Author: Smile Foundation

In a narrow lane of northeast Delhi, 17-year-old Anjali balances her textbooks on a small desk wedged between a sewing machine and a pile of laundry. Her mother, who left school after Class 6, runs the sewing machine late into the night while Anjali studies by the dim light of a single bulb. She is one of more than 100,000 students supported by Smile Foundation’s Scholarships@Smile programme — an initiative reshaping how India thinks about education, gender,and opportunity .

Across India, it is no longer news that girls are in school. Over two decades, enrolment has soared. What remains less visible are the fault lines that appear after enrolment. The distance between schooling and success, between learning and livelihood, is where most girls still stumble.

The dropout dilemma

The latest Unified District Information System for Education (UDISE+) data show that the secondary-level dropout rate for girls is about 12.3 per cent, with household work and early marriage among the most common causes . For every hundred girls who enter middle school, too many never reach college gates.

While boys often leave school seeking work, girls’ exit is a quiet retreat dictated by circumstance: sibling care, household duties or a family’s financial crisis. These are not isolated choices but symptoms of a deeper social arithmetic, one that still discounts a girl’s potential return on education.

India’s Economic Survey notes that although women’s labour-force participation is inching upward, much of it remains in informal, unpaid or agricultural work.

STEM: The great unfinished revolution

Nowhere is the gender gap starker than in the fields shaping the future — science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Government data show that women constitute roughly 43 per cent of enrolments in STEMM disciplines (PIB 2024), yet only about 14 per cent of India’s scientists and engineers are women (Forbes India, 2021)

The imbalance begins early. In the JEE Main 2024 exams, about 406,900 female candidates registered, roughly 33 per cent of total applicants (Jagran Josh, 2024) . And according to AISHE 2020-21, women make up around 19 per cent of engineering students (AISHE Report 2020-21) .

These figures underscore that the barriers are not academic alone but cultural and structural. For many young women, the path from school to STEM is strewn with unseen obstacles like limited exposure, scarce role models and social expectations that quietly steer them away from technical fields.

Where policy meets lived reality

India’s National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 sets a bold target: to raise the Gross Enrolment Ratio in higher and vocational education from 26.3 per cent (2018) to 50 per cent by 2035 . On paper, this ambition is visionary. Yet without addressing the frictions that keep girls from completing secondary school, the pipeline feeding that goal remains fragile.

Government efforts like Beti Bachao Beti Padhao and start-up schemes for women entrepreneurs have opened doors. Still, for millions of girls, the real question is simpler: who will pay the fees, buy the books or convince the family that education is worth the wait?

This is where interventions such as Scholarships@Smile step in.

Beyond tuition: A new grammar of opportunity

Launched in 2006, Smile Foundation‘s Scholarships@Smile has reached more than 100,000 students across 22 states . Its model combines financial and academic support, life-skills training, mentorship and employability coaching. Few initiatives in India link education so directly to empowerment.

The programme operates through three major pillars:

• School Scholarships (Grades 8–12): Targeting girls from families earning below ₹2 lakh annually, these have supported around 3,000 girls across Delhi-NCR, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Telangana, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka .
• Vocational Scholarships: Aimed at employability, this track has enabled over 1,394 young women to pursue degrees in management, IT, design, finance and pharmacy .
• Engineering Scholarships: Supporting more than 2,831 students in B.Tech and B.E. courses nationwide, the programme prepares “industry-ready” engineers through training and mentorship .

Together, these pathways make education a continuum, from school to skill to success, rather than a disconnected series of stages.

The social dividend of inclusion

Each scholar represents more than individual success; she becomes a multiplier. Educated girls delay marriage, participate more in the economy and invest in their families’ health and education. The World Bank estimates that each additional year of secondary education raises a woman’s future earnings by 10–20 per cent.

Scholars report increased confidence, improved decision-making and a clearer sense of career direction. The ripple effect extends to their communities, where younger girls see proof that education can lead to independence.

The corporate link

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has become a key driver of educational equity. Scholarships@Smile aligns with Schedule VII, Items 2 and 3 of the Companies Act 2013, covering education, gender equality and skill development .

It also aligns with Sustainable Development Goals 4 (Quality Education) and 5 (Gender Equality), ensuring that corporate partnerships translate into measurable social impact . In an era when ESG frameworks define accountability, such alignment offers both moral and strategic value.

The next frontier: Bridging aspiration and access

India’s challenge is not a shortage of ambition but of bridges. Each statistic hides a geography of constraint, between rural and urban, English-medium and vernacular, privilege and poverty.

Scholarships help, but the next phase must build a broader ecosystem: mentoring networks, exposure to professional role models, digital access and family sensitisation. It also requires challenging social norms that quietly limit girls’ educational trajectories.

Industry analyses suggest that India produces roughly 1.5 million engineering graduates annually, but only about 250,000 secure core-engineering jobs (NASSCOM 2019, media analyses) . The inefficiency is a disconnect between education and employability that hits women hardest.

At the same time, a TeamLease report projects around 12 million new jobs across engineering, telecom and healthcare sectors over the next five years (The Hindu, 2 May 2022; TeamLease Digital 2022) . To close this gap, interventions must move from access to agency, ensuring not only that girls study, but that they thrive and lead.

A moment of reckoning

The coming decade will decide whether India’s demographic dividend translates into development or disappointment. With one of the youngest populations globally, India’s growth narrative depends not only on how many young people it educates but how well.

For girls, the stakes are existential. Education is not just a ticket to a job; it is a claim to citizenship, safety and self-worth.

As India expands higher education, private and civil-society actors will be indispensable in filling gaps that government policy alone cannot. Scholarships@Smile shows what such partnerships can achieve — scalable, data-backed and deeply human.

The faces behind the figures

When Anjali talks about her scholarship, she doesn’t mention percentages or policy frameworks. She talks about the dignity of not having to ask her mother for fees, about learning to speak confidently and about her dream of becoming a software engineer.

Her confidence is no accident; it is the product of deliberate investment — in her mind, her voice and her future. In a country where so many girls still drop out before finishing school, her story feels both extraordinary and quietly ordinary — a glimpse of the India that could be, if opportunity were not rationed by birth.

The way forward

The future of education equity in India lies in deepening, not diluting, such models. That means:

• Expanding partnerships with CSR and public institutions for sustained scholarships.
• Integrating mentorship and job-linkage more tightly with academic support.
• Increasing focus on STEM pathways for girls through targeted exposure, internships and confidence-building.
• Using digital tools to scale access and reduce geographic disparity.

Above all, it means changing how we talk about girls’ education — not as a favour extended, but as an investment returned many times over.

A conclusion in continuity

Anjali will take her Class 12 exams next year. Her younger sister already says she wants to study “like Didi.” For their mother, that dream once seemed unaffordable. Today, it feels achievable.

That shift, from resignation to resolve, is the truest measure of success for any scholarship programme. In every girl who studies by a sewing machine, in every mother who learns to dream again, lies the answer to India’s unfinished promise: not just Beti Padhao, but Beti Udaao — let her soar.

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Citations

1. Scholarships@Smile July’25 PPT (Smile Foundation internal presentation).
2. UDISE+ 2021-22 secondary education data (Govt of India).
3. Forbes India (2021): “43 per cent of Indian STEM graduates are women, but only 14 per cent work as scientists/engineers.”
4. Press Information Bureau (2024): Government briefing on STEMM enrolment.
5. Jagran Josh (2024): JEE Main 2024 gender distribution.
6. AISHE 2020-21 Report (Ministry of Education).
7. Industry analyses summarising NASSCOM 2019 engineering employment data.
8. The Hindu (2 May 2022) and TeamLease Digital 2022 report on 12 million new jobs across engineering, telecom and healthcare.

When we talk about scholarships, we often talk about opportunity — about the chance to study, to rise, to cross the invisible barriers that hold talent hostage to circumstance. What we talk about less often is the human scaffolding that allows those opportunities to hold steady: mentorship.

In the vocabulary of education, “scholarship” has long meant financial support — a cheque, a stipend, a seat at the table. But in the lived experience of the thousands of young people who win these awards each year, the money is often just the beginning. What sustains ambition, particularly for first-generation learners, is guidance. Mentorship, in this sense, is not an accessory to scholarship; it is its moral core.

The Invisible Curriculum

Every scholarship programme, no matter how generous, sits atop an invisible divide between those who know how to navigate elite systems and those who must learn it from scratch. For a student from a remote village in Bihar or a fishing community in Kerala, winning a scholarship to a top university can feel like landing on another planet. The classrooms are larger, the language more abstract, the expectations unspoken.

Mentorship steps into that silence. It translates the hidden curriculum — the unspoken norms, confidence cues, and institutional rhythms that privilege the already privileged. A mentor tells a student not just how to write a dissertation but how to read between the lines of an email, how to network without self-doubt, how to seek help without shame.

In that sense, mentorship is not about academic coaching. It’s about cultural decoding. It gives young scholars, particularly those from marginalised backgrounds, the tools to navigate systems designed for others.

The Numbers Behind the Nudge

Globally, the data on mentorship is as compelling as any financial argument. A 2023 study by the World Bank and the Mastercard Foundation found that students paired with structured mentorship programmes were 40% more likely to complete higher education and 70% more likely to pursue leadership roles in their sectors.

In India, a survey by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) found that scholarship recipients with sustained mentor contact reported higher self-efficacy and lower dropout rates, even when compared to peers receiving larger financial grants. The same study noted that the greatest gains were among women, first-generation learners and students from rural or low-income backgrounds, precisely those who often face social isolation in higher education.

While financial aid solves one layer of inequity which is access and mentorship solves another: belonging.

Money Opens Doors, Mentorship Keeps Them Open

The logic is straightforward. Money may get you into the room; mentorship teaches you how to stay there. It helps bridge the transition between aspiration and achievement.

While the grant itself is prestigious, past scholars often emphasise that it was the mentorship — formal and informal — that transformed their journeys. Alumni who had once navigated similar struggles became mentors, guiding younger cohorts through not just academic choices but emotional resilience. “Knowing there was someone who understood where I came from changed everything,” says one recipient. “It made me feel less like an imposter.”

The same pattern is visible in international programmes. The Chevening Scholarship, funded by the UK government, pairs its scholars with professional mentors from their fields. The Fulbright network in the United States goes further, cultivating a lifelong alumni mentorship model that keeps scholars connected long after graduation. Even the Gates Cambridge and Rhodes Trust have recently expanded mentoring support to help scholars adapt socially and emotionally to demanding environments.

Each of these programmes has recognised that the transformative impact of a scholarship is not measured solely by degrees or publications, but by how confidently a scholar can navigate the world beyond the classroom.

A Human Infrastructure for Equity

To see the value of mentorship, one only has to step into the shoes of a first-generation scholar. Imagine being admitted to a top university abroad where the reading lists are foreign, the seminars intimidating and the social circles self-assured. In that moment, financial aid can pay tuition, but it cannot buy confidence.

Mentorship provides that bridge. It offers psychological safety — the assurance that you are not alone in your confusion or doubt. It anchors the intangible: self-belief, professional identity, the courage to fail and begin again.

In the absence of such support, many gifted students falter not for lack of intellect, but for lack of navigation. A report by India’s Ministry of Education in 2022 noted that nearly one in five students from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in elite universities felt socially alienated despite academic competence. Most cited lack of guidance or relatable mentors as a key factor.

The tragedy of talent loss lies not in opportunity denied, but in opportunity unaccompanied.

Mentorship as Social Capital

Sociologists often describe mentorship as a form of social capital — the networked knowledge and emotional support that enable individuals to move confidently through institutions. Pierre Bourdieu, who coined the term, argued that inequality persists not only because of economic differences but because of disparities in social know-how: who you know, how you speak, when you ask, how you belong.

In that light, mentorship democratizes what privilege once monopolized. It gives access not just to information, but to interpretation. A mentor decodes the unwritten rules — when to publish, how to present, what to prioritize. In elite academic and professional spaces, such guidance can be the difference between thriving and merely surviving.

For women scholars, particularly in STEM and policy fields, mentorship often doubles as advocacy. A study by UNESCO found that women with active mentors were three times more likely to remain in research careers after graduation than those without. The mentor’s role, in these cases, is not only academic but structural — amplifying voices in spaces that have historically excluded them.

The Emotional Architecture of Success

If scholarships build opportunity, mentorship builds endurance. Every student’s journey includes moments of self-doubt: the first failed exam, the isolating winter abroad, the conference where everyone else seems more articulate. In those moments, mentorship is a lifeline.

Good mentors do more than guide; they listen. They normalise vulnerability in a system obsessed with achievement.

This emotional architecture of mentorship including empathy, reassurance and perspective is often what sustains long-term impact. Financial aid can change a year; mentorship can change a life trajectory.

Institutionalising Mentorship: From Ad Hoc to Embedded

Despite the evidence, many scholarship programmes still treat mentorship as optional — an informal relationship left to alumni goodwill. This is changing. Organisations are increasingly institutionalising mentorship frameworks that match scholars with professionals, alumni or peers based on discipline, geography or shared background.

The Inlaks Fellowship for Indian Journalists, for instance, pairs fellows with senior mentors who review work, offer editorial guidance and connect them to networks. The mentorship continues even after the fellowship ends, evolving into professional collaboration.

Globally, the Schmidt Science Fellows, Obama Foundation Scholars and Mandela Rhodes Foundation have embedded mentorship as a structural pillar. Their approach is systematic: orientation sessions, monthly check-ins, leadership retreats and evaluation mechanisms that treat mentorship not as charity but as pedagogy.

Such integration transforms mentorship from a benevolent gesture into an accountability framework — ensuring that scholarship programmes deliver not just opportunity, but continuity.

Mentorship and the Multipliers of Change

The impact of mentorship doesn’t end with the scholar. When mentees return home, they often become mentors themselves. This creates what sociologists call “social multipliers” — effects that ripple beyond individual benefit.

A first-generation scholar who returns to teach, for instance, carries back not just knowledge but a new model of guidance. They become living proof that mentorship begets leadership. In India, several former scholarship recipients now run grassroots mentorship circles for students from marginalised backgrounds. Their message is simple: someone once helped me; now I help others.

This multiplier effect is perhaps mentorship’s most enduring legacy. It converts personal advancement into collective progress. The Chevening and Commonwealth alumni networks, for example, now run peer-mentorship programmes across South Asia and Africa, mentoring younger applicants and offering moral and logistical support. In doing so, they keep the ladder open.

Barriers to Mentorship

Yet, even as the case for mentorship grows, practical barriers remain. Time is the most obvious one. Mentors are often overcommitted academics or professionals balancing multiple responsibilities. Institutions must therefore invest in systems that make mentorship feasible and rewarding through recognition, training or shared credit.

Another challenge lies in matching mentors and mentees effectively. Poorly matched pairs can lead to disengagement or worse, discouragement. Mentorship is not transactional; it relies on chemistry, shared trust and mutual respect.

Finally, there is the challenge of diversity. Too often, mentors reflect the same demographic patterns of privilege that scholarships seek to redress. Diversifying mentor pools by gender, geography and lived experience is key to creating authentic connection.

Digital Mentorship: Expanding the Reach

Technology is beginning to address some of these challenges. Digital mentorship platforms now allow scholars to connect with global networks beyond their institutions. During the COVID-19 pandemic, many scholarship programmes moved mentoring online and discovered unexpected benefits.

The UNDP Global Policy Network, for instance, piloted a virtual mentorship model that connected young researchers from developing countries with policy experts worldwide. Surveys found that 85% of participants continued their mentor relationships after the programme ended.

Similarly, India’s National Scholarship Portal is exploring AI-driven mentor matching to connect students with professionals across industries. Digital tools democratize mentorship by breaking the barriers of geography and access though they cannot replace the intimacy of human connection.

What Effective Mentorship Looks Like

Mentorship is not one-size-fits-all. Its impact depends on depth, continuity, and reciprocity. The most effective mentors share three traits: empathy, consistency, and empowerment.

Empathy builds trust — the foundation for honest dialogue. Consistency sustains growth — ensuring that guidance is not sporadic but iterative. Empowerment transforms the dynamic — mentors do not mould mentees into replicas of themselves; they help them find their own voice.

Successful mentorship programmes also include feedback loops, structured goal-setting and opportunities for peer learning. Mentorship, after all, is a two-way street. Mentors, too, often describe learning as much as they teach.

From Merit to Meaning

Ultimately, mentorship redefines what merit means in scholarship programmes. It moves us away from the myth of the self-made student toward a more collective understanding of success. No scholar, no matter how brilliant, thrives in isolation. Behind every award-winning thesis or social innovation stands a teacher, an advisor, a friend who believed before the world did.

By institutionalising mentorship, scholarship programmes affirm that intellect alone is not enough — that empathy, guidance and community are part of what makes education transformative.

In an age where inequality is both deep and diffuse, mentorship offers a rare antidote: a human relationship that cuts through structural barriers. It does not fix every inequity, but it equips individuals to navigate them with confidence and clarity.

The Multiplier of Hope

The true impact of mentorship cannot always be measured in metrics. It appears in subtler forms — in a student who finally asks a question in class, in a young researcher who applies for a fellowship they thought was beyond reach, in a scholar who returns home and builds something new.

Scholarship programmes may provide the wings, but mentorship teaches flight. It gives meaning to opportunity and turns privilege into possibility.

In the long arc of education, mentorship is not an add-on; it is the multiplier of hope. And as more institutions begin to recognise its power, the question is no longer whether mentorship belongs in scholarship programmes but how soon we can make it universal.

In a small government secondary school on the outskirts of Barabanki, Uttar Pradesh, a gleaming plaque outside a locked room reads “Science Laboratory – Gifted under CSR Support.” The lock has gathered dust. Inside, through the mesh window, one can see microscopes still wrapped in plastic, a rack of test tubes untouched and a gas burner that has never been connected. The headmaster says the school received the equipment two years ago, but the lab never became operational. “We have no trained lab assistant. The science teacher teaches three grades alone,” he says with a half-smile. “And there’s no gas connection.”

This image of a science lab that exists, yet does not, is a striking metaphor for India’s uneasy relationship with scientific education. On paper, every secondary school in the country is supposed to have a functioning laboratory. In reality, according to the Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+ 2024–245) data shows only 57.1% integrated science lab availability in Indian schools with secondary sections. India must accelerate to bridge the gap by 2030. Of those, many remain underutilised or entirely non-functional due to lack of maintenance, power supply or trained personnel.

The Mirage of Access

The past decade has seen an expansion in physical infrastructure across India’s education system. Classrooms have been built, electricity connections provided and computers distributed. Yet, the quality and functionality of these facilities remain patchy. In science education, this gap is especially visible.

A recent ASER (Annual Status of Education Report) survey found that over 70% of students in Classes 9 and 10 had never performed even a single hands-on science experiment in school. What students experience as “science” is often reduced to textbook definitions and rote memorisation — the periodic table copied by hand, the laws of motion explained through chalk diagrams, the human heart drawn on a blackboard.

It is not that schools lack awareness of the need for practical science learning. Many have rooms designated as laboratories. What they lack is the functional ecosystem of steady funding, skilled teachers, consumables, and accountability that allows those labs to operate meaningfully.

Infrastructure Without Systems

The problem begins with how infrastructure projects are conceived. Under schemes like RMSA (Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan), funds were allocated for constructing science laboratories in government schools. But once the physical space was built and equipment purchased, there was no consistent provision for upkeep or consumables.

A microscope can last years, but chemicals, slides and wires degrade quickly in India’s humid climate. Without recurring maintenance budgets, labs quickly fall into disrepair.

Another invisible gap lies in staffing. Most government secondary schools have only one science teacher for all upper grades. The norm of having a dedicated laboratory assistant, as envisaged by NCERT’s Lab Manual Guidelines, is rarely met outside Kendriya or Navodaya Vidyalayas. Teachers must unlock the lab, prepare the experiment, supervise the class, clean up and then rush back to teach the next period.

This burden has led to what many educators call “symbolic science” — schools tick boxes to show compliance, but no meaningful experimentation takes place.

When Labs Become Locked Rooms

In rural schools, power supply and safety are constant concerns. Many labs cannot run equipment for lack of electricity or proper ventilation. Others are kept locked for fear of misuse or accidents. In several states, school principals confessed to keeping laboratories closed during inspections to “avoid damage.”

The irony is painful. Facilities meant to ignite curiosity are locked away in the name of protection. Students learn that science is something too fragile, too expensive or too dangerous for them to touch. This invisibly reinforces inequity between elite schools where lab work is routine and public schools, where science is mostly theoretical.

Digital Labs and the New Divide

The pandemic shifted attention toward digital learning. The push for “virtual labs” and online science content promised to fill gaps in physical infrastructure. The Ministry of Education’s Virtual Labs platform, developed by IITs and Amrita University, now offers over 200 simulations for Class 9–12 students. While innovative, these solutions require reliable internet access and trained teachers.

In practice, most rural and low-income schools still lack that digital readiness. Less than 30% of government secondary schools have functional computer labs, according to UDISE+. Many computers remain packed or outdated. As a result, the digital turn risks deepening inequalities instead of reducing them.

The Question of Teacher Preparation

A lab is not just a room full of equipment. It is a pedagogy in motion — an approach that requires confidence, curiosity and time. Unfortunately, teacher preparation programmes in India devote minimal hours to laboratory management or inquiry-based learning.

Pre-service teacher education remains largely theory-driven. In-service training sessions, often one-day workshops, cannot equip teachers with practical confidence.

Without institutional support, even the most dedicated teachers become deskilled. Science teaching turns into textbook recitation.

The CSR Paradox

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programmes have stepped in to fill some gaps. From setting up digital labs to funding STEM equipment, several companies and foundations have invested in science infrastructure. Yet, many of these projects face the same challenge as government schemes — sustainability.

Smile Foundation’s education initiatives offer a revealing counterexample. Rather than focusing only on equipment, Smile integrates teacher training, curriculum alignment and maintenance into its science and digital learning interventions. In its AI-enabled and solar-powered digital classrooms, students not only use devices but learn how technology connects with real-world problem solving.

This model works because it treats the lab not as a product but as a process. The emphasis is on capacity-building and contextual learning, ensuring that technology enhances curiosity rather than replaces it.

Too many CSR interventions, however, stop at delivery. Donated kits gather dust once the partner NGO leaves. Without a long-term relationship between donors, schools and local authorities, even the most sophisticated infrastructure fails to deliver educational outcomes.

The Policy Blind Spot

India’s National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 places strong emphasis on experiential learning and multidisciplinary education. It envisions every child developing “scientific temper” through experimentation and observation. Yet, the policy remains silent on the operational realities of science infrastructure.

While it promotes coding and tinkering labs under the Atal Innovation Mission, the policy does not address the systemic maintenance crisis of traditional laboratories. The assumption seems to be that digital and innovation labs will leapfrog old constraints. But without fixing foundational issues like regular funding, accountability and teacher support, we risk repeating the same mistakes in new forms.

Rethinking the Idea of a Lab

Perhaps the most important shift needed is conceptual. The science lab should not be seen merely as a physical room, but as a pedagogical mindset. Experiments can begin in classrooms, school gardens or community spaces. Many successful low-cost innovations — from using kitchen materials to simulate chemical reactions to turning mobile phones into microscopes — show that inquiry-based learning does not require expensive setups.

However, these innovations must be scaled through teacher networks, not left to individual ingenuity. When teachers see experimentation as integral to teaching, not an extra burden, the lab can truly open — in spirit, even before in space.

Opening the Lab Again

The story of the unopened lab is not a story of failure. It is a story about priorities. We have built walls before building systems. We have measured success in square feet rather than student engagement.

To change this, India needs a three-pronged approach:

1. Dedicated funding for maintenance and consumables in science labs, integrated into annual school budgets rather than one-time grants.
2. Training and hiring of laboratory assistants to support teachers, especially in multi-grade rural schools.
3. Embedding practical science in teacher education, with continuous mentoring rather than episodic workshops.

Complementing this, partnerships between government, NGOs and private sector must move from donation to co-creation — designing labs that are accessible, safe and alive with use.

The unopened lab in Barabanki, then, is not a lost cause. It is a reminder of what education could be if policy met practice. When students finally hold those microscopes, when they watch a reaction happen before their eyes, the abstract world of science turns tangible. Curiosity becomes confidence.

India’s challenge is not that it lacks science labs. It is that too many remain locked. Opening them requires imagination, trust and investment in the people who make science come alive.