THIS Children's Day, instead of the tokenism that usually marks the occasion, Bombay's children had something to celebrate. Thanks to the efforts of Pratham, a voluntary organisation promoting universal primary education, learning could become an enjoyable and rewarding experience.
With over seven lakh students in about 1,2 50 schools, the Municipal Corporation of Greater Bombay (mcgb) runs one of the largest primary-education networks in the world. About five lakh children are enrolled in standards I to IV, but, unfortunately, a quarter of them drop out even before reaching standard V Why does the mcgb, which accounts for 60 per cent of the city's students in standards I to IV, fail to retain them?
This was the question that exercised Pratham and prompted it to launch a unique programme called smile, Social Mobilisation for an Improved Learning Environment. According to its executive secretary, Madhav Chavan, Pratham identified the lack of pre-school-or kindergarten- education as largely responsible for the high drop-out rate-a situation compounded by lack of motivation and low achievement levels. To this end, Pratham has set up 210 baalwadis, or kindergartens, in the city.
Over 180 baalwadi instructors have been selected from targeted communities and provided with the basic material. An instructor is paid a monthly stipend of Rs 150-classes are held for two hours daily-and gets to keep the fee, Rs 10 to Rs 15 per child. While only 40 per cent of the children paid the fee in the first year, 9 0 per cent did so in the next-an indication of the recognition by parents of the value of early learning. Air e ady, 6,3 0 0 children attend the baalwadis and this number is expected to increase to 9,000 by next year.
A second component of smile is the shikshan prerak (education motivators), meant to ensure attendance in schools. College students in the targeted communities were paid Rs 300 each to train aspreraks. Their job: to de- velop a rapport with frequent absentees-or those lagging in academics-and involving their parents. By next year, Pratham will have 300 preraks, each covering 1,000 homes and, thus, a 15-lakh population. Launched two years ago at the initiative of the unicef, Pratham's trustees are drawn from the mcgb, the Maharashtra Government and the corporate and voluntary sectors. Initially funded by state grants and the unicef, Pratham commissioned a survey of the infrastructure of the mcgb schools. Over 3 50 doctors who volunteered to inspect 875 schools found that the vast majority of schools were in surprisingly good shape. Several were overcrowded, many had insufficient water supply, others had leaky roofs but most were well-lit and ventilated. Twenty per cent, however, were rated from bad to very bad.
The survey revealed that the mcgb had created, but couldn't maintain, an education infrastructure. Of its annual budget of Rs 2 5 3 crore for primary education, 8 5 per cent is spent on wages, admits D.U. Dandavate, education officer, mcgb. But now that the lack of essential facilities had been identified, Pratham set out to find corporate support to provide them.
Its school-adoption programme involves volunteers 'adopting' mcgb schools and then working with the faculty to solve their most pressing problems-be it a shortage of teaching material, lack of space or poor hygiene-with funds raised by Pratham. Early success has enabled Pratham to raise over Rs 15 lakh from the corporate sector, notably the Tata and Godrej foundations, the Bombay Community Public Trust and icici. However, Pratham's rapid expansion has stretched its resources. Its activists are highly motivated but inadequately trained. Moreover, the entire initiative is expected to cost Rs 1.5 crore, a tall order considering the scale of corporate contributions so far. But as Dandavate puts it, with its initial success, Pratham has helped Bombay "begin its march towards total literacy".