Wipro Applying Thought in Schools Working in School Education: Experience Sharing and Reflections by Partner Organizations Wipro Applying Thought In Schools Proceedings of 16th Wipro Partners’ Forum, 13th-15th April 2016, School of Ancient Wisdom, Bangalore. Wipro Applying Thought in Schools ipro Applying Thought in Schools is Wipro’s social initiative in Weducation born out of Wipro’s belief that a corporation’s ‘power to do good’ must manifest in a thoughtful and deliberate set of initiatives to¬wards a social purpose. Education was chosen as the sphere of work as it can be a fundamental enabler of social change. Within education, Our work in school education is grounded in our vision of a just, equitable, our focus is specifically on school education. sustainable and humane society. This vision is inspired by democratic ideals and India’s constitutional values. Schools are spaces that can nurture these values in young people and develop their capabilities to become active participants in nurturing such a society. Good education enables the growth of individuals along the multiple dimensions of cognitive, social, emotional, physical, ethical and aesthetic development, so they are able to grow to their fullest potential. These ideas are not new or unique; in fact it derives from ideas of various educational thinkers, educationists as well as national documents such as the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) 2005. Bringing about this educational reform requires deliberate, long term and sustained work to build capacities of schools and the larger education system. Civil society organizations have an important role to play in this. Our strategy is to support civil society organizations engaged in school education to develop their capacities to work towards this education reform in a systemic manner. Over the past 15 years, we have supported over 50 organizations through over 100 educational projects and initiatives and built an active network of organizations working in school education in India. The 16th Partner’s Forum was on partners sharing insights on organizational development and their work. The authors and publishers permit others to copy, distribute, display, quote from this publication in print and electronic format — for any non- and this publication is credited. commercial, non-profit purposes — on condition that the original author All works reproduced from this book must give similar rights and reproduce this clause within the publication. Reproduction of the texts for commercial purposes is strictly prohibited. Contents Preface Page i Acknowledgements Page iii Participants Page iv Addressing Educational Concerns - Experience Sharing by Organizations - Page 1 Evolving a comprehensive educational support model for street children – Rainbow Foundation - Page 1 Recreating Nai Taleem in today’s context - Disha India - Page 19 Showcasing Indian children’s literature for educators & parents through book reviews - Goodbooks - Page 40 Evolving context-appropriate educational practices, staying small and spreading wider- Shikshamitra - Page 58 Ideas and Initiatives in Education- Page 77 Loving Nature: Bringing children and adults closer to the natural world - Nature Conservation Foundation - Page 78 Alternative school stories from across India – Arun Elassery - Page 94 Singh - Page 106 Making films in education and finding purpose – Jagjot A Framework for Social & Emotional Learning- The Teacher Foundation - Page 115 Introducing New Partners - Page 137 Punarchith - Page 138 Page 143 VidyaJMECT Mytri - - Page 144 Organization Development - Experiences & Insights - Page 155 Vidya Bhawan - Page 157 Vikramshila - Page 160 Ezvidya - Page 163 Eklavya - Page 167 Organization Development in the Social/Non- Page 185 profit Sector – Moderated Discussion Wipro Applying Thought in Schools’ evolving strategic priorities - Page 207 Wipro Applying Thought in Schools Partners’ Forum 2016 Preface he 16th Wipro Partners’ Forum, held in April 2016, was focused Ton sharing and discussing partner organizations’ work. Many organizations and individuals talked about their work in education, how of the forum was set aside for a discussion on Organization building. A it evolved over the years and their reflections from the work. One day few partners presented their approaches to organization development. strategy and thrust on partner network expansion. Wipro’s Chief Sustainability Officer, Anurag Behar, also shared Wipro’s organizational journeys. The Rainbow Foundation team shared their The first day saw four different partner organizations share their experiences of working for the education of street children, how they developed a comprehensive educational support model for them at Rainbow homes in Delhi and how the approach is now spreading to many other cities. Disha India spoke about how they started with the idea of experiential learning and applied some of the principles from Gandhi’s ‘Nai Taleem’ in today’s context in schools and the lessons they learned in that journey. The Goodbooks team shared their work, promoting Indian children’s literature among educators and parents through a professional online review platform for children’s literature (Goodbooks. in), and Shikshamitra shared their journey of being a community school to evolving into a resource organization. organizations and individuals who have been engaged in different kinds The second day had a diverse set of experiences and reflections from of work in education. Suhel Quader talked about Nature Conservation Foundation’s (NCF) idea of nature education, the importance of children developing an emotional relationship with nature and NCF’s efforts to weave this into their work. Arun Elassery shared reflections from his journeys to different alternative schools across the country. Jagjot Singh Sethi shared his personal narrative about how making films in education i Working in School Education: Experience Sharing and Reflections by Partner Organizations shared the work that has been happening on social and emotional led to finding a purpose beyond the self. The Teacher Foundation team learning. The second day also had introductory presentations from some shared about their organization, their area of work, challenges and their of our newer partners: Punarchith, JMECT and Vidya Mytri, who briefly plans ahead. The third day’s focus was on organization development. Four long- term partners, Vidya Bhawan, Vikramshila, EZ Vidya and Eklavya shared their journey and insights on organization development over the years. Apart from a lively discussion around these presentations, there was also a moderated discussion on organizational development issues in the social sector and possible ways of addressing some of these. Anurag Behar shared about Wipro Applying Thought in Schools’ evolving strategic priorities. This book is an edited transcript of the presentations and discussions through the three days. Publishing and disseminating the proceedings education community. We hope you will enjoy reading the proceedings is an attempt to take these discussions and reflections to the larger and find it useful in your work and engagement with education. ii Wipro Applying Thought in Schools Partners’ Forum 2016 Acknowledgement lot of effort went into making the 16th Wipro Partners’ Forum A happen the way it did and this book to come into being. We wish to express our sincere thanks to all speakers who shared their journeys and experiences; all our partner organizations and participants for their presence over the 3 days and for adding to the richness of discussions; Maitreyee, Deeya and Madhavi for all their efforts towards making this the team at the School of Ancient Wisdom who hosted us; Jagjot, compilation possible; and all others who lent us a hand and were party to this endeavour in various forms. Avinash, Shaheen & Supriya iii Working in School Education: Experience Sharing and Reflections by Partner Organizations Participants A R Vasavi, Punarchith Abhijit Paul Zacharia, Wipro Abdul Jalil Ahmed, Jubayer Masud Educational Charitable Trust Ajit Singh, Samavesh Akhila, The Teacher Foundation Amit Kohli, Eklavya Anjali Noronha, Eklavya Anurag Behar, Wipro Samavesh Arpitha Rai, Wipro Anwar Jafri, Arun Elassery, Independent Ashish Mathew George, ATREE Ashish Shah, Independent Avinash Kumar, Wipro Bala Subramaniam, EZ Vidya Brajesh Verma, Muskaan Chanda Uikey, Muskaan Chandrashekar Balachandran, The Institute of Geographical Studies David, DOST Educational Foundation Devika Nadig, Shikshangan EH Qazi, Vidyabhavan Ganesh Subramanian, EZ Vidya Gayatri Vaidya, Educational Initiatives Geeta Subhedar, Aseema Chartitable Trust iv Wipro Applying Thought in Schools Partners’ Forum 2016 Hardy (Hridaykant) Dewan, Azim Premji University Hari Hegde, Wipro Wipro Isaac George, Wipro Imnasenla Jamir, DOST Educational Foundation Educational Initiatives Jagjot Singh Sethi, Independent Janvi Soni, Independent Jim Tharu, Organization for Early Literacy Promotion KanuPriya Jhunjhunwala, Komal Mangla, Keerti Jayaram, Lokesh Thakur, Azim Premji Foundation JodoGyan Madhubanti Bhattacharya, Vikramshila Mahira Kakajiwala, Dakshin Maitreyee, Independent Maninder Singh, NEEV Margaret K T, Vidya Mytri Trust Maya Menon, The Teacher Foundation Meenu Tomar, Disha India Education Foundation Misbah, The Teacher Foundation Monila, The Teacher Foundation Mukut Bhuyan, Pratham Naseema Israr, Naveen Kumar, Wipro JodoGyan Naveen Namboothiri, Dakshin Nayan Patel, Neelesh Malviya, Eklavya Jan Vikas Nomita Sikand, Gubbachi Noratmal