Poshera
January 2019
Palghar
Households: 20,241
People: 203
Intervention
Integrated School Development
Lives Impacted
0
Homes Illuminated
0
Donor
Nathan Krishnan
Grassroot Partner
Diganta Swaraj Foundation
Assessment
Health and education standards of Poshera village, in Maharashtra are some of the poorest in the district of Palghar. 20% children drop out while more than 50% are irregular students. The ZP School, Poshera, was severely lacking in infrastructure. Extensive power cuts from many months were a problem, as the school could not afford the electricity bill. This led to students sitting in darkened classrooms, for months at a time. With no access to water, the school had to procure tanker water. The teachers were motivated but they were not supported in any way by the Block Administration. The teachers have spent from their own pockets and managed to get some painting work done in one of the classrooms, to make it interesting. No innovative teaching mechanism was being used to aid learning.
Intervention
Chirag Rural Development Foundation under its flagship initiative Project Chirag, provided Integrated School Development support to the school enabling a complete model change in the school itself. There were two levels to this intervention: developing the spaces to create varied teaching-learning situations, and developing the built elements in these spaces as teaching-learning aids. This concept was called B.A.L.A. (Building as Learning Aid) which was balanced with Dyan Rachna Vaad, a learning pedagogy introduced by Maharashtra State Government in Zilla Parishad schools. To enable these components, Every classroom in the school received solar electrification with access to a projector, for engaged learning in a comfortable environment including adequate lighting and a fan. The school also received a tab loaded with E learning material up to Std VIII. The walls were made into interactive models using them as a medium of instruction. Poshera now has an activity centre which was an unused school room. The activity centre is a library for older students and for younger students it is a place for indoor games. The money saved on electricity bills will be used by Poshera to procure clean drinking water for the students and faculty. The teachers received training on how to best use BALA and Dyan Rachna Vaad to enhance education. The playground has been levelled and activity and sports equipment such as jungle gym, slide, cricket set etc have been provided. The school space has been utilized appropriately, marking specific areas such as amphitheatre, playground, activity room etc. A wastewater management system has been adopted to ensure no water logging.
Impact
The immediate result of the intervention was 100% attendance in school within a week of installation. By June 2019, in the new academic year, enrollments increased by 25% and today, students who earlier would choose to move to block level schools in Mokhada prefer to continue in these schools. These schools are using e-learning & project based teaching and thereby using new learning pedagogy that is more engaging & child friendly. Student & teacher confidence and commitment has improved considerably, as is evident in performance. While students who participated in a block level (143 schools) Science competition /exhibition came out as winners, the School Management Committee (SMC) has been activated and is all charged up. They are responsible not just for upkeep of the solar system, but are now visiting ideal or Adarsh schools in Pune to learn and adopt best practices in education and are trying to raise school standards to get ISO certification. Confidence levels are seen in the quality of socio- cultural programmes being organized. Saturdays, which are half days for schools are allocated to group projects and activities, making the learning process more experiential. And watching the transformation in these 2 schools, we have received applications from 17 other ZP schools requesting for similar interventions.
