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In The Spotlight

Celebrating National Girl Child Day on Jan 24

Celebrating National Girl Child Day on Jan 24

National Girl Child Day is observed on January 24 every year. The Ministry of Women and Child Development has demarcated this date to mark this special occasion.

 

Female infanticide to gender inequality, discrimination to sexual abuse and violence … girls face numerous issues every day. National Girl Child Day aims to shed light on the inequalities faced by girls and promotes awareness about rights of a girl child. Education, health, and nutrition are all very important for the betterment of girl children.

 

Government and educational institutions celebrate the day with various events. All these seek to change the attitude of society towards women and uplift the girl child.

 

Working for girls is an important part of Smile Foundation’s initiatives. Today, let us celebrate some of the beautiful girls we are working with.

 

Lali

 

Eleven-year-old Lali is a student of class II studying at a Mission Education centre. She has 7 members in her family, including her parents and four siblings. Her father is a daily wage earner and mother is a homemaker. Being uneducated, her family members never encouraged her to study. This gradually lowered her self-confidence.

 

The ME centre staff held a number of meetings with Lali’s parents. They sensitized them on how important it is for their child to get educated and become self-reliant. As a result, they finally agreed to enrol Lali at the ME centre. However, due to the pandemic, things came to standstill. Children like Lali could not access online education due to lack of digital access. To help her study, her father bought a second-hand phone.

 

Now, Lali joins her online class at 10 am sharp. She attends 45-minute sessions each of English, Hindi, EVS, and Mathematics. Her teacher assigns activities and checks the completed work and gives feedback.

 

She is an intelligent and enthusiastic learner who enjoys her lessons. Lali strives to reach her full potential and seeks new challenges. She participates actively in discussions and responds to what is taught during the sessions. She is self-motivated, displays self-discipline, and is well prepared for class every day.

 

Sumitra

 

Sumitra is a student of Class 9. Her mother is the only earning member in a family of six since her father passed away. Due to her meager income, Sumitra’s mother is always worried about the family’s finances. Her mother used to work in a school. Thus, when the lockdowns began, her income suffered a great deal. Lockdown after lockdown has only added to the family’s financial instability.

 

Sumitra shares, “My studies have been neglected because the school has been closed for almost a year since the lockdown began. Smile Foundation gave me a tab to help me study. My siblings and I studied and practiced a lot on that tab. There is a video on how to crack the exam in all subjects, so it was very easy to understand and we benefited a lot from it. The tab also has puzzles. There is lots to read on the tab again and this helped us develop the habit of reading.”

 

Sumitra enjoys her studies and likes her teachers very much. Even through online learning, the teachers explain very well. They are also available to resolve any doubts. With regular and academic support, Sumitra was able to make significant progress in learning. She completes her daily work diligently and actively participates in co-curricular activities.

 

Sunaina

 

Words can hardly do justice to Sunaina’s story. Childhood gave her all the qualms and no joy. At the age of 12 years only, Sunaina has witnessed many hardships at a very tender age. This limited her growth in all aspects.

 

Sunaina’s her father passed away when she was 10. Her mother was left to fend for the family of 3. She picked up odd jobs to give her children a decent life. The odds were stacked against the family as their economic woes became an obstacle for the children’s education. Thankfully, one day her mother came to know about the Mission Education centre in their community and its facilities for the poor children. Learning about the free tuition and co-curricular support, uniform, learning materials, etc. convinced her to enroll Sunaina at the centre.

 

Through the direct intervention of ME teachers, Sunaina overcame the hurdles by accessing the available resources. Further, the positive and vibrant environment and easy access to learning materials have helped in her holistic development. She follows all instructions in class and pays attention to her teachers. She has also been getting good grades.

 

Sunaina was very thankful when she received the sanitization kit from the centre. It saved her mother an added expense. She dreams of becoming a teacher one day.

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Insights

Development Sector Needs to Adapt to the Digital Age and Capitalise on Technology

Development Sector Needs to Adapt to the Digital Age and Capitalise on Technology

Every firm will soon be a digital business. To succeed in the digital economy, CEOs must make precise decisions about their approach. Like every other sector, the development sector needs to adapt to the digital age too.

 

The world is changing due to digitization; philanthropy and development must adapt as well

 

Most digital development projects are still fragmented by sector. In some cases, they are motivated by a relentlessly optimistic goal of “connecting the last billion.”

 

Binary issues are a favourite of development. Either you had the polio vaccine or you didn’t. Either you’re above the poverty line or you’re not. We can agree on evaluation procedures that provide detailed data to demonstrate the program’s success.

 

Randomized Control Trials can be used to demonstrate the efficacy of our solutions. We can quantify the issues we encounter in terms of enormous numbers. These can be shared on social media once we’ve created a binary problem. The last billion, and so on.

 

The problem with treating digital connectivity as a binary issue is that while the system is based on binary logic, the capacity to benefit from being linked to it is not. “How many people are connected to the Internet throughout the world?” should not be the last question. “To what sort of Internet are people throughout the world connected?” and “How efficiently are they using it?” are questions that need to be answered.

 

Therefore, development organisations which want to engage in digitisation must avoid simple binaries like pushing for the digital gap to be closed. In the digital age, they will need to interact with complicated, nuanced notions like agency, literacy, authority, and structure.

 

It’s challenging, but we should strive for meaningful use rather than simply inclusion

 

Educating a few more people to code will not be enough to attain digital literacy. We need to encourage social and platform digital literacy in a world where virtually everyone on the planet needs to know how to engage with each other via platforms. Thereby people will know how to manage their digital lifestyle, from education and communication to livelihoods and citizenship, safely.

 

Whilst the cost of Internet access decreases, the ongoing quest to create a world that encourages inclusive and meaningful use will necessitate a variety of ways. Of course, startups, technological advancements, financing, and the private sector are all intertwined. However, the larger issues are multidisciplinary, involving psychology, sociology, political science, human-computer interaction, economics, and ethics.

 

Digital connectivity is vital but not adequate

 

Connectivity is required to participate in the global information economy. This is imperative for states and institutions to function in the twenty-first century. However, connectivity is insufficient in and of itself. We must advocate for it, and organisations such as the Alliance for Affordable Internet should be applauded. However, we can’t expect cell phones, social media, or even online accounting software to begin development on their own. These are tools, the foundation upon which prosperity can be built. But they are not drivers of prosperity in and of themselves.

 

Digital has the potential to unlock vast amounts of previously untapped human capital. Investment in digital infrastructure will be required to enable this. But digital platforms — the glue that binds digital infrastructure and human capital — are sucking value from both nations and citizens.

 

The trio of smartphones, satellites, and sensors

 

Smartphones, satellites, and sensors are revolutionising the way we see the world. On the one hand, they offer a huge potential to develop more inclusive, comprehensive, and global methods to understanding how humans interact with nature and with one another in socioeconomic systems.

 

On the other hand, the growing debates in the Global North about AI ethics and prejudice in algorithmic computation must be introduced into the development community. It’s vital that we focus on the decisions we all make about how we deploy, process, interpret, and regulate data, not just the data we can collect or even its potential.

 

Wrapping up

 

Every new network invention — telephony, television, highways, the Internet, and so on — highlights the interdependence between a network’s potential and its political economy: who gets rewarded, who retains power, and who benefits from the development.

 

In some ways, the new digital infrastructure sees a billion people too little, while at least a billion people now feel they are seen too much. The conflict between these issues will be kept in mind by excellent policymaking and good innovation. Without the other, neither can be solved. Thus, the development sector needs to adapt to the digital age and embrace technology.

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Insights

Tools that Help with Online Learning

Tools that Help with Online Learning

What a change in the way we work, the way we teach and the way we learn. … The pandemic has set in. “Unmute yourself! Turn on your video! Check the chat box! Stop annotating!” These few phrases have become an integral part of our lives since we all shifted our working, teaching, and training online. Thence started the journey of educators to first educate themselves and then take classes online. Teachers have started seeking tools that help with online learning. Brands like Zoom, MS Teams, Zoho, Google Meet became a part of everyday parlance. Schools have progressed to more advanced education tools and enlisted support from Edtech companies. Some schools even became Microsoft-certified schools. Edtech platforms like Byjus and Vedantu saw a jump in their user base. Many organisations setup online K12 curriculum as their core business.

 

However, when we look at most of the big schools, the transition was rather smooth. This is because students here had access to at least a smartphone and/or tablet for logging into online classes. On the other hand, teachers were being trained to use video conferencing, blackboard, and many such softwares and applications. All these are aimed to somehow make online teaching and learning more interesting.

 

There still is a huge part of the school fraternity that does not have the type of academic infrastructure mentioned above. That’s where a huge chunk of India is still languishing. This could also be we have seen students not really learning much in online classes. The government and many NGOs in the education space are trying to ensure that students and teachers alike are made more digital savvy.

 

Reopening of schools on and off

 

Around Dussehra 2021, we had started seeing a significant dip in Covid cases. Schools had started to reopen and we were seeing an increased number of children, from primary to senior classes, going back to school. Some were even using school buses. Unfortunately, the new year has brought with it a spike in Covid cases. And with it, the comeback of school closures. This has created huge unease in the minds of teachers who had started to welcome their students back physically with renewed vigour.

 

From an online training conducted by Smile Foundation.
From an online training conducted by Smile Foundation.

 

Helpful tools for teachers

 

However, most teachers in India, despite almost 2 years of online schooling, still experience discomfort in taking online classes. So we witnessed a quick upsurge in school teachers looking for more and better applications and tools that can make their classes more interesting and students more attentive.

 

We organised one such session for primary school teachers of Vimala Hridaya Central School in Kerala. They have been running short of ways to keep their children engaged in online classes.

 

I got the opportunity to take the teachers through some very basic videos on Youtube that can be played in classes and could work as energizers for students. Then there are applications like Epic that take children back to the charm of reading books and short stories. This is especially true for the younger ones in primary classes who are also being subjected to, rather tortured through, online classes. And of course, there are a plethora of value-based movies and documentaries that can be streamed during online classes. These movies are sources of important lessons which can be taught to children.

 

To facilitate more exciting classroom experience these days there are AR (Augmented Reality) apps which schools can subscribe to at a nominal license fee. Such apps can actually make creatures come alive on a screen. Children can have a 3D view of the image and can understand the anatomy of various beings with a realistic view.

 

Back to basics

 

Most importantly, teachers have to stick to the basics. They must keep their PPT slides formatted, colourful, without spelling mistakes, and loaded with images. Presentations are their blackboard and that’s where children will love to interact. Mixing of sessions by interesting speakers from across the globe is much easier online these days. This should be done regularly.

 

All this calls for significant effort. But it’s all worth it when you have an engaged class that is interactive and keen to learn more.

 

Hybrid teaching and learning

 

With hybrid form of teaching and learning emerging as the norm and children already gaming online, teaching can definitely be made fun by using gamification. There should be goals, there should be challenges, and there should be rewards. Make every lesson a fun one for children. Once a challenge is accepted and solution found, there have to be rewards–a clap emoji or even a musical appreciation. Teachers have to upskill themselves, they have to become more digital literate and master the platform they are taking their classes on.

 

I do hope that the teachers had a fun time with me as I hope the students have with them.

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Insights

How can we ensure that children return to school when schools finally open?

How can we ensure that children return to school when schools finally open?

Countries around the world are still at various stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. This means they are facing a variety of issues, ranging from overburdened healthcare systems to growing economic despair. Many stakeholders are considering reopening schools in the geographies that are emerging from the first wave of COVID-19 cases. Schools give not only academic and social support to students, but also childcare, which many parents require in order to return to work. Reopening schools, on the other hand, poses a public health risk of the virus’ reemergence. It’s understandable that parents and teachers are worried about when children will return to school. 

 

UNICEF, UNESCO, the World Bank, the World Food Programme, and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) published a joint framework for reopening schools. This provides high-level guidance on operational safety. It guarantees the health and wellness of students and teachers, and aims to reach the most oppressed and disadvantaged children to aid in reopening schools and stemming learning losses.

 

Evolving pedagogy and redesigning the academic schedule

 

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most nations’ academic calendars for the 2019/2020 and 2020/2021 academic years were severely disrupted. This raised challenges about how to approach the present and next school calendars to make up for missed learning and improve student well-being. Extending the school day, week, or year could be one option for increasing teaching time. Alternatively, countries may want to pursue an “intersessional” schedule, which allows for recovery time in the event of subsequent shutdowns.

 

Teacher preparation and support

 

The crisis has posed a significant challenge to educational systems in terms of ensuring learning continuity. It has also significantly increased the expectations placed on instructors and the intensity of their work. To boost their efficacy, countries must re-engage with teachers and assist them in improving their well-being. Countries must also offer teachers clear instructions on how to identify students at risk of dropping out. Teachers also need to be trained on how to enforce health measures. Finally, instructors should have access to high-quality professional development and continuing assistance in order to:

 

  1. reconnect with students
  2. assess student learning
  3. implement a redesigned curriculum adopting relevant pedagogy
  4. enhance their digital skills.

 

Ramping up learning recovery

 

National COVID-19 response education programmes should include remedial activity to speed up the recovery of learning loss. The quantity of learning loss is expected to differ by student. Thus, teaching at the appropriate level will be even more critical in assisting children in catching up to grade-level norms. In a variety of situations, national tutoring programmes, personalised self-learning programmes, and computer-assisted education have been found to boost student learning. Summer school can be extended to cover more students. When combined with the “teaching at the correct level” method, it can be very effective. Grade retention is ineffective as a remedial method unless it is used in conjunction with other specific measures.

 

Exams and evaluations of learning

 

Learning processes will help teachers, schools, and education systems identify learning needs before schools reopen. This way, they can adjust guidance and target resources accordingly to prevent learning losses caused by school closures and economic shocks associated with the pandemic. These tests should be targeted for pupils in the early grades or transition years. They should begin by reviewing the knowledge that was lost during closures in core areas such as reading and math. Education systems can adjust or replace high stakes assessments that verify school completion or determine transitions to higher levels of education. This will ensure safety and give every child equal opportunity to display what they know, understand, and can do.

 

Interaction with stakeholders

 

As education systems have gone through school closures and reopenings since the past couple of years, communication has evolved as a critical component of an effective COVID response program. The primary concepts include using numerous channels to communicate early and often, localizing communication efforts to include community leaders, and guaranteeing diversity in messaging via multiple languages and non-written media as well. In addition to health and safety communications, it has been discovered that communicating to foster learning continuity is helpful at improving achievement (in pre-COVID settings). It’s also critical to establish channels of communication with parents in order to plan ahead.

 

Promoting re-enrollment to encourage children to return to school

 

Many countries may find it difficult to assure that all pupils return to school following extensive school closures. Re-enrolling vulnerable pupils, such as girls and immigrants, will very certainly entail significantly more work. Providing financial and pragmatic support to students, closely watching the re-enrollment process, which would include women and girls in decision-making, re-evaluating policy proposals that might also result in inequity, and individually empowering the most at-risk students are all ways that countries can encourage re-enrollment.

 

These were crucial considerations for the reopening of the school. Above all, health, hygiene, and cleanliness must be maintained. Everyone, from school employees to students, must be educated on the value and importance of cleanliness.

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In The Spotlight Insights

A Women-Centric View of NFHS-5

A Women-Centric View of NFHS-5

The National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5) presents a bird’s eye view of the state of India’s health and development. Among other things, it focuses specifically on the condition of women in the country. This is in tune with India’s aim to achieve United Nations-mandated Sustainable Development Goal-5, which focuses on women empowerment and gender equality. 

Let us explore a women-centric view of NFHS-5.

 

Key indicators of NFHS-5

 

Phase II of NFHS-5 was conducted for 14 states and union territories. Its findings were revealed in November 2021. On the state of women, the survey has six key indicators.

 

The percentage of currently married women who usually participate in household decisions;

  • Women who worked in the last 12 months and were paid in cash;
  • Those owning a house and/or land (alone or jointly with others);
  • Women having a mobile phone that they themselves use;
  • Those who have a bank or savings account that they use; and
  • Women aged 15-24 years who use hygienic methods of protection during their menstrual period.

Apart from these, the survey also highlights the need for further improvement on various fronts. This includes gender-based violence and harmful practices against women.

 

 

Let us look at some of these indicators one by one.

 

Participation of Married Women in Household Decisions

 

In 2015-16, the percentage of married women involved in household decisions was 73.8%. This number increased significantly in 2019-21 to 92%.

 

This is possibly a reflection of the growing number of women who have their own bank accounts, and thus some level of financial independence.

 

Employment for Women

 

This number increased from 21.1% to 24.9%.

 

While a large number of women work, only a few are salaried. Moreover, only 25.4 per cent of women aged 15-49 years who worked in the last 12 months were paid in cash. This figure is quite low and there has been negligible improvement from the last survey (2015-16). None of the states crossed the 50% mark in this category.

 

Telangana was at the top of this list, followed by either north-eastern or southern states. Lakshadweep, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Jharkhand have performed the worst. In these states, less than 18 per cent of women were paid for their work. Some states such as Tamil Nadu have improved their performance while several others have regressed significantly.

 

It is noteworthy that there is not much difference between urban (25%) and rural (25.6%) women on this front.

 

Owning Land/House

 

Land/house ownership among women went up in all the states except five–MP, Odisha, Uttarakhand, Delhi NCT, and Puducherry.

 

For instance, among the women surveyed in Punjab, 63.5% owned a house or a land in 2020-21, compared to 32.1% in 2015-16. In Uttar Pradesh as well, this percentage went up from 34.2% in 2015-16 to 51.9% in 2019-21.

 

However, in two other agrarian states Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, land/house ownership among women either fell or failed to show much improvement.

 

Women Owning Mobile Phones

 

Low tariffs since 2016 saw a rise in mobile phone use among women across many states. However, Haryana and Chandigarh saw a drop in the share of women owning a mobile phone. In Haryana, 50.4% women used mobile phones in 2020-2021. The percentage went down from 74.2% in 2015-16 to 70% in 2019-21.

 

The all-India figure went up from 45.9% to 54%.

 

Women having a Bank Account

 

There is a significant jump in the number of women using bank accounts. The figures show that close to 80% women now have their own bank account. The number went up from 53 per cent in 2015-16 to 78.6 per cent in 2019-21.

 

Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Odisha, Puducherry, and Punjab have topped the list. Experts suggest that this jump can be attributed to the Jan Dhan Yojana which enabled women and households to come within the banking fold.

 

Improvement in Number of Women using Period Products

 

The proportion of women aged 15-24 years who use menstruation-related products improved. Seventeen states and union territories had 90% or more women using period products. The number is even better in Puducherry and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands–99%. Tripura, Chhattisgarh, Assam, Gujarat, Meghalaya, Madhya Pradesh and Bihar had 70% or fewer women using period products. Bihar was at the bottom of this list at 60%.

 

Using period products can improve overall health outcomes. It could also lead to prevention of reproductive and urinary tract infections.

 

A Favorable Sex Ratio

 

The NFHS-5 is the first time that the sex ratio is in favor of women. The sec ratio as per the survey is 1020:1000. This is a demographic shift. It was 1000:1000 as per NFHS-3 in 2055-06 but declined to 991:1000 in 2015-16.

 

The sex ratio at birth has also seen an improvement. From 919 in 2015-16, it has gone up to 929 in 2019-20. The Health Ministry said in a statement that this positive turn can be attributed to measures like the PC and PNDT Act.

Government and civil society organizations have also been working on other empowerment measures such as financial inclusion and combating gender bias and disparities.

 

Some Other Findings

 

Nearly 78 per cent mothers received postnatal care from health personnel, rise from 62.4 per cent in NFHS-4.

 

Total fertility rate (children per woman) has reached replacement level of fertility. It was 2.2 in 2015-16, 2.0 in 2019-21. This means lesser births per woman. Need for family planning has declined from 12.9 per cent in 2015-16 to 9.4 per cent in 2019-21.

 

What This Means?

 

It is important that all stakeholders converge to bring about desired change. Discriminatory social norms need to be addressed strictly. These norms drive gender-based violence and harmful practices. We must empower women to exercise agency and autonomy in all spheres of life.

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Partners In Change

What has been the role of teachers in the battle against COVID-19?

What has been the role of teachers in the battle against COVID-19?

Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.

 

Bill Gates

 

Students have lost access to regular education during the COVID-19 pandemic. Governments, civil bodies, NGOs, and local community stakeholders have no road map to educate the child and serve the community. In the first phase of the lockdown, strict action was taken against those who broke the COVID guidelines by the police and the municipal corporation. Those living in slums and villages faced even graver consequences. Thousands of people had to take up odd jobs to take care of their children and families. These include the jobs of cleaner, tailor, construction site worker, making papad, making chapati in a local restaurant, and so on. Many also took up jobs in COVID wards.

 

To make things worse, they had to stand in long queues for dry ration, free face masks, and other government and local schemes. People lost their jobs due to lack of employment. Many of them started consuming excess alcohol. As a result, women became the victims of domestic and sexual violence. Some of these women were teachers too.

 

Role of teachers against COVID-19

 

When people adopted the new normal, female teachers who are wives, daughters, and mothers faced all kinds of challenges to educate the students, keep their family members safe, and fight domestic abuse without any support.

 

During the pandemic, we have given awards to various organizations, influential people, eminent personalities. But these unsung heroes are far from all these and are still doing their work with full dedication. They are taking online classes, cluster classes, and whatever else they are able to do while taking care of their domestic responsibilities. The pandemic has transformed the role of a teacher to a community worker, a counselor, a health worker, depending on the situation.

 

Teaching via technology

 

Learning to teach using technology at an older age is no easy task. Doing it overnight is even more difficult. Traditionally teachers have always been comfortable with live conversations in the classroom. However, being able to teach without the student in front of you is a whole new ball game. The teachers have picked it up beautifully without any formal training and are doing some incredible work out there. Despite facing their own adversity, they are constantly helping students everywhere to learn to the best of their abilities. Through our Shiksha Na Ruke initiative, we have trained teachers to adapt to the new normal and continue their good work.

 

Teachers build the citizens of tomorrow in today’s classrooms. We need to first equip our teachers with the right technology to help them prepare our students for a digital world.

 

My heartfelt salute to all the women warriors who saved the family, country, and the world. We are in blessed hands and are safe.

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Insights Partners In Change

What Can Keep Teachers Motivated during the Uncertain Times of the Pandemic?

What Can Keep Teachers Motivated during the Uncertain Times of the Pandemic?

COVID-19 disrupted professional norms across all industries. Education was equally impacted by the pandemic. Everyone talks about how the pandemic has affected students. However, very few pay attention to how teachers have been dealing with their jobs. In these uncertain times, what can keep teachers motivated?

 

Boost blended learning infrastructure and training

 

Blended learning has emerged as the go-to method for students as well as teachers all over the world. It provides a great degree of flexibility in learning. It also enables teachers and students to use technology to their advantage.

 

Some teachers have started using video modules to impart education. Some have been using voice notes on whatsapp to communicate with students as well as parents. However, there are still many teachers who are not able to capitalize on using technology. Thus, schools and institutions must invest time and effort to train teachers on this new aspect of teaching.

 

Teachers need to be acknowledged for the tremendous effort they have put in to learn digital tools. However, with the correct guidance and some time, they can master the art of blended learning and make their lessons more effective. Despite all this, Internet access and availability of devices remains an issue.

 

Focus on their emotional and mental well-being

 

The pandemic has brought into focus the need for good mental and emotional health. COVID-19 has had a psychological impact on millions of people on the planet. Children and adults alike have been affected. Teachers are no different. With schools being shut intermittently, teachers are also continuously adapting to the situation and adopting new techniques to continue their work. As a result, teachers are working harder than ever to ensure that their students continue learning.

 

In this situation, we need to take care of teachers’ mental and emotional well-being more than ever. Counselling and the correct tools to help deal with the stress can help to a great extent.

 

Governments and institutions can play a vital role on this front by innovating. For instance, government schools in Delhi introduced the happiness curriculum even before the pandemic. The concepts taught as part of this curriculum–mindfulness, listening, emotional well-being—have become important in the COVID times.

 

Increase autonomy of teachers to keep them motivated

 

Before the pandemic, the curriculum being taught in educational institutions was limited in certain ways. More or less, it was a one-size-fits-all approach. The pandemic taught teachers to find creative ways to reach out to children. And this they did in different ways for different students, all of whom are facing some challenge or the other. Thus, teachers got an increased sense of autonomy.

 

Instead of relying only on textbooks, teachers started experimenting with other content delivery formats. They also started visiting the homes of students in the community. The students who have access to the Internet and smart devices have also been learning online.

 

The experience of improvising through the pandemic has definitely taught teachers a lot. If they are given more say in the curriculum and in teaching methods, it will motivate the teachers and also improve their performance. This will in turn contribute in keeping them motivated.

 

Creating communities through practice

 

A supportive network of peers is important for any community. We can strengthen our teaching community in the same manner. Having forums where teachers can discuss their learnings and strategies and also share feedback will build a sense of community. During the pandemic especially, sharing experiences with other teachers helped all of them.

 

Filling teacher vacancies to reduce pressure

 

Teachers have been paying individual attention to many students during online classes and home visits. However, once schools open, this focused attention might not be possible. The teacher-student ratio needs to be improved by filling up all the vacancies. 

 

This will help to reduce the burden on teachers. It can also help to ensure that weaker students get the benefit from a better teacher-student ratio. By enhancing learning outcomes, this can keep teachers motivated.

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Insights Partners In Change

Role of Community Mobilizers: Pillars of Strength for the Healthcare System

Role of Community Mobilizers (Anganwadi): Pillars of Strength for the Healthcare System

In a country as large as India, it is impractical and nearly impossible for healthcare workers to be available in every village and every remote corner. This where the role of community mobilizers comes in. They are a vital part of the healthcare system as they are often the first point of contact or information related to health, vaccinations, and so on. This includes both Anganwadi and ASHA workers.

 

Anganwadi and ASHA workers

 

ASHA workers come under the ambit of India’s National Rural Health Mission. They act as the first point of contact for any health-related issue in rural areas. The most marginalized communities in the country depend on ASHA workers for doorstep healthcare services. The women who work as ASHA workers have played a huge part in bringing down maternal and infant mortality rates. They inform and educate the communities, right from pregnancy, to childbirth, lactation, and even after that. Moreover, ASHA workers also help marginalized women with institutional deliveries. As per the scheme, every village in the country must have an ASHA worker. This is a trained female community health activist who belongs to the village itself. She is accountable to the people and works as an interface between the community and the public health system.

 

Anganwadi workers primarily work on nutrition of children. They come under the umbrella of Integrated Child Development Services of the government.

 

Even amid the pandemic, this force of community mobilizers played a large role in informing, educating, and collecting data. They have also been at the forefront of many immunization initiatives over the years. During the pandemic, they were responsible for contact tracing as well as ensuring that migrant workers quarantined properly.

 

What all services do community mobilizers provide?

 

Anganwadi and ASHA workers are responsible for a number of nutrition and healthcare services. Some of these are as follows.

 

ASHA

 

Promoters good health practices in the community.

Provide a minimum package of appropriate and feasible curative care.

Arrange for timely referrals.

Generate community awareness concerning various aspects of health. These include basic sanitation and hygiene (promoting WASH), healthy living conditions, balanced nutrition, and so on.

Counsel women over the course of their pregnancy and after childbirth. They educate women about birth preparedness, institutional delivery, breastfeeding, immunization of the child, contraception, and prevention of common infections.

Facilitate the community’s access to health-related institutional services.

Provisions essential items like oral rehydration solution and so on.

Anganwadi

 

Elicit community support and participation in various programmes.

Carry out surveys with special focus on mothers and children.

Organise non-formal pre-school activities for children.

Educate mothers about supplementary nutrition.

Provide health and nutrition education.

Conduct home visits to educate parents about the growth and development of their children.

Keep track of possible outbreaks of diseases such as cholera.

Guide ASHAs in carrying out their responsibilities and in maintaining records.

 

Why are community mobilizers crucial to the healthcare infrastructure?

 

The responsibilities of ASHAs and Anganwadis listed above make it clear that they are at the frontline of the healthcare infrastructure of rural areas and even in urban villages. Being from the community themselves, they are trusted and counted on by the community. These women at the grassroots are the main force for improving health and nutritional status among our impoverished masses.

 

The pandemic also gave us some community leaders

 

Community leader Savita conducting an informative session
Community leader Savita conducting an informative session

 

Fifty-year old Savita is a resident of Surat Nagar Phase 2 in Gurgaon. She has been working for her community for the past five years. However, it was during the COVID-19 lockdowns over the past two years that she has emerged as a true change-maker.

 

Savita suffered a huge loss in her personal life during the pandemic. She lost her husband. Despite this, she kept working tirelessly for her people. During the pandemic, all primary healthcare services had come to a standstill. At this time, she ensured institutional deliveries of at least 10 women from her community.

Singlehandedly, she coordinated with health authorities and the families of expecting women to ensure that they reach hospitals in time for their deliveries.

 

She is also regularly counseling women in her community on reproductive health and guiding them on good health practices.

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Insights

Can climate change turn into a child rights crisis?

Can climate change turn into a child rights crisis?

Children are the most susceptible in crises ranging from warfare to natural disasters and everything in between. Climate change is no different. The threat presented by the global warming catastrophe will only intensify unless the world comes together and thinks of immediate and long-term solutions. Before climate change turns into a child rights crisis, we need to address this issue.

 

At the recently held COP26 UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland, world leaders promised to combat carbon emissions and other climate-related challenges with greater vigour than ever before. The world has no other choice, and children will play a critical part in addressing the crisis of climate change.

 

Mary Robinson, former Irish president who also served twice as a UN special envoy for climate change, moderated the event. During the conversation, she stated that every committee to future climate summits should include at least one or more student representatives. This can help guarantee that young people’s perspectives are acknowledged.

 

The Future

 

A recent Save the Children report has revealed some telling data. If the earth gets warmer at the current rate, children born in 2020 would suffer more heatwaves, floods, droughts, and wildfires than earlier generations. In comparison to a person born in 1960, these children will encounter three times as many climatic disasters as their grandparents. They will also experience nearly seven times as many heat waves over their lifetimes.

 

Water scarcity and air pollution will worsen as global temperatures continue to rise. It will put children at danger of the most lethal effects of water-borne infections and severe respiratory disorders. Indeed, according to a UNICEF research, The Children’s Climate Risk Index (CCRI), released in the run-up to COP26, practically every child on the earth is vulnerable to at least one climate and environmental danger. These may include heatwaves, cyclones, air pollution, flooding, and water scarcity. The Index also categorizes roughly one billion youngsters – nearly half of the world’s minors living in 33 nations – as being at “very high-risk”.

 

There are additional repercussions to extreme weather events. According to the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) report, women and children who are affected by natural disasters are at increased danger of modern slavery and human trafficking.

 

Climate change manifesto for children and the youth

 

South Asia contains some of the world’s densest, child-populated places, including India. Thus, large numbers of children are likely to be affected by flooding, drought, and heat waves.

 

Young people around the world may inherit a problem that was not created by them. However, they may contribute in greater numbers to environmental causes and raise awareness about the impending issue. According to UNICEF, young people can play a bigger role as climate change pressure groups.

 

UNICEF is urging governments, NGOs, and corporations for a number of things.

 

  1. Invest more on climate adaptation and resilience in vital children’s services. Critical services, such as water, sanitation and hygiene systems, health and education services, must be changed to safeguard children, communities, and the most vulnerable from the worst effects of the already changing climate.
  2. Minimise the amount of greenhouse gas emissions. Comprehensive and immediate action is essential to avoid the worst effects of the climate crisis. To keep global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius, countries must reduce emissions by at least 45 percent by 2030 (compared to 2010 levels).
  3. Focus on providing climate education and environmental skills to children, which are essential for their adaptation to and preparation for the impacts of climate change. Children and young people will bear the brunt of the climate problem and water scarcity, despite bearing the least responsibility. All young people and future generations owe us a duty.
  4. Involve young people in all climate debates and decisions at the national, regional, and international levels, especially at COP26. All climate-related decision-making must include children and young people.
  5. Help to make sure a green, low-carbon, and inclusive recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, so that future generations’ ability to address and respond to the climate challenge is not jeopardised.

 

India’s child rights activists

 

Vinisha Umashankar of Tamil Nadu, Ridhima Pandey of Uttarakhand, and Ayaan Shankta of Maharashtra are some of the Indian child activists who have received international attention for spreading awareness about climate change and environmental conservation.

 

Ridhima was just 11 years old when she filed a petition with the National Green Tribunal in 2017, condemning the Indian government for failing to take proper climate action. Seeing the horrific 2013 floods in Kedarnath, which killed nearly 6,000 people, had a profound impact on her. She decided to step up. She even addressed the United Nations, urging swift action to rescue the earth.

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In The Spotlight

Why Beneficiary Management System Is Crucial to Mission Education

Why Beneficiary Management System Is Crucial to Mission Education

Mission Education is the flagship programme at Smile Foundation. The aim of this integral initiative is to reach out and make quality education accessible and available to underprivileged children. Mission Education reaches out to children across the length and breadth of the country. We need to ensure that the objective of the programme is in alignment with our interventions. To study the expected outcomes, it is important to have qualitative management of beneficiary data in place. Thus, the function of collecting, storing, and managing student-related data from pan-India centers comprise the Beneficiary Management System, commonly called the BMS.

 

About Beneficiary Management System (BMS)

 

Beneficiary Management System (BMS) deals with all the details of the students. These include academic reports, batch details, and so on. It tracks all the main points of a student. For example, total number of children enrolled, number of children retained, etc. Data collation is an annual event, facilitated and supported by Smile teams on the ground and from the individual centers. This portal essentially intends to gather and maintain students’ data securely.

 

Why BMS?

 

Our portal will facilitate to explore all the details about the students at any given point of time. The BMS is an automated version of the manual way of entering and managing beneficiary data. It is able to handle all the data points in a robust manner. The information consists of center or school, student education, parent/guardian, and socio-economic background details.

 

Features of BMS

 

Through this system, we have access to alumni information, like their names, contact numbers, address, geographic details, etc. Since it is centralized, project coordinators or regional officers can verify the students’ details during their regular visit to the centers. If any changes are required they can observe, note and update online immediately. There are times when there might be errors in student profiles, including change in status due to migration or other reasons.

 

Identifying these errors and finding effective ways to rectify them can help in improving the systems in maintaining records, managing operations, etc. This process refers to the physical verification of the beneficiary. The data is accessible through a well-designed front-end interface that is easy and friendly to use. The back-end administration tools to administer authorizations and control the front-end content are also optimized. This can also help focus on sustainability. 

 

Benefits of BMS

 

Beneficiary Management System (BMS) is an effective management tool to view students’ details, educational details, etc. within the broader purview of the Mission Education programme management. The obvious advantage of the BMS is that it is a strategic technique to make and manage the data management network, a platform facilitating alumni engagement and alumni community building. The system will give all the random uncoordinated efforts to manage student information by student management services right away. Therefore, BMS is a critical element in the effective execution of the Mission Education initiative.

 

This blog has been contribute by Dharmendra Kumar Chauhan, Senior Executive, Mission Education, SVP.

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