Mr. Siddhesh Mhatre introduced that Pratham is a large non-profit foundation in India that aims to improve education for every child. At the household level, Pratham tried to reach children through their families. Passing on information and following ups are the key to this level. Pratham was also leveraging and expanding its parental network for this mission. At the community level, Pratham utilizes twenty-five thousand volunteers to reach two hundred thousand children during one of the longest school closures in the world. The critical methodology of Pratham is “Reaching at the right level” for both parental and voluntary human resources.
To scale up its activities, or in Pratham’s way, “to scale up reaching the right level, the first thing to do is assess the current learning outcome level lost during the pandemic. There’s an urgent need to catch up to the right level. Then, besides partnering with the government and schools, partnering with communities is also needed. On the community side, mothers are essential and need holistic development because they play the most crucial role in developing young children.
Mr. Siddesh concluded his 3 takeaways as follows;
- To catch up on the learning loss that occurred for the 2 years during the pandemic by utilizing communities and volunteers rather than going through step-by-step textbooks.
- Leaping forward will also help eliminate the need to catch up. Strong parental support, especially through mothers’ groups, could establish strong foundations for younger children and help them leap forward.
- Stay in touch and connect while the physical meetings are still difficult. Providing adequate access to digital devices and the internet is essential, as well as required online skills.
Source
International Conference on Equitable Education: Together Towards Equity 2022
Session 2: Community and Parental Support By Mr. Siddhesh Mhatre, Co-Head and Lead Operations of Direct Elementary Programs, Pratham Education Foundation
