Nexus of Good: Inclusivity in education

There are a number of problems that beset school education in India. One of these relates to Out-of-School children (OOSC). COVID has gone on to add to the severity of this problem. Humana People to People have made an attempt to address this issue. They have succeeded substantially in the regions that they have worked in and they are scaling their effort.

In 2005, Humana People to People India (HPPI), a civil society organisation, decided to address the challenge of the OOSC, especially those living in slums, urban and semi-urban areas. The project was initiated as ‘Academies for Working Children’. From 2005 to 2015, around 15,000 children benefited from these ‘academies’. While around 50 per cent of the children were mainstreamed in government primary schools at some time during their education, the project was ‘independent’ of government and was dependent on full funding from private contributions, which limited the scale of the programme.

With the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act (RTE) in 2009, an idea emerged for developing a pedagogical and operational model that was aligned with the RTE Act for OOSC under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (now, Samagra Shiksha). From around 2013 to 2015, the teaching-learning materials, tools and techniques were developed and designed, and the model was piloted on a very small scale in different CSR funded projects. The attempt, thereafter, was to develop a strategy based on public-private partnership and scale up the out-of-school programme.

The first large-scale programme with 2000 children was implemented in cooperation with Bharti Foundation and RSK Madhya Pradesh in the session of 2015-2016 in two of the state’s tribal districts, Bharwani and Jhabua. After the initial success in Madhya Pradesh, in July 2016, an agreement was signed with Educate a Child – a programme under Education Above All Foundation, Qatar — for mainstreaming 30,000 children in Haryana over three years. In October, the same year, an MOU was signed with the State Project Office of Haryana. The department committed to pay for the Kadam teachers (education volunteers) and the printing of the Kadam tool-kits for each child. These contributions by the state took off during the second year of the project. By July 2019, the project had enrolled over 40,000 children and successfully mainstreamed over 34,000 children. An assessment of the mainstreamed children showed that over 90 per cent stayed in school, and performed average, at par with the other children of their grade.

In 2017 and 2018, the regional workshops organised by the Ministry of Education enabled HPPI to present the Kadam model in four of the five regional workshops and discuss extensively with states. This gave a boost to the public-private partnership model and resulted in Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) with Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir. A model for bridge education was also developed under the name of Kadam+. This approach for remedial learning and bridge education for in-school children has, until April 2023, reached out to 1,24,163 primary school children in Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand. The partnership between HPPI and Haryana for OOSC was extended for three more years in the second phase in 2019, and again, was extended for yet another three years in December 2022. Till April 2023, a total of 155,421 children were integrated at age-appropriate grade levels after closing their learning gaps with the support of Kadam programme.

Identification of OOSC is where it all begins. It is perhaps the most challenging part as well. Areas with a large number of OOSC are identified, and the catchment area of the Gram Panchayat Samiti in that area is defined. The Kadam teacher starts with a door-to-door household survey, mapping all OOSC in the catchment area of the school. The teacher mobilises the children and the parents to enroll in the school. The school allocates a class-room, a veranda or a corridor for the Kadam Centre (a Special Training Centre). The Centre ideally runs for 9-11 months. The Government Primary School (GPS) is involved in the programme. The head teacher supervises and supports the Kadam teacher and its activities. The Kadam teachers are organised in groups of 10, who meet weekly and share experiences and collect data for the online Management Information System (MIS).

A baseline determines the entry step, and their age determines the end goal for the exit step. Each child has an assessment card called TmP Card – Tracking my Progress Card, which makes the progress of the child visible to him/her as well as the other stakeholders, including teachers, parents, BRPs, etc. The children in the Kadam programme work in groups of three, called trios, and spend 70 per cent of their time doing exercises that are directly linked to NCERT-defined learning competencies. In all, the programme is significantly based on 540 competencies and 10 steps across five grades and four subjects. In the remaining 30 per cent of their time, the children are engaged in theme-based, hands-on activities which provide them with real-life learning. A monthly theme headline determines the scope of these activities which, at the end of the month, culminates in Children’s Day. Once a month, the parents are invited for a Parent Teacher meeting. Engaging with parents is an important component of the programme.

With the success of Kadam at the lower primary level, Humana created a programme that could take on quality learning to upper primary level, and hence, came up with Sambhavana programme for grades 6 to 8. Like Kadam, Sambhavana is also a programme that can be implemented as an out-of-school programme addressing children in the age group of 12 to 14 years, and as a programme to close the learning gaps in children studying in the middle school grades.

The field staff of Humana, connected with the children in the streets to collect information, found that many children were hooked to mobile phones and were wasting their whole day. As the parents of these children could only be found in the early hours of the day or later in the evening, the Humana team visited their homes accordingly. The idea was to convince the parents to get their children enrolled in schools. This wasn’t a difficult task. The reason being that most of the parents were also aware of the existing situation and wanted a correction in the ways of life of their children.

To begin with, Humana opened three centers in Panipat for OOSC to enroll those who were above 11 years. Many of these children had increased learning gaps which needed to be bridged, as they had either never been to a school or had dropped-out of school very early on. The task was, therefore, not only huge but also sensitive. The specially trained teachers of Humana exhibited extreme patience and commitment, and were able to start the three centres with OOSC. Their focus was simply to make children like “learning”. Many simple yet powerful applications were brought into class. Foundational learning was emphasised upon to build a robust ground for progressive learning. Tablets were introduced for e-learning to corroborate textbook concepts. Thematic learning enhanced the holistic development in children. Peer interaction methods that built sociability and boosted confidence were integrated. Soft skills were introduced to enhance their future skill building. Teachers formed rapport with both parents and children to bring everyone in the circle of education. All in all, a very conducive environment for education of these groups of soon-to-be adults was constituted. With a showcase of success in the three Panipat centers that were started in 2018, two more centres were established in 2022. In 2022, the Sambhavana programme was adopted by the Haryana Education Department for integrating OOSC into formal schooling in the state.

Humana People to People have demonstrated that issues relating to OOSC and foundational learning can be addressed substantially through public-private partnerships in the true spirit of Nexus of Good. The model is already being scaled and can be scaled further.

Views expressed are personal