Education quality and Gender Equality

[raj_rathee]

Folks:

Two threads of related interests (and of personal interest to me)
have been going on at Jatland:

Quality of education:

http://www.jatland.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10361

and

Upliftment of Females:

http://www.jatland.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10443


I think now could be a good time to come up with some concrete
suggestions that can be pursued at the government level. We currently have
Jatland member, Deepender Singh Hooda as a Haryana MP. And his
dad Ch. Bhupinder Singh Hooda as the the CM of Haryana.

This could be a good opportunity to thoroughly abuse them ! What I mean
is to take advantage of their positions and strong desire to make change,
and see if we can provide any valuable input that they can help implement.
I am sure they are already working on those lines, but our additional input
could further serve to mould their thinking and approaches.

The purpose here would be suggestions that would serve for policy and
government level implementation, rather than what independent group
and organisations (NGOs etc) could do.

If there are any takers for it I am willing to serve to co-ordinate this
discussion. (And I for my part will try to minimize any use of humor here. ).

The end result would seek to provide a written document that would
summarise the various approaches/ideas that we collectively come up
with, and provide this to Deepender...who still logs in from time to time.

While doing this we would have to keep in mind that suggestions should
be practical, in line with political considerations, with legal and
enforceable constraints etc. Any active members who are aware of these
issues (lawyers etc.) could serve to keep the discussion in check and in
line with such practical standpoints.

But for this to be successful we would need some good participation
from the memers here in the form of good critical and analytical
discussion.

Let me know if there is sufficient interest here and I'll kick it off.

 

[vinodks]

Yeah kick it off. Dhisuuum!!

There are certain things where direct involvement of govt. can bring more effective and massive change than NGOs, because later is limited by resources, finance and workers. In this thread we can start developing kind of semi-formal appeal to D Hooda about this issue. Fringing of the subject, there was nice idea that Anmol suggested. We can also have a petition. As far I see, we can include two items in petition
1). female education and empowerment and
2). IT education in rural areas.(Having too many items in petition might underemphasize the main idea).

We can formulate exact wording of petition out of this discussion and other 2 threads and it can be refined by further discussion. And then it can be passed down to Hooda directly(because it will sound more sincere). It would be great if R K ji pitch in and help us.

http://www.petitiononline.com/petition.html

But beside this particular petition we might also end up with, as a by product, a draft of formal protocol of appealing and sending mass message to other politicians too in the region.

Petition is one aspect. By this way we can also know from D Hooda what govt is actually doing (plz somebody don't tell us what he said in parliament). Thats where 'right of information' act comes in. We can spread awareness about this so that people can have access to information of where the money gets spent. 2 crore for a contsy is LOT. Anyway I am sure people will have other ideas too. So come in, join us!!! Waiting are you for what???

-Vinod

 

[devdahiya]

It Will Require Character And Devotion

Bhai Raj aaj pehli baar kaam ki baat kahi chhore arr aatma ki baat kahun suun....i liked it hell of a lot. Be on these lines in future also...he,he,he...Kidding dear.



Education: The word sounds simple but reaching it in true sense needs interest, labour,keenness,motivation[internal and external] and ofcourse infrastructure coupled with good directing staff [both at the institutes and at home] and if that be the requirement then it is simple to list out the steps and inputs required to be gone into/taken.In Rural jat belts of Haryana/Rajasthan/UP and MP[specially in Haryana] education has become a big bussiness as thousands of schools mushroomings year after year like PAN shops in every street and corner with a sole aim of generating money.I have the firsthand information of a few schools where a certain amount of money is collected from the students who appear for the board exams towards facelitating mass copying.Part of this money so collected goes to the invigilaters and mass copying does take place. Here it will be pertinent to mention that the students are a happy party to this stupidity as they want to pass the exam by hook or crook.....this they do because for future admissions/jobs certificate is the key and not the mental inputs and as such these endorsements of grades/marks on these passing certificate are the bench mark. If that be so, first and foremost require ment will be TO CHANGE THIS ATTITUDE AND STALL THIS PRACTICE WITHOUT ANY DELAY.......SHORT CUTS ALWAY DOOM PEOPLE AND CIVILIZATIONS.


Then comes the teaching staff...In govt schools all teachers have lost interest[i am talking of those who have some self respect left and have knowledge of their subjects] A shade better students[those whose parents can afford to spend a little more or are in towns] land up in so called public schools and are a little better than their counterparts in Govt schools.In govt schools niether the students have any interest in learning nor the teachers inclined to teach...THIS IS THE TRUTH. Then teaching aids are missing as the funds allotted are siphoned off. buildings are in shambles and animals are grazing on the so called playgrounds. Amenities are hardly any and monitoring zero. Thus the sight is real pathetic and system needs overhaul by involving the govt agencies,NGOs,social groups,parents,public at lardge,Teachers and ofcourse the students and then the things must be monitored properly. Task is daunting but those brave people who have undertaken such challenges in past are respected and rememberd by one and all. IT IS TOTAL MUCK ALL AROUND AND YOU NEED THUNDERING RAINS TO CLEANSE THE ATMOSPHERE. More subsequently.................................................!

 

[raj_rathee]

Couple of Approaches.....

Thanks Vinod and Dev Chacha. I am hoping a few more people
at least will pitch in and show some interest. This will
only be worthwile if we have wide range of views, and have
people willing to question and be critical of what
others have to say. A broad sprinkling of folks from
different competencies will be needed if we want to carry
this through. So lets see if we can get a quorum of 10-15
people willing to spend some time thinking this through.

I was thinking of two different approaches here, and I'll
outline these below. We can choose the one that seems more
effective.

The first approach would be to take a broad look at the
issues involved at a macro level and lay them out with our
suggestions for possible change. Personally I would not
favor this approach as it would come out as a pie in the
sky set of high level suggestions that might seem too
wishy washy. And I think the petition approach might
come out like that.

The other approach that I was more keen on was to come
out with something more concrete so that we can pretty much
spoon feed the "what to do" and "how to do" details of the
steps we propose. To this end I am thinking that we should
assume that we are the politician and the bureacrat handed the
assignment, and then think it through their position and
viewpoint of how to make it happen.

Further, what I would propose is that we bite only what we
can chew. And by that I mean we should simplify the task to
a smaller level so that not only we can view the entirety of the
problem, but also have a measurable means of tracking the end
results if indeed anything were to be followed up on.

From this perspective we perhaps should assume that we are
given a single village ( or at most a cluster of villages)
as a sort of "model" village (cluster) to which are suggestions
can be applied.

Given that we can assume that some additional resources in addiiton
to what is currently available maybe be provided.But we should
be realistic and not assume that we get anything we ask for. So
I would like to think through the issues with the assumption
that little additional resources are provided by the government
other than what is already currently allotted to a village.

I think if we break down the problems as above, think of
the issues at the level of a single village and with no
substantial additional resources...we might have some chance
of coming out with some meaning proposals.

And maybe at the end of all that it might be possible to actually get
"assigned" such a model village where the suggestions are implemented
to see if indeed they bring change. Hence some measurable metrics
would need to be proposed.

That is the broad overview of what I have in mind right now.
So lets poke holes in all this and see if we can agree on
some approach.

[Hopefully we get some additional contributors here who can
also provide the ground realities and keep us in check so we
don't end up in fantasy land. If that quorum doesn't happen
then we'll just dump the effort....]

 

[devdahiya]

Focus

Raj dear, there are three stages an idea has to cross to be accepted by a cmajority ie Debate....redicule....and acceptance. Nothing on thids earth ever has been a success unless thoroghly rediculed and condemned and hence this idea too will have to pass through that very test of time if we want a wider, general acceptance. Let us debate it thoroghly. I will give my ground realities subsequently. Wish this topic a deliberate and lengthy churnings!

 

[priti]

Some ideas for gender equality

Hi Raj, Good thread indeed!

Some ideas which came to my mind to be included in your idea of a 'Green paper for closing gender and education gap in Haryana':

Sadly, gender discrimination starts right at the stage of conceiving a baby in our state, the first step the government can take is to crack down on the ultrasound clinics which are proliferating in cities and towns like Rohtak, sonipat. Obviously its hard to differentiate between real need and artifically created need of ultrasound technology but I'm sure the locals would know what goes on in which clinic.

Also, every clinic should have gender education provisions to inform the visiting clients on these issues...especially on girl child.

Second thing is to make education compulsory for all children (i'm sure its already compulsory but since the idea is to have a comprehensive road map, why to leave this out). But this education should come at a cost for most as people value what they pay for and free riders take things for granted. Within the secondary school curriculum, a course on Rights might help in attitude change. Making people aware of their civil and legal rights is a very useful and proven strategy of behaviour and attitude change. The course should also include 'Human Rights' which sensitises people to treat others with respect and dignity irrespective of their gender, caste, income. Lots of indians are working in the field of human rights and am sure designing a module like this would not be an issue if the government has firm resolution insolving these problems. Also, one main thing to be targeted is the Choudharaat attitude of jats with their own folks (i think some attitude is good for confidence and personality if practiced judiciously in the outside world....but whats the use of having this attitude with our own kin ).

I think first and foremost requirement is a social survey of the situation in haryana villages. Any plan is only effective if its firmly grounded in the reality and known problems, any speculative assessment is as good as deathbed for good intentioned plans.

On a specualtive note, women should be represented and consulted on policy issues. I dont remeber which government introduced the no-alcohol policy in the state some years back...but i do remember that the women folk were pretty happy with that arrangement although it proved to unsustainable due to the inherent weaknesses of the system. I think consulting women should give policies a more effective and practical tone as you pointed out in your kofi annan's post that they are the locus of all development issues...

I seriously think the government should start with a study on current state of affairs on gender and education gap and then start a consultation process on this very important issue...thats the right way of doing it everywhere in the world.

Will write more as more things come to mind..

Goodluck!

 

[vinodks]

IT IS TOTAL MUCK ALL AROUND AND YOU NEED THUNDERING RAINS TO CLEANSE THE ATMOSPHERE.....!

Reminds me Robert de Niro's dialogue in Taxi Driver

"Someday a real rain will come and wash all this scum off the streets."

Deb kaka, aapke idea to revolutionary hain... I agree you are sincere person for society... but we need focused discussion to do something... aur wasse Raj saheb ko bhasanh pasand nahi hai


-vinod

 

[shokeen123]

Good Effort!

Dear all:

I haven’t had a chance to review the entire discussion, had to take care of something urgent at the home front (Chhore ki college application), however, please count me in for whatever task I may be able to perform. Please also know this will not be possible without the involvement and or guidance of the experienced people with good insight, I am obviously referring to NAJC chapter.

More later…

 

[raj_rathee]

Hi Raj, Good thread indeed!

Some ideas which came to my mind to be included in your idea of a 'Green paper for closing gender and education gap in Haryana':

Priti:

You brought up:
--------------------------------------------------------------
Suggestions:

o Cracking down on ultra sound clinics => keep sex ratio balanced
-- locals know what happens where, can point out clinics
abusing ultra sound technology
-- clinic should have gender education => guide potential
customers against aborting female child


o Make education cumpulsory for all children
-- It probably already is...at least on paper
-- Attach some cost to it => make it "appear valuable"

o Make knowledge of civil + legal rights part of curriculum
-- Includes issues of human rights (respect regardless
of caste, religion, *gender*, income)

o Carry out social survey to discover ground realities
=> have a solid foundation for any suggestions
-- govt. should have a comprehensive analysis
(consultative) on ground realties vis-a-vis
gender and education issues

o Consult women on social/policy issues

--------------------------------------------------------------

Some of my comments:

Regarding Ultra Sound Clinics:

I think over time in the recent past various laws
have been passed against sex determination. I have direct knowledge
in this regard. They are NOT working as of now. The only thing that
has happened is that now the doctors are charging a bit more. And the
customers are quite happy to shell out the extra bucks. It is probably
like Bansi Lals' prohibition (???). i.e. No change in attitude of
behaviour...just gave some people the opportunity to make a lot
more money.

I think making clinics provide gender education is a good idea. And
some system can be devised to ensure that it gets done. ** Please
provide some ideas of how to ensure that it gets done. **

In general my take on most social issues is not to try to *force*
people into anything but to *guide* people into making the
*desirable* choices on their own. To this end the education
aspect is a nice idea....and a theme that I would like to follow
in general in other issues to.

Make Education Compulsory

I think it already is. If its not it should be declared as such.
Enforcing it is again hard. How do you do it ? Again gotta make
the parents want to send their kids. And such parents usually are
the poorer ones in the first place who resort to child labour.

Make Civil + Legal Rights part of curriculum

I strongly agree with this one. I see such education (social behaviour,
environment issues, inter-personal, rights etc.) being provided
right from the get go (grades 1, 2 and onwards) here in the US and
Canada. And I can personally attest to its positive affects in the kids.

Carry out social survey

This is generally the approach to follow in an ideal situation. But
I would stay away from it for this specific purpose that we are looking
at under this thread. I'll discuss this a bit more in my next post.

Consult women on social/policy issues

Yes we should. The "how to" of this should be ironed out (logistics,
approach, information sought etc.). Got suggestions ? Again I would
look for specific guidelines for the *very specific* objective of this
thread.

 

[raj_rathee]

Lets scope it down !!!

Priti brought out some good points in her post. She
made some sugesstions that are broader in nature (abortion
clinics, broad based consultation/surveys...etc.). I think
these are great suggestions but I fear that the scope of all this
brain storming would be too large for us to undertake here.

My interest would be to really cut down the scope here
so that we can be more concrete and focussed and can come
up with some cookie-cutter suggestions that any able
administrator can implement right away.

So let scope it down as follows:

o We collectively are the *administrator* in charge
of implementation of the proposals.

o We are the sample target for any survey. Our common
experience reflects the issues need to be solved.

o We are provided a model village (call it "Harya"). Harya
is a typical Haryana village (mixed castes/professions/economic
strata etc. i.e. We are not talking about some far off tribal area.)

o Harya already has a school...upto 12th grade.

o We have free hand in adminisetring the school (teachers,
resources)...can seek transfer of those than do not meet
our needs etc...but can't fire them and so on.

o We have choice of two additional employees

o We have an additional budget of say 3 lakh rupess
(just trying to be conservative and realistic)

o Our only charter is over Harya and no where else. i.e.
We need to *only* consider gender+education issues in "Harya"

Lets take the above scoped down problem and come out with the
issues we need to solve. Subsequent to that we'll come up
with solutions. And for the solutions we need to come down with
the last detail of implementation. For instance, if we need
to do a survey than issues like who does it, who the target
audience is, how many in the target audience, what information is
sought, how is it used...and so on...At least I want to go into
that direction.

 

[vinodks]

Hey Raj,

These points are good, no doubts but lets go step by step. First of all lets decide on 2 basic things.

-What is purpose of this thread? Nature of discussion very much depends on purpose.

-Out of discussion, we will emerge with to-do list. Who are doers? What resources we have? What is mode of operation?

I would say instead of going over all problem to make perfect a village. Lets target 1-2 most important ones. And then lets talk about specifics. General talks have been talked a lots of times. Same things have been talked earlier in many thread and Jatland-Seva people went through gruelling emails about this. They are important but we need to get out of general talks of problems.
There is no use talking of ultra-sound if we don;t have any plan of what we going to do about it in next 3-4 months. Life of a thread is max 2-3 weeks. To have a better follow up we need better and systematic approach, almost like an organization, which we don't have right now.

First of all, all serious people should put their cards on table and answer the most important question "What can I do?"

My card is this:

"I can't go to villages to do these things(except short time in vacation in which I will try my best). I can't donate. I can network, plan and discuss. I can give 30min daily"

Lemme me know how are you gonna use my resource?... lemme know what others can do? and we can first decide how we gonna use each of us and then we can talk WHAT we gonna DO.

If we aren't going to do anything about some problem, its no use to have gruelling session on that. Same issue will emmerge after few months and people will come up with renewed energy to post.

Bottom-up approach. First lets take stock of what we can do? then we will decide what to do.

-Vinod

 

[raj_rathee]

Hey Raj,

These points are good, no doubts but lets go step by step. First of all lets decide on 2 basic things.

Good points Vinod. Some of these I had tried to address
above but lets be more concrete as you suggest.

---------------------------------------------------------------
You concerns:

o Purpose of the thread.
o Who are doers ? What resources do we have ? Mode of operation ?
o Problems we want to target ? Have specifics.
o Answer to the question "What can I do ?" or "What do i HAVE to do ?"
----------------------------------------------------------------

My comments:

My initial approach/requirement here is that all we
do is *THINK* and thats it ! No donations. No volunteer work !
Nothing. Just *think*.

Like I said, my motivation for starting this is that we have
someone in the government who we believe is receptive to what we
say. No NGOs. No charity organisations. Zilch. Zero. We already
got the government ! That is the assumption everything will be
based on.

My ideal situation is that Deepender Hooda/CM listens to us
and assigns a model village and an administrator and DOES exactly
as laid out. No questions asked. Resources as mentioned above.
So nothing out of the blue. No huge sums of money. Just an
administrator to oversee. 2 additional employees. An additional
3 lakh per annum spending money to carry out tasks.

The problems we want to target is education quality and gender equality.
10+2 School is already there. Teachers are already there. We just
need to ensure that students are getting QUALITY education.
It has to be MEASURABLE increase in QUALITY. So this will encompass
all aspects of education (ensuring teachers perform, ensuring children
and parents have a say, ensuring regular performance is measured and
evaluated with proper standards). We further need to define this problem
space based on feedback here. Hence I was proposing a problem definition
phase before we begin to seek solutions.

The problem of gender equality is a more general one. I would like
to tie this down more closely to the education of the female child and
ensuring that she gets it on par with the make child. Members should
provide what needs to be covered. Maybe we should limit it to education.

As mentioned before you or I don't have to do anything at all. We just
think and provide the implementation details to be followed by the
administrator. That is it.

[ Of course, if this were to be ever realised (and I hope it would)
we could serve as role models, career guides, guest lecturars
etc. on our India trips etc. on a strictly volunteer basis. No money.
No commitments etc. Just a common desire to make the "Harya" a successful
model village for EDUCATION and EQUALITY for THE FEMALE CHILD ]

That is the crux of my goal here. To just brainstorm around this
limited scope.

Let me know if I need to clarify further. Its good that we clearly lay
it out so that discussion don't keep on going at tangents. We need
to stick to exactly the charter we are laying out here and everyone
participating is agreable to it upfront.

 

[raj_rathee]

Dear all:

I haven’t had a chance to review the entire discussion, had to take care of something urgent at the home front (Chhore ki college application), however, please count me in for whatever task I may be able to perform. Please also know this will not be possible without the involvement and or guidance of the experienced people with good insight, I am obviously referring to NAJC chapter.
More later…

Thanks Sujata. Looking forward to your inputs. You are right in that
guidance of the experienced people is the key here. As you will have
read from the previous posts, the key ingredient I am looking for here
is raw brain power. We need to be able to keep focused on the limited
scope of this thread's purpose and live with the assumptions made...
...and specifically live with *limited resources* as laid out already.

The key thing I will lay out here is that one of the most overlooked
resource here are *the students themselves*.

As a mum of college applicants you will have a tremendous amount
of knowledge and understanding about how the American system
of education uses the students themselves in their own education
as well as their direct involvement in their neighbourhood/society.

If that same resource can be channelled productively in the village
environment too (e.g. just as one example...senior female students
needing to do school projects that involve gender education
to village women...just off the top of my head...) then we'd
have a large resource right there ! So rather than whining about
lack of money for this and that we can find novel ways to reach
our objectives.

So perhaps one of the areas you could think about is providing
such avenues where the students themselves not only play a
role in their own education but also contribute to their village
("Harya").

 

[devdahiya]

Let us come to the point

rathee chhore ibb meri baat dhyan te suniye...theek ?

first of all we have to change the mind set of our people in the villages which i suppose is not easy at all. People in the villages are of the opinion that if some one is coming to their village with some ideas/inputs to improve their lot....it is basically to gain some favours in turn and this is too deep a psych universally prevailing and it is not without a reason because invariabaly people in past had been using them. So first and foremost requirement is to win their trust before undertaking any venture out there.To do that we have to make them realise that whatever is being offered through an idea or venture has to be accomplished by them only [villagers] and that only moral support will be offered because if you talk laud they waste no second to avoid you. It is also important to mention here that unless these people do things practically on ground via a blueprint provided by us, they will take it lightly and hence the key is to generate interest and curiosity so that they seek our advise and support willingly. To do that we have to get associated from a distance with local leadership of that village/area deeply involved and associated with the undertakings...be it towards improving education standards,health,hygiene,senitation, awareness of their rights and duties or for that matter any thing we wish to accomplish................................MORE LATER

 

[vinodks]

In that case I am afraid I won't be able to contribute much. Though I will follow up this thread and will pitch-in if needed. Everybody knows what we need to do to make a ideal village(all of us know about these problems).
And people can argue that instead of giving everything to village to make it perfect, it's better to attack most critical issue common in many villages. Its more important that 20 villages get atleast good education than one village gets all the attention.

Also its not wise to proceed to discuss a lot about model if we don't have assurance from D Hooda that he will listen to us. But go ahead, atleast some things will become clear after this thread.

And Dahiyaji, yeah first we have to change attitude. But thee is no pill that can do that and no amount of preaching will work if it is not accompanied by work. And no work can be done without good attitude. The way of this catch 22 is intervention outsiders like us through "work" notjust preaching. Old people in village preach youth about becoming "good", that doesn't work. Development work is indirect way to change attitude.

-Vinod

My initial approach/requirement here is that all we
do is *THINK* and thats it ! No donations. No volunteer work !
Nothing. Just *think*.

My ideal situation is that Deepender Hooda/CM listens to us
and assigns a model village and an administrator and DOES exactly
as laid out. No questions asked. Resources as mentioned above.
So nothing out of the blue. No huge sums of money. Just an
administrator to oversee. 2 additional employees. An additional
3 lakh per annum spending money to carry out tasks.

.

 

[ajeetsingh]

Jatni

hi all, i think bhupinder hooda is an educated CM.if he stays for some time he will do someting for the upliftment of women in haryana.recently haryana got its first women secretaryfor the first time in history.his son is also an educated man but i think haryana politics is based on uneducated rather that educated.the heart of jats is still innocent.they r still BHOLE.
every body knows that we have a gender bias society.when a son is born TAHLI BAJAI JATI HAI.it still happens.it all start from the birth.
why we all just talk about this.why donot we do some thing in this regard.charity begins from home.so lets do something for the upliftment of our matas and bahens.otherwise it wil continUe to bother us directly or indirectly.
TIME HAS COME TO ACT.
REGARDS
AJEET

 

[raj_rathee]

In that case I am afraid I won't be able to contribute much. Though I will follow up this thread and will pitch-in if needed. Everybody knows what we need to do to make a ideal village(all of us know about these problems).

Vinod:

------------------------------------------------------------------
You point out:

o Every body knows what we need to do. We all know the problems.
o Why attention on one village and not many more
o Need for Hooda's assurance of action
------------------------------------------------------------------

My Comments:

Everybody knows what needs to be done :

I am not so sure about that. Everyone does know at a *very high*
level what the problems are (Teachers don't teach. Students don't
care. No resources/materials and on and on.)

But I will not agree that everyone knows what needs to be done.
Yes, people readily make sweeping statements (make education
compulsory, crack down on teachers and on and on). Yet no
one realy has an idea of what realistic practical solutions
could be devised that don't require massive upheaval of the system
to bring gains.

The impression I get is that no one has much of a clue. Everyone
just seems to want some God to land up and shake a magic wand
to fix the problems.

It was in this light that I felt that brainstorming while
keeping the assumptions squarely in mind might be the way to
go. My hope was for some thinking, and pardon the cliche,
outside-the-box.

Why attention on one village :

There is no such hard proposal. Why I would take this
approach is first just to keep the scope of our thought tightly
bound. An approach that works for one village would work for 20.
So that is not limiting in any way. If it were to get implemented,
then the govt. could could one or 20.

But anything different from the norm usually works well when
tested out on a smaller scale. If it works, expand...otherwise
learn from it.

Also, it is easier to convince someone to spend effort on
one village than 20 or 100. This approach would be no
different than some private enterprise introducing its
brand new product in a focused market. If it takes off
great, expand to other markets..otherwise revisit and improve
or dump it.


Need for Hooda's Assurance for Action

Would be great if we did. Currently we don't. If he logs
in he will hopefully have something to say.

But if I were in his place I would first say, "Show me what
you got. Lets hear your ideas and then I'll think about it."
No assurances till then ...(except if I was looking for votes
which I am not ).

That is the way real world works. How can one give assurances
without knowing whats cooking ?

Further, even if Hooda says "Thanks but no thanks", it would
not be an entirely fruitless effort. The mere excercise
could enormously enhance our own understanding of the issues...
and if someone was interested in running their own school (for
instance) they might pick up valuable ideas....just an example.


Additional Comments :

My purpose for this is to solicit input and feedback. I don't
want to be thrusting my own ideas...but would rather like
to serve to co-ordinate and provide direction for the
discussion. So participation is necessary. If the feeling
is "Ah forget it. No use" then I'd like to not
spend my energy.

Personally I am not too great a fan of NGOs and volunteer
work etc as a means of making change. Just how many of
us here are REALLY likely to go out to the villages and
carry out these tasks. I don't think too many. Hence
I do not want to go in that direction of proposing that
we become foot soldiers. I know very well that I wouldn't.
Except for the once in a couple of years visit to a school
to meet the kids I wouldn't be able to do much else
at the ground level. So I want to stay realistic.

Yes when it comes to direct contribution we could
provide support in the form of guidance (career, academic,
written material ...etc...that I think we could do
on a volunteer basis.) and we would be open
to those suggestions as part of this discussion.

 

[raj_rathee]

rathee chhore ibb meri baat dhyan te suniye...theek ?

first of all we have to change the mind set of our people in the villages which i suppose is not easy at all. People in the villages are of the opinion that if some one is coming to their village with some ideas/inputs to improve their lot....it is basically to gain some favours in turn and this is too deep a psych universally prevailing and it is not without a reason because invariabaly people in past had been using them. So first and foremost requirement is to win their trust before undertaking any venture out there.To do that we have to make them realse that whatever is being offered through an idea or venture has to be accompished by them only [villagers] and that only moral support will be offered because if you talk laud they waste no second to avoid you. It is also important to mention here that unless these people do things practically on ground via a blueprint provided by us, they will take it lightly and hence the key is to generate interest and curiosity so that they seek our advise and support willingly. To do that we have to get associated from a distance with local leadership of that village/area deeply involved and associated with the undertakings...be it towards improving education standards,health,hygiene,senitation, awareness of their rights and duties or for that matter any thing we wish to accomplish................................MORE LATER

Absolutely chacha. As we know our folks don't like bhasans. Nor do I.
But if I feel something is for my good and I *WANT* it then I'll lap it
up like a dog on a hot summer day.

I think one of the key aspect that would need to come out of any discussion
is to how to make the parents and the kids themselves responsible for
the education quality. They would need to become partners in anything
proposed. Its their education at stake.

The government servants can't be the *karta dharta* here. We know where
that ends. The driver would have to be the kids and parents. And for that
to happen a system would need to be in place where they get to have a say.

How that would happen would be a problem needed to be solved here.

 

[shokeen123]

Focus on what is salvageable...

Unless we do some factual analysis we will not know what and how to improve, so I would tend to agree with Raj, as they say data is money? Secondly I agree with you all that, is to be overly ambitious will neither be realistic nor feasible. So let us first understand the psychology and economics of girl’s education.

“Bottom of the Barrel”

There is a group of girl-children that gets stamped unfortunate at birth. Simply put, these girls are the first casualty of illiteracy. They are born to poor families where the question is about next meal on the table vs. next day at school. They are far beyond our reach; and no matter how hard or what approach you try, it will be unfair to ask of further sacrifices from them. These are our Dhannos, Chhannos, Dhapatis, and Kelas and Santras. Unfortunately they are oblivious (sorry Binod….) to what anyone of us has to say. Fortunately, they represent a smaller contingency (unless I am wrong?)

“The Paanchvi Fails”

This group manages to attend middle school (perhaps even high school if there one, all-girls within the village) but they must also contribute to the overall functionality of the family unit, be it household chores (tend animals) or elaborate farming; therefore subject to continuous cost-benefit analysis. To a large extent they are willing participants until circumstances beyond their reach overwhelm them (no high school, family pressure to marry). They lack personal motivation as well as career guidance at the critical junction and since “high school education” alone doesn’t yield fruitful gains further education is considered waste - abstaining from field work must equal discernable economic gains for further consideration. Even though I was an exception (because of my family make up and my own need for independence), a lot of “Sujatas” fall into this group. This group needs high school education for nothing more than to aid in the bridegroom hunt! Once married, the limited education as well as the dream fades, and very often they join the ranks of Dhannos and Chhannos, which goes to prove “perception is reality!” That is, high school education doesn’t make the cut!

“The Manor Born”

Gender equality or not, this group of girl-children is fortunate from the get-go, simply by virtue of either educated parents or monetary affluence, so no worries there! These are our smart, independent, and successful Poonams, Pritis, and Uditas, they can charter a path of success not just for themselves but any needy soul on Jatland!

********************************************************************************************************************

Pragmatically and philosophically, the group that needs to be specifically tapped is the middle one which has attempted the beginning, if the “Paanchavi fails” can achieve sustainable educational development, they can salvage their own destiny with just a little push. How to tap this group? Gender sensitive education and or empowerment, both, at school and at home. Each locality (community leaders) should focus on this captive audience, as this group is impressionable and have stake in their future; it is important to link this group to career counseling center/services at a much earlier stage so that they have the capability to glimpse into their future and make appropriate, timely changes. Why not establish and promote educational coaching centers to improve high school performance so that they don’t end up being accepted into third rate correspondence colleges and or menial vocational training schools?

Bottom line is, our community is not going to change attitude unless it sees clear benefits of education.

 

[rkumar]

Pragmatically and philosophically, the group that needs to be specifically tapped is the middle one which has attempted the beginning, if the “Paanchavi fails” can achieve sustainable educational development, they can salvage their own destiny with just a little push. How to tap this group? Gender sensitive education and or empowerment, both, at school and at home. Each locality (community leaders) should focus on this captive audience, as this group is impressionable and have stake in their future; it is important to link this group to career counseling center/services at a much earlier stage so that they have the capability to glimpse into their future and make appropriate, timely changes. Why not establish and promote educational coaching centers to improve high school performance so that they don’t end up being accepted into third rate correspondence colleges and or menial vocational training schools?

Bottom line is, our community is not going to change attitude unless it sees clear benefits of education.

Very practical suggestion Sujata Ji. Action taken will be reported in due course.

RK^2