saif

The Problem

In Mumbai, at the heart of the COVID 19 outbreak in India…

Sana (name changed) is a 12 yr old girl from the slums of Rafiq nagar in Mumbai. Daughter of a carpenter and maid, she is a first generation learner who planned to extract her family out of poverty by making the most out of her education. She wakes at 5:30 AM to help her mother fill water, cook breakfast and lunch, and sweep the home before rushing off to school. The teachers from the community believe in her potential and try their best to lend support with food rations and stationery. They know that Sana will in turn look out for others, and rightly so, Sana tutors other children in her colony.

Children like Sana are not rare... They uplift their community along with their struggles and success. Advocate Saif Alam & his team works directly with 300 of them.

However, with the onset of COVID, schools and libraries have shut. Despite their motivation and best efforts, These children just do not have access to learning materials. Their ambitions have been put on hold, all because they do not have access to any digital device.

These students are the pillars of the community and have gone the extra mile enabling others with their motivation. They are now helpless when it comes to learning or helping others learn without technology. Even post the lockdown, social distancing is just not possible in dense under-resourced communities. To put things into perspective, 50 children will be expected to sit in a school classroom meant for 20. We need to provide them with digital tablets to increase their access to education.

*Child rights and education are inseparable from each other. Closed schools mean that children are more vulnerable to abuse at home, suffer from malnourishment, and lose out on valuable months of stimulation.

Solution

Bring the classrooms to these 300 student leaders. Provide them with digital tablets loaded with content.

Advocate Saif Alam & his team will ensure that Ranjani and her 299 exceptional friends will use these digital tablets fruitfully. Each tab will help 5 children learn.

1] We shall load the tablets with high quality content

2] Work closely with the student leaders and help them complete their curriculum

3] Work with schools to set up mini classrooms (with 5 children) within the community and conduct classes via zoom/hangouts

4] Help motivated students teach their peers 

Advocate Saif Alam & his team has been working with the children, schools and community members in this geography for the past three years and are sensitive to the needs of their local and nuanced needs. We are fully aware that a piece meal intervention such as simply delivering the tabs will not be enough to create the desired impact and hence will follow though all the way.

Impact

300 Students will get this E-learning Education.

We are going to directly empower 300 student leaders to lead the education revolution in their community with technology for over 1500 students. They will be able to continue studying and helping others study along with them.

Ample research shows that all it takes is one member to be educated to pull an entire family out of poverty.

$7 or Rs 500 = Internet access for 5 students

$45 or Rs 3,000 = Towards a digital tablet

$160 or Rs 12,000 = An entire digital tablet for 4 students