Vision
MISSION POSSIBLE
KAIVALYA means freedom from a conditioned existence and Kaivalya Education Foundation (KEF) has chosen education as its karmakshetra (work field).
Kaivalya came into being from the recognition that the country’s education system is facing a grave crisis. While physical access to primary schools has improved, approximately half of children aged 7-14 are unable to complete basic reading and math problems. Whatever improvements have been made, basic competencies are still well below adequate levels. While primary school enrolment is high, only a third of the relevant age group enters secondary schools. Overall literacy is below that of many sub-Saharan African countries.
The need for change is equally great in higher education. Only 7 per cent of young Indians receive higher education, compared to 15 % in China and 45-50 % in OECD countries.
Right to Education and the government’s universalisation attempt have ensured that 94 per cent of children are now within 1-km of a primary school. An average of 87 % teachers and 75 % of the enrolled children attend their schools.
Despite great strides in access to schools, enrollment rates, funding and teacher attendance, learning quality remains abysmal.
More than 100 million school-aged Indian children are still illiterate. They cannot read a paragraph of text in their mother tongue. Of the total number of illiterate children, 55 million drop out of school after only 4 years. Only 40 per cent of relevant age children complete secondary education.
Also, the Indian education system is a dreamer’s nightmare. It works fine – may be – for those who only seek linearity: degrees, careers and arrears. But what about those who dream differently; who want to soar rather than fit in; who want to become more than just another brick in the wall!
There is a growing consensus that change is needed at all levels of the education system. And there are no quick-fix solutions, because the challenges are complex and disparate. We need ideas, thousands of tailored solutions, and thousands of trained leaders.
To produce these ideas, and these leaders, India needs to generate innovative solutions. Only then will we be able to build the next generation of education leaders, entrepreneurs and practitioners.
It’s a Herculean task but we need to start somewhere.
Kaivalya went straight to where it thought the roots – and probably solution – of this crisis lay: government schools. But going back to these schools with same satchel of books and ideas would have meant nothing.
That’s why Kaivalya envisaged a three-pronged synergic experiment, which is being carried out in several government schools across three states to begin with. Government school children, headmasters and the chosen graduates and postgraduates are its key participants. We believe that the starting point for school change is not system change, not change in others around us, but change in ourselves.
And that school change driven by individual change can create systemic change. We believe that transformation, like charity, begins at home. If you want to change the society, you need to change yourself first. To change ourselves we need to move from idea to action, from fear to courage, from apathy to empathy, and from cynicism to belief. That is how, the Kaivalya Education Foundation believes, we will be able to create a different world, a better world.
Established in 2007, with an eye to bring about school change, Kaivalya initiated the Principal Leadership Development Programme (PLDP). Firm in its belief that behind all change was the energy of young people, it started the Gandhi Fellowship Programme, a two-year “Work For India” initiative to engage the bright young students of the Indian college and university system.
Principal Leadership Development Programme (PLDP)
Kaivalya devised the Principal Leadership Development Programme (PLDP) to strike at the root of the schools education problem. It aims to address the fact that Headmasters of government schools are not adequately trained to run a school as an independent unit. We develop initiatives that cause significant personal transformation among Headmasters leading to a life-long commitment to social change.
The PLDP runs in tandem with the Gandhi Fellowship Programme, where the young Fellow becomes the catalyst in change for the older school Headmaster. PLDP provides a 3-year, in-service, training course for government primary school principals. The programme tackles real problems existing in government schools; supporting headmasters to find solutions to turn around their failing schools and, in the process, creating leaders out of mere administrators.
Gandhi Fellowship Programme
The Gandhi Fellowship is a two-year, full-time, residential leadership programme for graduates and postgraduates. The programme sends the best from among the inspired and inventive young people of India to resuscitate the country’s ailing government schools. The Fellowship is a special nursery that raises and nurtures young people of different persuasions and predilections to confront practical challenges and solve real-life problems. It’s a slice of life, an intense 4-semester period, during which, each Gandhi Fellow works with five Principals and children to support government schools in their change process.
Through a deeply transformative process of self-discovery and personal change, the eclectic Kaivalya team gently encourages the fellows to delve deeper, to rediscover their passions, and devise ways of converting their private dreams into a public reality.
How are we going about it?
The Gandhi Fellows drawn from top colleges and universities across the country are placed at the grass roots to work as assistants to the Headmasters to aid their journey of school change. During this journey the Fellows themselves go through a process of self-change by working with empathy and rigour to negotiate for a fear-free school. In the process the Fellows get exposed to grassroots realities and understand the dynamics of change.
The vibrant Kaivalya team led by the Director, Aditya Natraj, brings in over a 100 years of collective experience from diverse spheres.