhury.

The District Collector and his team decided that they will use technology to build a truly transparent system for RTE admissions.

The Collector allotted an amount of Rs. 17 lakhs towards this initiative that they called ‘RTE Pardarshi’, meaning ‘transparent’.

A centralized system was developed that would allot seats to the nursery, Kindergarten 1 and Kindergarten 2 classes based on an algorithm and not on human whims and fancies. The online system gave people a clear view of how many seats were available and in which schools. Parents could also apply to multiple schools of their choice for their children.

The District Administration gained tremendous support from volunteer groups that reached out to poor families and also spreading the word were many workshops, school events, and radio and TV programmes.

A dedicated helpline was up to support the queries of the parents. A total of 80 centres helped families in filling the online applications. The team kept the offline applications open too, but surprisingly 90% of the applications for this academic year were submitted online – a testimony to the trust that the online system gained among the poor families.

On an announced date the entire allotment of seats was by the system and announcement of the admissions was made through SMS to the mobile phones of the parents. With the entire process going online, no bogus admissions could be made, no favouritism was possible, no one held discretionary powers on who gets admission and who does not, and 5589 truly deserving poor children got admissions in top tier schools of Raipur.

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Last year, though the records aren’t completely believable owing to the falsifications, an estimated 2800 seats were allotted through RTE. With the new system, the admissions have more than doubled.

Starting this academic year, from the nursery till Class 8, these children will be provided eleven years of education – completely free of cost! This comes in where the annual fees in the private schools in Raipur come up to anywhere between Rs. 30,000 to 1.5 lakh per year. 

The government will reimburse the schools for an amount of Rs. 7000 per child every year.  

The system, with its centralized database, now has a complete view of RTE admissions across the city and holds the private and aided schools accountable for the RTE admissions. This is a complete shift from the manual admission process that was marred by malpractices.

To sustain the robustness of RTE implementation, a tracking mechanism will also be introduced to monitor the attendance and progress of the children. Realising that adapting to new environments would not be a cakewalk for the children, the District administration is also seeking the help of volunteers to provide special community-based tuitions.

These tuitions will also be offered to government school children. Raipur is also working towards improving the quality of education in government schools by converting 100 government schools into smart schools.

You can write to the District Collector of Raipur, OP Choudhury, at opcias@gmail.com

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The murder of a seven-year-old in a reputed Gurugram school’s premises and the rape of a five-year-old girl by a school peon in Delhi have opened a Pandora’s box of concerns.

Parents now worry about the physical safety, mental and emotional health of their wards as well as its security and well-being.

Alarmed by the gruesome incidents, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) issued a new set of security-related guidelines on Tuesday, that are to be followed by educational institutions across the country, lest they face the perils of being derecognised.

“The onus for safety and security of children in school campus shall solely lie upon the school authorities. It is a fundamental right of a child to engage and study in an environment where he/she feels safe and is free from any form of physical or emotional abuse or harassment,” the directive said.

Following are the guidelines issued in the circular posted by CBSE:

1. The schools should strive to promote a better understanding amongst their teachers and staff on the laws protecting the safety, security and interests of the students and devise means to take immediate remedial and punitive action against such violations.

2. The staff members should also be educated to recognise their protective obligation towards students and to ensure safety and well being of children in schools.

3. Get the security /safety audit done on their premises and personnel from their respective local police station and follow the security related advice for the safety of school children. This may be compiled and reported online on the CBSE website within two months of receipt of the circular.

4. Install CCTV Cameras at all vulnerable are as/point in the school premises and ensure they are functional at all times.

5. They must get the police verification, and psychometric evaluation is done for all the staff employed. Such verification and evaluation for non-teaching staff such as bus drivers, conductors, peon and other support staff may be done very carefully and in a detailed manner.

6. Ensure that supporting staff is employed only from authorized agencies and proper records are maintained.

7. To constitute a parent-teacher-students committee to address the safety needs of the students and to take regular feedback from parents in this regard.

8. The access to school building by outsiders should be controlled and visitors monitored.

9. To provide training and development for staff to address their responsibilities to protect children from any form of abuse.

10. The school shall constitute separate committees for redressal of public/staff/parents/students grievances, Internal Complaints committee on sexual harassment and committees under POCSO Act and details of these committees along with contact details shall be displayed prominently on School Notice Board and conspicuously on the school website for information of all stakeholders.

11. All schools affiliated with CBSE are at this moment directed to strictly adhere to all the guidelines issued by Ministry of Human Resource Development and Board from time to time. Any violation/lapses about safety and well being of children in school campus would invite appropriate action including the disaffiliation of the school as per the provisions under Affiliation Bye-Laws of the Board.

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“I“ didn’t know what iron was. But you have to find your passion when you are young and take an interest in it. After that, you put in countless hours and never let it go. You’ll conquer it. And no matter what, never stop,” says Bhimrao Patil, a 72-year-old mechanical engineer, looking back on his struggles.

Poverty closed all doors, but Bhimrao did not let that stop him from becoming an engineer. He decided to learn on the job by choosing a path less travelled – one of tremendous struggle.

“I am the first person in my family who managed to pass grade VII,” says Bhimrao as he introduces himself to me.

Bhimrao was 15 when he discovered his passion for engineering. Born into a poverty stricken family, fate continued to be cruel when he lost his father and then had to take on many responsibilities.

Talking about his in days in grade seven, Bhimrao says, “I could only attend school for four months and didn’t even have the money to fill the exam form. I worked for 12 hours on a farm over the weekends and earned Rs 1. However, there was a teacher named Mr Chavan who gave me books to study and made me take the exams, which I managed to successfully clear .”

Bhimrao had no money to continue his education. After passing grade VII, he started to cut sugarcane for Sugar Mill Bawada, 25 km away from his home at Sajani village in Kolhapur district in Maharashtra. He then worked as a labourer in the fields of others for a year.

Eventually, he got a job in the Maharashtra State Electricity Board (MSEB) where he fixed electricity lines.

“After two years of back breaking labour, I was offered the job of a permanent wireman by MSEB. But it was in Pune, where I could not relocate because of pressing family reasons.”

However, the inability to move to Pune changed Bhimrao’s life, bringing him closer to his destiny. He started working as a helper in a local lathe machine factory in Ichalkaranji town. Bhimrao walked 22 km to and fro every day to learn the basics of machines.

The turning point was when his boss refused to let him work on a machine. Humiliated by the experience, Bhimrao says, “That was the day I became passionate about machines. At the time my salary was not more than Rs 20 per month. But I felt one day I could buy many such machines.”

He moved to a different company where he was paid Rs 30 every month for 16 hours of work. Later he worked at the Panchganga Sugar Factory, where he was given the role of fitting boilers and maintaining machines.

At the factory, he was paid a daily wage of Rs 2.5 daily, and only offered a permanent job after two years.

In 1969, his ex-boss came to him desperately asking for help.

“He placed Rs 300 at home and offered me a salary of Rs 90 per month, and begged me to join immediately to solve the crisis,” recalls Bhimrao.

Bhimrao worked two jobs, one during the day and the other into the night. “I did two jobs for a month which involved 19 hours of work every day, and I used to walk 11 km to reach my home at 2 in the morning,” says Bhimrao.

“In those 8 hours, I managed to complete work that would take two days, and for this month long project I was offered Rs 250,” added Bhimrao.

He proudly says that for more than 50 years now, he has never worked less than 16 hours and says his hard work is the reason behind his success. Working under much pressure and tight deadlines, Bhimrao recalls, “Somewhere around 1984, our company got an order to deliver 30 engines. However, by the 15th of the month, only 15 engines were ready, and the boss asked me to complete the rest in the next 14 days. I toiled from 8 AM to 3 in the morning, managing to assemble all the engines by 28th.

Over a period of 52 years, Bhimrao has never worked for less than 16 hours a day which gives him more than a quarter of a million hours of technical experience. Bhimrao has visited more than 20 cities to assemble and design machines at several international mechanical expos.

During the 80s there was a special machine called the Honing. The USA was a leading manufacturer of the machine.

“No Indian company used to make the system. Its delivery from the USA would cost a lot and take at least six months. One day my boss asked me to design the machine by opening it. We had no computers back then. With the help of a few engineers, I took a month to open the machine and draw the corresponding parts. Meanwhile, I made a mental note of all the information. In three months, we were able to design that machine successfully,” says Bhimrao.

Today, Bhimrao works at a factory in Mangaon, has more than a quarter of a million hours of technical experience and has visited more than 20 cities to assemble and design machines at several international mechanical expos.

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He attributes all his success to his 68-year-old wife, Mrs Shalan Patil. He proudly addresses her as the agriculture minister of the house, since she was the one who managed the family’s land over all of these years.

Shalan says, “Sometimes Bhimrao wouldn’t return home for months because of work. But I never feared and managed the agricultural work.”

Bhimrao has designed more than 5000 machines till date and is working on his dream project – an automobile. He says this can help keep the environment pollution free.

He believes that knowledge comes from everywhere. People just need to chase their curiosity.

Whether attending several international computer expos or travelling to various states, Bhimrao follows one basic principle:

“Remove the word ‘no’ from your mind, fuel your passion and never feel sad if you don’t know enough. Keep learning and work without any age barrier.”

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Chemistry Nobel laureate Venkatraman Ramakrishnan recently said that India ought to spend more time thinking about education, particularly in science and technology, and not be caught up in “all this sectarian squabble about who eats what kind of meat”.

Truer words haven’t been spoken in the near past.

In India, free and compulsory education is a fundamental right to children between the ages of 6 and 14, and it not only encompasses tuition costs but even uniforms, books, stationery and other requisites for a wholesome education.

Sadly, intent and implementation barely resemble each other here. Poor facilities, skewed student-teacher ratios and mounting expenses make school less enticing for an already vulnerable group of children.

But criticism is free. What costs us is working to bring about tangible change in a messy system.

“If we really what to make an impact on a large scale, as far as education is concerned, then we have to work with governments because of their sheer scale,” says Nitin P Khanna.

Nitin P Khanna is the brains behind an initiative called Bharat Learn that aims to retain students in government schools, as well as enhance their learning experience.

While millions of children become adults without ever entering the gates of a school, there is an equal number that does not complete school either.

They drop out to work and make ends meet, and in the case of the girl child – because she has hit puberty. And poor facilities and disengaging teaching only compound the high dropout rates we have.

Nitin, an engineer, while working as a training consultant with Reebok, realised that training staff from many parts of rural India was a challenge. This was on account of language barriers and the lack of a sound education. It was after this incident that Nitin realised a more nuanced approach is necessary while teaching kids right from the stage of primary schooling.

“Skills do not exist in isolation. A solid foundation is needed,” says Nitin.

The genesis of Bharat Learn or the Smart Classes initiative was around the year 2013.

The program is active in 15 schools in the Singrauli district of Madhya Pradesh. As per a Government of Madhya Pradesh baseline survey in 2016 of educational outcomes in state schools, Singrauli ranked 50th out of 51 districts in MP.

It was for this reason that Nitin and his colleagues decided to narrow down on Singrauli to for the pilot.

So what is Bharat Learn and how or why is it different from all the other NGO driven reformation programs that exist in India?

Bharat Learn uses films with educational content to enhance the learning and teaching experience. Videos that break down concepts in the simplest form are played for children. The entire program consists of student videos, teacher videos, practice sheets and comic books.

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These Smart Class content, or any other content for that matter, would be incomplete if just given to schools by itself. The entire course is designed for rural and semi-urban classrooms. The program ensures the availability of a 40” smart TV, a computer and printer, a 600-watt solar power support where schools do not have power, and staff who train the teachers who use the equipment.

It has been less than a year since the program is in effect and already Nitin says the average attendance in all the 15 schools has gone up and parents have started to send kids to public schools as opposed to low-cost private schools. His dream is to see that it spreads to four states and 1500 schools over the next five years.

Bharat Learn is currently funded by the CSR wings of companies, but for the initiative to prove its success, it is in want of much more funds. If you can help Nitin and children across India experience a more enriching education, then please click here. To do directly contact Nitin, you can email him at nitin@bharatlearn.org

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How many of us still feel the jitters when thinking about Trigonometry? Ask any engineer about Fourier transforms, and Laplace transforms, and it is highly probable that you will see a pained look on their face.

To change this is the mission of Premanand Sethurajan, Founder-Director of Let’s Make Engineering Simple.

By founding this organisation, he aims to make science accessible and understandable to everyone. He says everything in life has a science behind it if you look closely.

“The buildings around us conform to the laws of trigonometry – if one can simplify and exemplify concepts, the students can grasp and retain even the most abstract of theory.”

Prem belongs to a village called Thinaikulam, in Tamil Nadu. Having completed his basic school education from his village, he went on to pursue engineering, like most students in his vintage.

Speaking to The Better India, Prem says, “I studied electronic engineering and went on to work in HCL. That was my first job.”

His journey continued, and he moved to the United States where he was working in the aviation and aerospace industry for several years.

Working with some of the best companies meant rubbing shoulders with the world’s best engineering minds, and that made Prem realise that the shortcomings of his education and the education system in India.

“It was during my stint in the U.S. that I realised that while I remembered the theoretical concepts, and had the requisite marks, my knowledge and sense of application of many theories were nearly non-existent.”

In India, he says, we study for the marks rather than to gain knowledge. The applicability of knowledge, however, was where Indian engineers had issues. He realised that one needed to make science interesting and relatable to real life and that led to the creation of a YouTube channel called – Let’s Make Engineering Simple.

“On August 19, 2014, I published the first video on YouTube which was based on Bernoulli’s principle, something that all engineering students are familiar with in theory but not in practice. I demonstrated this principle with the help of a bottle of deodorant.”

The likes, comments, and shares that this video got encouraged Prem to take the channel further.

Interestingly, for many who aspire to migrate to the U.S., Prem was living the American dream.

However, after a lot of deliberation, passion prevailed, and Prem decided to move back to India to work in the education space.

“For me, this decision was not something I arrived at overnight. I had been thinking about it for almost a year when I decided to move back finally. It took a while to convince my parents. No one was able to understand immediately why I would give everything I had in the U.S. up for teaching.”

Eventually, Prem’s father became his support. Prem says, “My father was confident of my educational qualification. He would always say ‘go ahead and live your dreams’, in case you feel you aren’t making progress you always have your education, and that will get you a steady job again.”

The key objective of LMES is to make the students and teachers understand how to apply every scientific concept and principle that they learn and teach.

Speaking about the importance of good educators, he says, “When I was in grade 12, I had a teacher by the name Peter Paul Sahayaraj. It was his passion in teaching physics that instilled in me the enthusiasm to learn. When I was unable to understand concepts, he would break it down and explain it in a very simple manner.”

What started off as a single man’s passion has today resulted in the opening of the LMES academy. LMES has worked with 63 schools so far and has reached around 7,500 students.

The target students are the secondary level students and college-goers. Social media platforms like YouTube and Facebook have played a very important role in his growth.

Prem says, “Even though only a very small segment of the students have full access to the Internet, social media platforms are a great way to reach many. LMES has about 1,50,000 subscribers, and most of them are students who are looking for new content and teachers who want to make a change in their teaching methodology.”

Feeling the impact that their work is doing is what motivates team LMES. “Everyday we get many e-mails from students and even teachers thanking us for what we are doing.”

If you wish to subscribe to LMES’s YouTube channel, click here.

To like their Facebook page, click here.

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The crisis in which the Rohingya community has found itself deeply muddled in, is undoubtedly one of the worst cases of human rights infringement in present times.

With hundreds being killed by the military in Myanmar, the remaining families have been on a lookout for the slightest opportunity to flee from the country that had once been home.

Despite hostile and apathetic treatment, many have found refuge in camps erected by neighbouring countries like Bangladesh and India. Though things are not very rosy, for the Rohingyas, it’s all about survival amidst adverse situations.

However, a night school in the Rohingya settlement at Balapur, Telangana, is something one would have never imagined.

Standing as a beacon of hope amidst a struggle for survival, the school is helping the community learn the basics of Math and English.

Most members of the community do not speak any other language than their own. This is proving quite a handicap for the community while looking for jobs.

Coming to the rescue is ‘Masterji’, who is also one of the throngs of refugees from Myanmar. Unable to take up daily-wage labour jobs because of a leg injury, the man has been taking classes for a group of 42 students, which includes 20 adults.

“The Burmese army broke my leg. I am imparting the little education I know to children and adults for a meagre salary I receive from the people themselves, which is usually ₹50 to ₹100,” said the 35-year-old Shamsul Alam to The New Indian Express.

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The classes are held under an asbestos-covered shed for which the community pays ₹2,000 as rent. Illuminated with a single 100-watt bulb, Shamsul begins his ‘school’ in the evening, which goes on until 11 pm in the night. More than teaching Spoken English, Shamsul takes a special interest in assisting children.

Though these kids can receive basic primary education from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) school that is within walking distance, the lack of citizenship prevents them from availing any higher education—be it from local government schools or private colleges.

The school symbolises the prick of light at the end of the tunnel for the Rohingyas. Facing discernment from every nook and corner, the community fending for itself amidst adverse situations is indeed a story worth appreciation.

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Holding a Master’s degree is no big feat in today’s day and age. But for Bareilly’s Raj Kumar Vaishya, it is indeed a lifetime achievement.

Following the announcement of results for the final year examinations of Masters programme on Monday, Raj Kumar can now proudly call himself a postgraduate degree holder in Economics.

In case you are wondering what is the entire buzz about, Raj Kumar is 97 years old!

Born in 1920, the man had graduated from Agra University all the way back in 1938. And 79 years later, he successfully completed his second innings in higher studies.

His earnest dedication and love for education led to his name finding a place in the Limca Book of Records for being the oldest person in the country to pursue an MA in Economics.

Despite his advanced age, he sought no additional privilege and appeared for the exams like any regular student. Father of three sons, all of whom are retired central government employees, Raj Kumar’s achievement has left even the University officials astounded.

“His zeal and dedication to pursue education is worthy of emulation by one and all”, SP Sinha, who is the University Registrar, told Hindustan Times.

Celebrating his achievement, officials personally went to his residence to congratulate and present him with the mark sheet of the MA examination.

Meanwhile, Raj Kumar’s grandsons rushed home to treat their highflier grandfather with sweets, as soon as they came to know about the results.

The nonagenarian, however, has only one grievance. Having secured second division, he only wishes that had he appeared for the exams earlier; he would have made it in the first division.

“I thank my daughter-in-law Professor Bharti S Kumar, former head of history at Patna University, for regularly standing by my side. She even discontinued watching the serials and movies of her choice on television just to keep me undisturbed,” he told HT.

His daughter-in-law, in turn, is all praises for the old man.

Lauding him for always having encouraged children to pursue education with utmost sincerity, Bharti also added that he had become a role model for everyone in the society.

The man now plans on spending his time writing about socio-economic issues, with a special focus on subjects like poverty and unemployment.

Talk about age being just a number!

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TEACH, or the Training and Educational Centre for Hearing impaired is an initiative that helps deaf students from vernacular medium schools. It also assists them with higher education and professional advice.

Students, who have studied in vernacular languages, are trained for three years in English & Maths, starting from grade 10, which prepares them for their higher secondary exams (H.S.C) in English.

The criteria to appear in the H.S.C exam in the Maharashtra Board is to clear the English language exam in the S.S.C boards. However, members of TEACH realized that most of these students were taught the equivalent of grade 1 or 2 English and hence, were not equipped to take the H.S.C examination.

TEACH also partners with individual schools to teach kids from grade 7 upwards, to supplement their existing syllabus.

Since TEACH aspires to be the stepping stone for educational success today and tomorrow; the team strategised to reach out to the students in schools and teach them English.

Learning English in school will help them save the first year from the three-year program of higher education. English being the universal language of communication, our aim through ELP is to help the students have a strong English written communication and the required knowledge to lead their life independently.

There are very few deaf people employed in corporate or government jobs as not many qualify/ meet the criteria to be placed in these organisations. The differently abled quota (job) for deaf goes unclaimed as they do not meet the necessary educational qualification for these opportunities.

TEACH wants deaf children to use the opportunity and be eligible for jobs that can have them placed in government & corporate jobs.

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They implement the Indian Sign Language (ISL) in their teaching and communication with the students.

The initiative adopts the methodology of “Total Communication” a blend of sign language and oral communication for educating children.

Also, it involves volunteers from top B-schools and colleges well equipped with knowledge sharing skills and will to support.

The initial plan is to reach out to the children all over Mumbai and then extend its reach to the rest of the nation.

By Heena Singh

The team is working and tapping in to each and every possible kind of donation, funding and
means to raise funds which will encourage the students to dream a better future. Along with
reaching out to students in Mumbai, TEACH plans to spread its footprint across cities in the near
future to cater to as many students as possible. To do so they will need help, support, contribution
and encouragement from all quarters.

If you want to reach out to them, click here.

If you would like to support the organisation, please click here.

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“During my days in school and college, I saw first hand what the lack of funds and resources could do to a family. From being a family that had had enough and more, overnight we became one that had to scrape even the last morsel off our plate to feed our hunger. It was only because of the help of my good-hearted friends that I managed to complete my education”, says Taruna Vidhay.

After an upbringing like that, 30-year-old Taruna made it her life’s mission to help those in need.

She recently took a sabbatical from being a bank manager of a leading public sector bank and has been working towards helping a group of street kids in Indirapuram in Ghaziabad.

It all began in 2012 when Taruna started teaching and spending time with a group of street-kids.

“I would finish my work by 5 pm each day and rush to be with them. I would spend at least three to four hours every day with them. We would learn, eat together, sing and dance,” she said.

What began as something that Taruna would do after work hours soon consumed her entire time, energy, and finances.

Speaking about her family, she says, “Initially there was a lot of pressure to settle down and get married. However, I made it very clear that whoever I marry must accept the work I do and the amount of time and money I dedicate to these children.”

It has taken a long while, but her family is now both supportive and appreciative of the work she does. They now say that they are glad that she is doing something for those who cannot fend for themselves. They understand that she learnt it the hard way and are happy to see the results of her work.

For Taruna these children have become a part of who she is.

Taruna and her group of friends ensure that they make learning fun for all the kids. The youngest child who comes to them is Chandni, all of two-years-old and the oldest child is Aslam who is 17-years-of-age.

Aslam, in fact, helps his family by managing a small roadside shop and in between his work hours he ensures that he comes to class as well.

Speaking about the children she says, “Some of the kids who come to us go to government schools. But unfortunately given that the standard and teaching methodology is very poor in these schools, they have stopped going to school.”

Taruna and her friends have started providing the students with one meal. She says the food, in some cases, is a big motivation for the parents to send them to her ‘school’.

“For parents who are unable to provide the children with even one proper meal, this is a blessing. We are happy that we get these students to come into the school even if it is for the need of food.”

In 2015, Taruna and her friends established an NGO, which they named the Nirbhed foundation. It is now under this umbrella that they function.

Taruna shares with me how disciplined these children are. “They are told once that all the younger kids will eat first followed by the older ones. The older ones will ensure that they feed the younger ones before picking up their own plate.”

“The camaraderie and love between them is truly unique.”

If you wish to make a difference and contribute towards making the lives of these children better, here are some of the ways you can help:

1. If you live in Ghaziabad and are left with excess food, then you could call +91-9599044255.

2. If you would like to make a contribution – food items, or even pre-owned clothes and books, please contact them at +91-9599044255.

3. For making a monetary contribution, you can head to the Milaap page where Taruna is raising funds.

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Hope is an alien concept if you’re born in Dehradun’s Bindal slum, lining the side banks of the unpredictable Bindal river. Your parents are mostly daily wage labourers working at construction sites. In most cases, the father is addicted to alcohol. Your parents – if both are working – leave for work early in the morning. The eldest female sibling is left to fend for the younger ones. Food is a luxury. A lot of the earnings, meager to begin with, are spent on alcohol and it’s not uncommon for women to drink either. Addiction to whiteners is found among children as young as 5 or 6.

Your surroundings don’t offer much hope either. Filth is your mainstay. Children of all shapes, sizes and ages – unkempt and unattended – scamper around barefoot along with stray dogs and pigs, begging or making their way to the closest temple to find a meal. Garbage heaps abound; drain water overflows; the stench makes you sick and the shanty dwellings look shaky as paper.

If it rains heavily, there’s a high possibility that you may lose your house.

It was November 2008 when the word ‘hope’ made its first intrusion in the Bindal slum. Shaila Brijnath (returned to India at the age of 44 after 40 years overseas) came across a few women who were trying to teach around 30 kids in an unused car parking and decided to plunge in. Brijnath, now 53, had left behind a financially rewarding but ‘soul-destroying’ career as a stockbroker in New York, Paris and London. She had her own savings, having earned ‘absurd salaries’ for years, but there was also support from a family trust – Aasraa – set up by her parents in Dehradun to do precisely the kind of work she had in mind.

Brijnath, who chairs the trust now, soon changed the face of the parking lot and had a small but efficient teaching operation in place.

Realising how deeply malnourished the children were, she started using hot milk and bananas as ‘bribe’ to lure kids – a strategy they deploy even today.

At around the same time as Brijnath was consolidating her own initiative (the unused parking lot had grown to house 130 kids), Neelu Khanna, now 60, had been offered a ‘Rain Basera’ in the center of Dehradun city to use during the day to teach street children.

She and a co-worker had started out by teaching around 15 street kids on the pavement of a busy street, much to the bewilderment of residents, pedestrians and the children themselves.

But even with a small number of children, Khanna faced two huge barriers – winning the children’s trust and getting them to leave their territory. The latter sounds rather simple when compared with the first, but it isn’t.

Across the pavement was Gandhi Park, one of the largest parks of the city, with trees and grass to sit on, but the children refused to budge. “Street children are so territorial that we couldn’t even get them to cross the street”. Initially despite the torrential rains, they refused the Rain Basera, saying it felt like a jail. But the only thing stronger than fear is hope, and slowly but surely, the children began to trust Khanna.

A chance meeting took place between Brijnath and Khanna – something that would change the fortunes of 1,800 street and slum children in Dehradun. What started out with 150 children during the inception in 2009, now encompasses 1,800 children across 17 total projects in the city.

The trust now has a full-time staff of 140.

When Rita, now 11, was 5, she spent most of her days playing near a shop in Chabil Bagh, a slum cluster where she lived. Her mother works as a cleaner in a few houses and her father is a stone-cutter. With four brothers, her parents couldn’t afford to send her to school and being a girl, she was considered more useful at home. After much persuasion, Aasraa’s outreach team managed to put Rita in their Shiv Sena center in Bindal slum area, and recently, the bright young girl was mainstreamed into Purkal Youth Development Society (PYDS), a CBSE school in the city that many locals consider better than the best local schools. She is in remedial classes but doing very well. Her life has changed drastically and even though Rita still does a lot of household chores and cooking, she loves her studies and is looking at a future she could never have imagined. The Aasraa team is working to convince the parents to allow her to stay in the school residential facilities so she can concentrate better on her studies.

Rita is one of the 19 children from Aasraa who have joined PYDS. Five to six of their girls – originally ragpickers – now attend Guru Ram Rai school. Many of the ragpickers continue to do their work, starting their day at 4 am and finishing their chores by the time school begins for the day. In this manner, over the last 8 years or so, 516 children have been mainstreamed by Aasraa; they now attend regular government and private schools in the city.

To start with, the Aasraa teams pulls children off the street and introduces them to the concept of basic literacy – Street Smart – and readies them for school. At the Shiv Sena center (there are two centers in Bindal and one at ISBT), around 75 children come in every day and are taught by three teachers.

A crèche for the very young at every center allows the older siblings to attend.

A large TV screen in one corner is teaching the children colour identification with a simple programme developed for their age. When this writer visits, the children’s attention wavers for a bit but all eyes are soon back on the screen. Most have never seen one and certainly not one this large. Television with its vivid images, the teacher explains, is what they look forward to most. There are two female helpers who look after the children, taking them to the toilet and looking after their general well-being. Twice a week, their hair and nails are examined and cut.

Although the main aim of Aasraa is to educate slum, street children and rag-pickers and give them a life worth living, it can’t educate in isolation. If a child is cold, hungry, sick or scared, how can he or she study, asks Brijnath.

As Aasra expanded, it kept its eye on nutrition, vaccination and inoculation (the Max group has done these for free), medication, de-addiction, clothing and care that they cannot or will not see at home. Close to 1100 children are fed by the trust every day through an external kitchen. They aim to start a centralised in-house kitchen soon. Four shelter homes provide a place to live for 300 children who are either orphans or have been abandoned.

Eight centers – premises that local schools have offered for free – are used to run a massive after-school tutorial and homework support programme with over 1100 children. This has around 900 Aasraa children but it also allows government school children who receive a very poor quality of education to benefit from it. There is a open school NIOS center – the first accredited center in the city – for children who are too old to join the regular schooling programme, but nonetheless want to study or do vocational training.

Four mobile vans target children who beg. These are mostly children who are not permitted by parents to leave a certain area, especially where Aasraa doesn’t have a center. The children are left out all day to beg and bring in their earnings. On finding these children, the Aasraa staff and outreach team visits and meets the parents to explain why the children should study instead of begging. Nine out of ten cases, parents relent.

But what is delightful to see is the outreach programme that tries to reach every possible child they can help.

In other words, if you are a street kid in Dehradun who is spotted by one of the Aasraa members, chances are someone will track down your family and pull you into their fold. No child is too much trouble for the outreach team – even if it takes a few months and several meetings with parents to convince them to allow their children to study instead of beg.

On the side of it all, there have been numerous other drives and activities they have organised. When Brijnath started working with the Bindal children, she found a large number of them were addicted to white spirit inhalation. “You could look into their eyes and see it. They would say ‘hello’ in this sing-song manner and sniff a cloth all the time”. The children were totally neglected with no view of the future. So Aasraa initiated a series of street plays for de-addiction to drive home the message to the children.

The scope seems unlimited as the organisation tends to respond more from its heart than its head.

So, the trust ends up taking to all kinds of children far beyond the purview of their regular work. Recently when they found 11-year-old Shivani, gravely ill, malnourished (20kg only) and abandoned at Doon hospital, they took charge of her, moved her to Synergy hospital, got three surgeries done, saved her life and have taken her into their shelter home. Sadly she is confined to a wheelchair. However, Shivani is now studying and very much a part of the Aasraa family.

Although Aasraa is currently restricted to Dehradun, support for its work has poured in from all over the world. The patrons of Fundacion Heres (a Spanish foundation), who have visited thrice, recently bought the trust their first-owned property in the Bindal area. Previously, they bought them large TV screens, computers, a van, scooters and photocopiers. Recently, Susan Blick, a New Zealand-based Australian photographer, found them on social media, came to Dehradun for the first time in September 2016 to see their work, took a series of stunning photographs of the children and used them to raise money for Aasraa in New Zealand. Blick says she is happy to see that the staff aren’t flying around the world and addressing talks on how to break the poverty cycle. Instead, they are “just doing it”.

Within India too, Aasraa has found support from both foundations and private donors.

Suhel Seth, managing partner of Counselage India, has been supporting them for years, and while he is yet to visit, he says it’s heart-warming to see the kids off the street and with an equal chance for the future.

It’s not as if they succeed with every child and every project. “Failure is part of it. Some kids have an attitude that is hard to change. And rather than letting one bad apple in, we prefer to accept defeat,” explains Khanna. Sometimes projects too start with gusto but fizzle out due to lack of vision, planning or funds. “But for every door that closes, a new door opens,” adds Brijnath, an eternal optimist, always brimming with energy.

If Aasraa has changed lives of hundreds, it has managed to do so for its two main pillars as well. Khanna, a cancer survivor and a mother of two, is finally working closely with the street and slum children she wanted to all her life, while Brijnath, unmarried but now with 1800 children, has found a new meaning to life that New York, London or Paris could never have provided.

This article was originally published in Business Standard.

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He was all of 33 when his friends, acquaintances, colleagues and the wider circle of people around him thought he’d taken leave of his senses.  And who really could blame them ?

The year was 2009.

An IIT Kharagpur engineer and IIM, Ahmedabad MBA Arghya Banerjee lived in Chennai with his wife and four year old daughter, worked at Irevna – a Standard and Poor’s equity research outsourcing company that later got acquired by Crisil – had built a career and reputation in his chosen field and had some savings to get by.

That’s when Banerjee decided to chuck it all up, return to his native town Suri in West Bengal’s Birbhum district and start a school.

He had no experience in running schools, had no degrees that teachers or school administrators typically acquired, he had no one chasing him to fund his “mad” idea and he really had no one patting his back, saying he was doing something noble.

What he did have was the support of his wife, a young daughter who could benefit in the bargain and a belief that education could be more than what he, she and several hundred million students in India receive.

Irevna – which he co-headed by the end of his stint – had grown from 5 to 500 people before his eyes and what he had noticed was that education failed to equip most with the skills needed to succeed. “Logical thinking and the ability to solve everyday problems were often missing; stuff one needs to learn in school was not to be found even in those with postgraduate degrees”, says he.

As is to be expected, everyone who encountered Banerjee and his plans was skeptical to begin with; many asking whether he had been fired from his job in Chennai. Some dismissed Banerjee as a nutcase or a madman but he has both his alma mater and his professional achievements to dispel any such notions.

He studied at a local government school for his formative years; yet he managed a state position in the JEE examination without coaching!. He couldn’t be as crazy as it appears.

And it all does appear rather crazy. Located in 2.5 acres, the 500-odd students at Levelfield – four and a half hours away from Kolkata – do none of the normal stuff. There are hardly any text books, no regular notes taken from black boards, no teachers dictating stuff ad nauseum – most of what you are used to seeing in traditional schools is missing.

Children in the classroom are encouraged to talk, discuss and argue and to think for themselves.

Class 1 and 2 students converse fluently in English, read and write it. This despite the fact that almost none of the parents speak the language and neither do any of their relatives or peers studying at other local schools.

Even with math, the approach is not to focus on only standard word problems but also Japanese puzzles, Sudoku and so on – a lot of this is done through apps developed especially for the students (not downloaded but developed). Tablets are provided in school itself that students use.

The first year or so – after he bought land and started building the school using his own savings – was spent developing unique content that simplifies even the most complex stories and thoughts to be understood by 4-7 year olds. As the children read a novel, they also filled in blanks, the focus always being on the why, what, how, where and when of things – not on cramming and rote.

But by the time the students reach Class 7-8, they are no longer absorbing simplified texts as their reading skills are advanced enough to proceed to original texts. So students in Class 8 don’t think that Orwell’s Animal Farm is a book aimed at cultivating a love for animals, they know and why Gulliver went on his travels and what it led to, they read and discuss books like Shawshank Redemption, Macbeth and Teacher Man.

Films are shown through the year and discussed at length. Grade 8 students watch Gandhi, Judgement at Nuremberg, Hotel Rwanda, the Pianist and Inherit the Wind. History and movements like genocide are introduced through them.

“The idea is to bring alive stuff and to do it in an engaging manner”, explains Banerjee, saying that almost none of his students aspire to become doctors or engineers.

It is the arts and social sciences that typically draw them due to the focus on reading, literature and history. Grade 9 students are studying “Sapiens” a book many adults would struggle with.

The school has created it own graded-reading softwares, graded-math software (Delta), and as many as 12 Android apps so that the teaching methods are uniform and can be deployed elsewhere as well, “by other idealistic entrepreneurs interested in true learning”, says Banerjee.

Parents too were skeptical at the start.

In the first year, the school took in around 70 children in the age group of 4-6 years. But after the first year, parents began to see the changes in their own children. Children could speak fluently, their behavior and manners showed improvement. “Often parents said that children would translate news or happenings for them – from TV news or newspapers”.

Sneha Ghosh whose son is in Upper KG says she has the option of putting him in a Kolkata school but chooses this over all because the ‘world is changing and in today’s world, children will need to be able to think”. She also says that she finds most parents – across schools – unhappy with their schools whereas the parents at Levelfield “love the school the more they discover it”.

Swati

Mukhopadhay’s

son has been in the school since he was four and she says they chose the school because It was “different”. When she compares with other children, she feels her son is learning to think and question – as against the rote education she herself received. She says she’s very satisfied when how he is turning out so far.

Parent endorsement has meant that now for 50 seats, Levelfield gets around 200 applications and several calls from local big-wigs seeking admission for their kith and kin, even though it is one of the more expensive schools in the area.

Fees for students in lower classes are around Rs 25,000 a year and go up to Rs 60,000 for senior classes. Typical budget schools charge Rs 500-800 a month; government schools are free. The average income of the parent community is around Rs 6 lakh a year and comprises government officials, local businessmen and government school teachers who prefer putting their own wards in this school rather than their own.

Teachers (the school has 15 at present) are between 23-30 years and are the highest paid in West Bengal. A starting teacher earns around Rs 28,000 a month; with some experience it is around Rs 40,000. Teachers are only hired if they don’t have a “B-Ed” degree and have no previous experience in teaching.

“Teachers we hire are not looking at this as a profession of last resort. They are in fact not even looking at teaching till they find us – through Facebook or word of mouth”, explains Banerjee. A teacher typically teaches his Class all subjects, an approach many question. Banerjee says that expectations from teachers today are very low. “If we expect students to learn all subjects, why can’t a teacher teach all subjects”, he adds.

What in the long run is Banerjee hoping to do though ?

Is he only looking at running one school ? 500-600 students in a country of this size is just a drop in the ocean. “I would like to spread this system of education elsewhere. I can’t do it through more schools as this one keeps my hands full but I’d like to bring about a change in the way things have been done so far, maybe by spreading the message”, says Banerjee. He’d be happy to share his curriculum and pedagogy with anyone who wants to do things differently.

Vikas Jhunjhunwala, who spent some years in the social enterprise space and is now CEO of Sunrise schools in Delhi, visited Levelfield before he set up his own school, says that Levelfield is questioning all the conventional thinking – both in terms of curriculum and pedagogy and that too in a location that he thinks is “back of beyond”. But he thinks it may be hard to scale up with a model like this as attracting good talent in terms of human resources will always be a big challenge.

Levelfield’s unconventional approach will be tested in 2018 as the first set of Class 10 students take the IGCSE exams. The school applied and received CBSE affiliation (more to prove to parents that they could than any conviction in the curriculum) but chose the CIE (Cambridge International Examinations) over the Indian board as it was a more “thinking” system.

But in the final analysis – for all their differences – students have to fit in and compete in the real world. The proof of the pudding will lie in the eating.

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myEnglish teachers at the British Council, India are guiding adult learners to achieve success through interactive online English courses. Using live online classrooms and guided online activities they are changing the traditional model and bringing the British Council classroom to their students across India.

Huma, Avinash, Purbani, Rajul and Ellora work in cities across India and are teachers at the British Council. Unlike most teachers, however, their job comes with a twist – their classroom only exists in the virtual world! Read their responses to questions about their work and their students!

How did you get into this very 21st century way of working?

Purbani: “I was given an opportunity to be a part of an online teacher-training programme. The course opened new avenues for me and I realised that online teaching might just be the future of education”.

Avinash: “I’ve always been interested in the use of technology in making learning engaging and more accessible. I’d had some experience as a student and was interested in the implications it had for a teacher. I felt there were several possibilities to be explored with online teaching.”

Huma: “The excitement of doing something so new and the fear of the unknown meant it would expand my teaching skills as well as give the flexibility and convenience of working at my own pace in my own space – something I had been long wishing for.”

Ellora: “I love teaching online. It allows me to work from home which saves time and allows flexibility”.

Rajul: “I can see all my students; I connect with them online and deliver classes prepared for them in a relaxed, fun manner without feeling the need to travel and rush into class from home. I am teaching from home! Even the students don’t have to go to class; the class comes to them wherever they are”.

What’s a typical week on a course like for your students?

Huma: “Interactive, practical, exciting, and demanding nevertheless! Everything that happens in a face-to-face class is possible here. The only thing different – the location, of course”.

Purbani: “A student spends around five hours of study on online activities per week and meets the trainer and the classmates for two hours over a live online session. The study time can be spread across the week or can be spent on two consecutive days – the flexibility is key”.

Avinash: “Students complete their online activities in order to prepare for the forum discussions and online classes as they’re linked and build on each other. They respond to forum posts and add their own. This gives them a chance to practise the language they’ve learned and this gives me an opportunity to respond to their opinions and ideas and give individual feedback”.

Rajul: “They also review videos to recap their learning, increase their vocabulary and access the website to explore and learn more. Unknowingly they learn to manage their time and study independently, overcome their fear of writing and gain confidence in their speaking. They communicate with others without hesitation in real life situations”.

What are the benefits of teaching and learning in an online format? Have you faced and  overcome any challenges?  

Huma: “I’m neither a technophobe nor am I tech-savvy. Like some of my students, I’ve had to work my way through handling technology but it’s been fun. I tell myself that I’ve been developing some 21st Century skills!”

Purbani: “In a face-to-face classroom, we often see that the learning stops once the learner leaves the classroom. On an online course, the possibilities of learning are limitless”.

Avinash: “One of the main challenges both learners and I have faced as a teacher is time management. In my experience, setting realistic weekly targets and working frequently and for shorter durations has helped most students and me have an enjoyable and enriching experience on the course”.

Can you share any success stories?

Rajul: There’s a student who was not even ready to write or talk to anyone because he didn’t feel confident. He’s currently enrolled in an MBA class! Another student was unwilling to speak in class. He would just say ‘I can’t’. After the course he got selected to appear for a TV interview”.

Huma: “One of my students has special needs and passed the course! This also goes to show that we are truly inclusive and the courses are meant for everybody”.

Avinash: “I taught an award-winning actor. She wanted to develop her fluency and accuracy as she had upcoming projects in international films. Over 3 courses she has developed her accuracy to a great degree, especially in pronunciation, and is now so much more confident with intonation and emotion in the English language.”

Purbani: “At the formal launch of myEnglish courses in August a former student of mine spoke to the gathered press in an eloquent manner about his wonderful experience on our online courses”.

Ellora: “A student from my class wanted to speak better English so he could study International Law. When he joined my class he had scored a 5 in IELTS. He completed the whole level and took his IELTS again, he scored a 7.5. He’s going to Canada in 2018 for his studies”. 

For more information, go here!

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