Nexus of Good: Hurdles deemed irrelevant

Goalpara, a remote district in Assam, has one of the lowest literacy rates in the country. Lack of quality teaching manpower, access issues due to difficult geography, high disaster proneness with annual floods, storms and lightning etc have further exacerbated the situation. The Goalpara saga has been about using every obstacle as a learning step. With a population comprising mainly tribal groups and minorities, lagging in all HDIs, one of the lowest literacy rates, low learning outcomes, lack of quality educators, a difficult topography with sketchy communication and connectivity, providing quality education to all seemed an impossible task. The heterogeneity of the population made a “one size fits all” approach impractical, even counterproductive.

To provide education to all groups, district administration launched Mission Vidyashakti as a multi-pronged approach which has successfully bridged this gap. Mission Vidyashakti began in 2018 with the objective to use innovation to overcome each constraint that prevented a child, a youngster or an adult from learning. Over a period of two years, district administration introduced a plethora of targeted interventions and scalable measures tailored across demography and age groups resulting in marked improvements in learning. What is even more encouraging is the positive spillovers from “Vidyashakti”. It has impacted each sphere of life of this extremely vulnerable section of society, be it health, public awareness, financial inclusion or better livelihood options.

The old and dilapidated Anganwadi Centres in the district were revamped making these much more children-friendly with essential facilities for the holistic development of young children. This led to a doubling of enrolment, improved attendance, much-improved activity levels in the children and a pervasive sense of community ownership.

STEM learning and the creation of scientific temper among children for a district like Goalpara appeared a daunting task. Innovative interventions were required. Under the Integrated Smart Classroom initiative, world-class smart classrooms were developed with multi-model and interactive content. Digital teaching in offline mode is difficult but this is what enabled the provision of digital education by bridging the connectivity divide. Both online and offline modes, encapsulating futuristic concepts & allowing access to a live base of researchers, were arranged.

Lack of quality educators, role models at home, growth-oriented peer activities, and environmental constraints are not factors conducive to a child’s holistic growth. There was a need to encourage the participation of school-going children in co-curricular activities. This was also essential for their overall personality development, to build the youth as future leaders & change bearers. This in turn would lead the way for community goals like Swachh Bharat, public health etc and address the societal apathy to environmental hygiene, maternal, infant and adolescent girl healthcare, fitness and so on. Swachh Poshan Health Clubs launched in all 1,698 schools of the district have brought about epochal changes in the lives of more than 10,000 students of the district besides reaching the wider community.

There were ethnocultural practices in the district that were a hurdle in imparting education. Receptivity to “outsiders” not belonging to a particular caste/tribe/religion was low. Youth living in small houses often develop a commune-like psyche preferring to gather together for various activities. These attributes were put to good effect. This strong sense of community was mobilised. Volunteers – college-going students of the particular community – were oriented in the Accelerated Learning Programme to identify, motivate and teach slow learners. Community peer reading sessions were organised. Hanging libraries in schools with books collected from donation drives addressed infrastructural constraints.

Innovative use of CSR and crowdfunding plugged all gaps in providing clean drinking water, girls' toilets, electricity etc. Having one of the lowest adult literacy rates in the country, using untied funds, an innovative block-wise approach was adopted to survey and make all adult (15+) women literate. The Female Literacy Enhancement Programme was designed with the convergence of different Departments to provide hand-holding support even post-literacy in terms of inclusion under Financial Inclusion etc. To address the problem of zero-teacher school an alternate education model was used with modular videos. Disaster cannot pause education. With this in mind, since 2019, the innovative use of Relief Camps as education centres has started impacting more than 45 per cent of the population that takes shelter at these camps every year during the long monsoon months.

All the interventions under Mission Vidyashakti focus on the ownership-building of the stakeholders who took responsibility to make it sustainable. In all the initiatives, the roles of each participant are well defined and every effort has been made to impart requisite skills and to make them well-versed in their roles.

Mission Vidyashakti has achieved remarkable outcomes, well beyond the originally envisaged ones. Through the intervention of Female Literacy, all 6,895 women of a block have been made literate and the intervention has created a positive impact beyond imagination with these women forming study groups and continuing to build upon the foundation of the Mission. The impact has gone much beyond literacy. This has led to financial empowerment, and improved standards of living as many of the newly literate women found the confidence to approach banks and obtain loans which they used for entrepreneurial activities. The Accelerated Learning Programme has impacted 13,000 students besides generating a pool of volunteers mitigating the gap between School and Community. Poshan Clubs have impacted over 10,000 students of all 1,698 schools in the District by developing them holistically as Change Leaders. Smart Classes have improved learning outcomes by providing high-engagement, competency-based, collaborative learning. The attendance of students has seen a dramatic increase as well as enrolment has shown a marked increase in specific schools. Students have also shown an increased affinity towards learning which has had a positive impact on their learning outcomes. This integrated approach has garnered positive responses from various officials from the education department encouraging them to incorporate such innovative ideas in their own fields of practice. Hanging libraries, community reading campaigns etc have helped inculcate the habit of learning in children impacting more than 10,000 children in schools.

What has been made to happen in this remote district in Assam by a dedicated and committed team under the inspired leadership of the Deputy Commissioner, Varnali Deka is a wonderful example of Nexus of Good. This intensive and collaborative approach adopted in the district can easily be replicated by other districts of the country.

Views expressed are personal