Professional Documents
Culture Documents
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Introduction
CARE’s Girls’ Education Program (GEP) has been in operation in India for more than 10 years and plays
a vital role in achieving our long term goal of reaching out to 2 million women, girls and other
marginalized people to enhance their abilities to exercise greater choice in personal and public spheres by
2014. GEP seeks to improve opportunities for girls and women through their increased participation in
formal and alternative education systems.
GEP also builds upon innovative pilot projects and strategic partnerships that have made important
improvements in access to and quality of education for girls, especially among poor, marginalized and
vulnerable girls. Realizing that there are multiple bottlenecks affecting access, availability and quality of
education, CARE, in partnership with the government of India, addresses the problems on many levels,
both within the formal school system and though a number of alternative approaches to schooling.
Support from Doug Tilden has helped CARE deepen the scope of GEP by improving opportunities for
marginalized girls in India’s Uttar Pradesh state, particularly in Balrampur, Bahraich, Shravasti,
Mohanlaganj and Lucknow districts. This work targets government primary, upper primary and
residential Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya (KGBV) schools, as well as a CARE accelerated
residential Udaan school. The best practices that emerged over recent years are now being implemented
on a larger scale through the Uttar Pradesh government’s Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA or Education for
All) program.
The following report describes activities supported by Doug Tilden during the first half of the third year
(November 2012 through April 2013) of the grant period.
CARE’s School Improvement Program targets formal schools and focuses on developing teacher and
education officials’ capacities to implement child-centered teaching strategies. The program also
emphasizes the participation of communities in monitoring of and support to the school. At present,
CARE works directly with 91 government primary schools (lab schools) through visits, meetings and
training sessions in Balrampur, Bahraich, Shrawasti, Mohanlaganj and Lucknow, and 7,483 schools
indirectly through state-level advocacy (e.g., sharing best practices), as noted in the table below.
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Schools open in early July after summer break. Each year during that time, teachers are engaged in the
distribution of books, uniforms, scholarships, etc. and the CARE team participates in rallies and drives to
push enrollments. The following sections provide an update on key activities and outcomes during this
reporting period:
School-based activities
Based on the themes of support identified through class observation, CARE team demonstrates how a
competency can be transacted in a class. The teachers observe while the CARE staff gives a
demonstration. Through demonstrations, CARE staff built the teachers’ understanding on the following
themes:
During the academic year, it is being clearly reflected in figure 1 that number of classroom observations
and demonstrations have been high in october to december as compared to other quarters. In first quarter,
though schools open in July still lot of time of teachers is engaged in non academic activities while in
third quarter due to cold there were government orders to close the school for almost a month, therefore
October to December was the prime period when our District Resource Persons (DRPs) provided
maximum input support to teachers through COT and lesson demonstrations.
After classroom observation, District Resource Persons (DRP) in field also provided input support to
teachers and students on following:
1. To use TLM for classroom transaction for making it easier for students to understand.
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2. To reach out to students and help them if students are facing any problem while classroom
transaction.
3. To give clear cut instructions for any activity.
4. To give sufficient time to students for practice.
5. To make the group in such a way that it’s a combination of slow as well as fast learner.
6. To ask open ended question on the basis of text they are using and to link it with other material
available in other books as well.
2 Morning Assemblies:
Morning Assemblies have been strengthened as forums of collective participation by CARE team. CARE
has helped teachers in conducting story telling sessions, role plays, songs and poem sessions in
assemblies. The objective of these activities is to create an enabling environment where teachers and
students feel free. It is a forum to build child-child relationship as well as teacher-child relationship. The
forum also helps children shed fear and hesitation. Besides, it helps children to develop communication
skills. The graph (figure 2) below shows the percentage of schools conducting morning assemblies with
more than three activities:
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Though in the start of new academic session there had been irregularity in morning assembly but with
consistent effort of teachers and District Resource Person the morning assembly regularized by the end
of the quarter and it has been reported that 92% of schools are conducting morning assembly as per
the schedule.
During the beginning of each academic year, CARE team supports teachers in preparing time tables in
accordance with the total no. of teachers, subject responsibilities and students in each grade. However
absenteeism of the permanent teachers and engagement of teachers in other than academic activities acts
as a barrier in the way of adherence to time table. Though by August, time tables were prepared in most
of the lab schools, still it took lot of time to stabilize. As in the given figure 3 it clearly depicts that
percentage of schools adhering to timetable is lowest in first quarter and it increases in next quarter.
As the new academic session for the year 2013-14 resumes in the month of July, teachers prepared their
time table for their respective classes. In July most of the teachers were involved in non academic
activities like distribution of books, dresses etc but with consistent supportive supervision almost 80%
schools were adhering to time table by the end of the quarter.
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During the reporting period more than 50% of
visits were done jointly with CARE staff along
with Education Officials to observe schools. The
purpose of these visits is to build understanding
of government officials on indicators of a good
school and to help them monitor schools on
these indicators. In the course of the visit CARE
team helped government officials in knowing the
challenges in the schools and discussing
strategies to overcome them.
5 Teachers’ training on ‘SAMVAD’, the module on Right to Education and National Curriculum
framework
SAMVAD is a module on Right to Education Act and its implications on regular teaching learning
process. CARE team, UNICEF, Education Department and other agencies have together contributed to
the development of this module.
Select members of CARE team participated in development and revision of SAWMAD Module and also
facilitated training of master trainers on the same. Master trainers were the senior teachers from various
districts of UP and these master trainers had the responsibility of training all the teachers across UP on
SAMVAD. 400 Master trainers were trained in Lucknow. CARE team members took select sessions in
the training of Master trainer.
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Community Engagement:
8 Strengthening SMCs:
During the reporting period, CARE staff focused on building capacities of School Management
Committees so that they may be oriented to their roles. CARE staff met the SMC members individually
and then in groups. Head Teacher is the main convener of SMC. It is the mandate of Head Teachers to
call SMC meetings. However, head teachers did not take the initiative of calling these meetings. CARE
team took this issue up and persuaded them to conduct meetings.
During the reporting period 207 SMC meetings were conducted with initiative of CARE staff. The district
team focused on following agenda in their SMC meetings which is as follows:
1. Information on Right to Education (RTE)
2. 100% Enrollment in schools
3. Role of SMC members in enrollment drive
4. Cleanliness of schools
5. Awareness of SMC and its role in functioning of school
The agenda developed by CARE team in district Shravasti for SMCs in Lab School was appreciated by
Basic Education Officer and a commitment was made from his side to replicate this process in non lab
schools.
Community meetings are conducted at village level while family contacts are made on one to one basis
for children who drop out from school for some specific reason. CARE had also promoted concept of
community seminars in which parents are appraised about the performance of their children, RTE (Right
to Education) as well as functioning of schools. In this forum parents also get a chance to question
teachers about progress of their child or related to functioning of schools.
In last quarter, CARE team has been extensively involved in making family contacts on one to one basis,
in first quarter focus was enrollment drive but from next quarter the challenge was to retain already
enrolled children. There have been drop outs but with continuous effort of District Resource Persons,
there has been a great achievement in getting back quite few of them to school.
Successes
In that process, resource persons from CARE got engaged in developing model questions papers for three
districts Balrampur, Bahraich and Shravasti. The effort from CARE has been highly acknowledged and
appreciated by government department.
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11 Successful accomplishment of SMC Convention in Bahraich:
SMCs are being increasingly seen as bodies that will ensure sustainability of the school improvement
initiatives. SMCs are expected to support schools by monitoring attendance and punctuality of teachers
and children; they will also monitor the quality of mid day meals provided by schools; they will support
in resolving local issues related to schools. To help SMCs members understand their rights and
responsibilities and to raise awareness on SMCs role, block events and district events had been planned
which was successfully conducted in all 16 blocks of Bahraich district.
The objective of the convention was to discuss on right to education, status of SMC and focus on most
marginalized section of population like Dalits and Scheduled Castes who are deprived of mainstream
education facilities. In this convention, along with SMC members, education officials from block level
were also present.
CARE team not only coordinated it but also facilitated most of the sessions. The convention brought in to
light various insights regarding functioning of SMC.
CARE team has also taken initiative in orienting SMC members on the role of teachers and community in
management of school as well as awareness regarding Right to Education (RTE).
The process of revision of text books is still continuing and CARE team is partnering with SSA at all
levels to contribute in this process.
Challenges
16 Transfer of Teachers:
In July and August, large numbers of teachers have been transferred from school and as a result, there has
been a fall in Pupil Teacher Ratio (PTR). In Bahraich the PTR has been 66 while the RTE norms make it
mandatory to have a PTR of 30.
Next Steps
Provide story and mathematics puzzle books to lab schools and work closely with teachers to help
them use the books creatively to enhance their students’ imaginations and communication skills.
Strengthen our engagement with the State Council of Educational Research & Training (SCERT), the
institution that designs plans for teachers’ in-service and pre-service training. SCERT is also
responsible for curriculum and textbook-related issues at the state level. To date, CARE has mostly
engaged with the SAA on these themes but we are now in a better position to deal directly with
SCERT.
Support in-service teacher training at the cluster level, coordinating with SAA to plan and facilitate
some sessions.
Focus on fourth- and fifth-grade math and science curriculum areas in lab schools, working toward
ensuring more focused inputs to teachers on the use of science and math kits.
Expenditure Report
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Conclusion
CARE is building a solid foundation to improve educational opportunities for marginalized girls in
India’s Uttar Pradesh state. Teachers are being trained and girls are becoming more confident and active
in school activities. Communities and local authorities are more aware of their roles and responsibilities
in regards to the Right to Education act and supporting girls’ education. While at this point it is too early
to measure longer-term impact, we know that new approaches to education are being adopted in targeted
schools and beyond and that more girls are assuming leadership roles. Moving forward, CARE will
continue to champion extremely poor and marginalized girls, many of whom would not be in school right
now if it were not for Doug Tilden’s support. On behalf of the girls, their families and communities in
Uttar Pradesh, CARE thanks you for your partnership.
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