NOVEMBER 2020

ShikshaLokam, a Shibulal Family Philanthropic Initiative, is a societal platform designed to transform the education leadership by enabling various stakeholders engaged in the K-12 education system through collaboration and co-creation.

Bidding farewell to the year that 2020 was.

Celebrating our Partners: The Harbingers of Hope

The pandemic may have forced us away from the ground, but has brought us a lot closer to our stakeholders and education leaders. The silver lining in these rather challenging times was to see a number of collaborations, innovations and virtual engagements leading to continuity in learning - whether it was for students, teachers, leaders or parents. As Helen Keller once said, "Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much", none of these engagements would be possible without our close-knit, amazingly inspiring partners. In this edition of our newsletter, we celebrate and salute our partners, who have been the harbingers of hope.

Mantra4Change was quick to pivot and conceptualise the remote Continuous Learning Enhancement Program for over 90,000 teachers with the SCERT team of Andhra Pradesh and the Resilient School Program with the AP Social Welfare Educational Institutions. Their Micro Innovations Festival was a priceless initiative to partner with. The environment of recognition, appreciation and celebration that it created certainly improved the motivation and participation of the HMs and the teachers.

Enabling learning from home for kids was the need of the hour. Towards this, Mantra's initiatives like Students Sabha, Quarantine Learning Camps and Virtual Maker Labs saw over 100,000 children engaging in project-based learning activities. It was enabled by a unique Remote Geography Collective.

To support the school leaders and teachers to minimise the learning loss for children during this year marred by school closure, our partner Sanjhi Sikhiya’s Young Leaders have been reviving spaces like the Cluster Academic Meetings (CAMs) virtually in Punjab’s Fatehgarh Sahib District. These meetings are aimed at discussing challenges, sharing best practices and supporting each other in creating plans to ease the process of learning for the students. Crisis necessitates collective problem solving.

ShikshaLokam has also been a part of the Punjab Education Collective which has been working closely with the Department of School Education in the state since August 2019. As early as in March 2020, the collective came together to identify challenges faced by the stakeholders on the ground, co-create solutions to effectively address these challenges and implement it with the help of education system officials. From Virtual Parent Teacher Meetings (PTM) to Enrollment Helplines to formation of state level task force - the Digital Sikhiya Team to enable the process of digital learning among students in the state - the organizations in the collective applied their expertise to create relevant and the most out-of-the-box innovative solutions. Read the ‘Punjab Education Collective Annual Impact Report’ which gives an in-depth view into what the wonderful work done in the state over the last year.

Further south, Tamil Nadu also saw several other programs to combat the new normal. Madhi Foundation’s Foundational Learning over WhatsApp (FLOW), which reached around 8,000 children, leveraged simple technology to provide daily educational engagement for children. The team also launched State Educators and Executive Development (SEED) programme which equipped over 4000 educators and executives with the skills to meet the demands of virtual classrooms, online project delivery and energised administration.

Vidhya Vidhai reimagined their initiatives to support school leaders at the most micro-level. They also initiated a remote learning opportunity "Aakam" which was availed by over 2000 students and launched a toll-free number to restore positivity and build resilience in students. A new partnership was also born with the Department of Education, Puducherry in the month of November 2020, when the Vidhya Vidhai team was invited to design and implement a School Leadership Development Program.

Kaivalya Education Foundation is another long-standing partner of ours which has continuously strived to develop leadership in the system. At ShikshaLokam, we have always believed in the power of ecosystem and partnerships. To us, this year was a striking testimony to their innovation and deep understanding of the education landscape.

Grey Matter

Barriers and Enablers of Agency

With the increasing complexity of problems, as seen in the COVID pandemic situation, organisations in the development sector are increasingly realising the need to move from working in silos to solving things together. Restoring agency of every relevant individual and organisation is fundamental to responding together. Societal Thinking is rooted in the value of restoring agency.

With respect to this, Societal Platform and eGovernments Foundation partnered and commissioned Aapti Institute to research on the idea of restoring agency and arrive at principles that could help the Societal Platform missions design for it.

Tap To Explore The Ideas

New Year, Hopeful Beginnings

Happy New Year..!

"Coming together is a beginning, staying together is progress, and working together is success." – Henry Ford

As this roller coaster year full of challenges, achievements, struggles, learnings and successes is about to come to an end, we at ShikshaLokam look forward to our continued journey with you in 2021. Looking forward to the new year and the new things it has in store for us. Stay tuned. Stay Safe. Stay Happy.