PRID Shekhar Mehta Chairman, Rotary India

Literacy Mission

LITERACY FOCUS

Rotary India Literacy Mission joined hands with NDTV-Coca Cola’s “Support My School” campaign along with Aircel to fund more than 50 Happy Schools in Coimbatore, Chennai and Pondicherry. PRIP Kalyan Banerjee and PRID and RILM Chair Shekhar Mehta handed over a cheque for 50 schools to Actor Ranveer Singh, Cricketer Sourav Ganguly and Vikram Chandra, CEO-NDTV at a function in Mumbai on November 29, 2015.

The project will focus on improving the infrastructural facilities men-

tioned below to transform 50 govern-ment schools in the above mentioned areas. l Painted and well maintained school

buildings and wallsl Creating awareness about hand

washing and installing hand wash-ing station

l Safe and adequate drinking water for both students and teachers.

l Library in schools with more than 200 students

l Footwear for every childl Benches and desks for better

student-teacher interactionl Well maintained space for teaching

staffl Play material according to age and

genderThe campaign funds are with

Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) who is one of the funding partners for this project. CAF along with Aircel had

646 Happy

Schools have

been undertaken

and more are

happening...

made a field visit to the schools in Chennai, Coimbatore and Pondi-cherry and have finalised 32 schools in Chennai, 8 in Coimbatore and 10 in Pondicherry. The MoU between RI Dist 3230 Rotary Centenary Char-itable Trust and CAF has already been signed.

The campaign will be completed over a period of one year, including social mobilisation, implementing activities and dedication. Total Beneficiaries: 20,939 students in 32 government schools in Chennai,

Tamil Nadu. Number of Boys: 6,216 and Girls: 13,613.

District 3190 is a pioneering district when it comes to Happy Schools and corporate funders of this area are giving serious thought to spend their CSR funds on building Happy Schools, as CREDAI, Suprajit Engineering Limited and State Bank of India partner with RILM to transform 50 schools into Happy Schools.

CREDAI, Bangalore is sponsor-ing 22 Happy Schools in District

RILM Partners with Coca Cola, Credai, Suprajit Engineering Limited & State Bank of India to fund more than 100 Happy Schools.

62 ROTARY NEWS JANUARY 2016

Literacy Focus.indd 62 4/27/2016 5:37:55 PM

3190, out of which the 8th school will be completed soon. The total project cost of 22 schools being funded by CREDAI is Rs 96 lakh. Suprajit Engineering Limited, Bangalore, is also funding 10 schools to be transformed into Happy Schools in District 3190, valuing about Rs 31 lakh. State Bank of India has partnered with RC Bangalore to provide funds for 18 Happy Schools, of which 8 are completed.

Children are the future of the nation, and investments in their upbringing are investments in the nation’s future. Several studies in India have revealed that lack of basic amenities like toilets, access to water and basic infrastructure creates an unwelcoming and non-conducive environment in government schools, leading to high rates of absenteeism, which results in children dropping out of school. It is the girl child who

is affected the most by lack of such infrastructure. As they enter adoles-cence, they are often forced to stay at home because there are no separate toilets for girls in rural schools.

Thus to help tackle this problem Rotary India Literacy Mission has embarked upon a journey of creating 1,000 Happy schools across India this year. Over the last one year more than 646 Happy Schools have come up all over India from our goal.

A Happy School undertaken by IWC Bhopal.

A Happy School undertaken by IWC Vizianagaram.

Association of Inner Wheel Clubs in India

The Association of Inner Wheel Clubs in India are leaders in making Happy

Schools. Around 70 Happy Schools have been undertaken by them, with more in the pipeline. IWC Bhopal, D 304, announced the completion of their first Happy School. IWC Khadki, D 313, completed 5 and 18 more are in the pipeline. IWC Pune Midtown completed 3 schools and IWC Pune Uptown inaugurated another Happy School in D 313. D 312 has completed 14 schools, along with D 318, D 316, D 298 who have completed 10 schools cumulatively.

JANUARY 2016 ROTARY NEWS 63

Literacy Focus.indd 63 4/27/2016 5:37:56 PM

NGO Visit in Bihar.

Asha Kiran continues to be the focus area of the T-E-A-C-H programme. Having got the commitments,

we are waiting for Rotarians, Inner Wheel Clubs to send in the fund. We have received commitments to send 26,000 children back to school from Rotarians pan India, along with financial contribution for 5,000 children, and the following steps are being taken:l Call for proposal advertisements were placed through

www.devnetjobsindia.org. Ninety four NGOs from 15 States namely Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Delhi, Gujarat, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telengana, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal have sent in their proposals, to take care of more than 50,000 children. These proposals are being scanned for further dialogue and MoUs are being drafted.

l On receiving the NGO proposal, due diligence is being done by the RILM office.

l After completion of vetting of the proposal, onsite field visits will be made by RILM office. Twenty six NGOs have been visited. At some places these NGOs are also being visited by Rotarians and Inner Wheel members.

l During the field visit the areas that are being looked into are:

v Legal status of the organisation.

v Organisation infrastructure and leadership structure.

v Past/Current donor feedback of the organisation.

v Interaction with the proposed Asha Kiran children.

v Experience in the relevant field.

l Getting the DGs/DLCCs/District Literacy Chairs/ Rotarians/RILM involved from the districts, where the chosen NGO is working, requesting deployment of Rotarians/IWC members to conduct child approval screening process. This experience has been good. The selection procedure is under guidelines of the RILM cri-teria: Children are between 7-14, never been to school; not attended school for over 45 days; laggard children, who do not study in their age-appropriate class.

l The MoU is then sent to the National Committee Members for their approval.

l RILM enters into a MoU with the partnering NGO.l After approval from the National Committee Members,

RILM will send a letter to the NGO, asking for dates of child approval screening process.

l On completion of the screening procedure, the NGO is provided with a Child Profile Format, which should be filled for all the screened children.

l The Child Profile Format should be as per RILM criteria, with comments mentioned in prescibed format. A final list of approved children is to be sent by NGO for funds disbursal after uploading the profiles of approved children, in 4 phases. 25% at the time of admission at the Asha Kiran Centre; 25% after 3 months at the centre with at least 75% attendance. A

progress report has to be uploaded by the NGO every 3 months for fund disbursal; 25% when the child gets enrolled in a State funded/aided school and has 50% attendance; 25% on completion of 3 months of formal school in a State funded/aided school with at least 75% attendance. Moni-toring report has to be submitted and uploaded on RILM website.l The local Rotary clubs in the

vicinity of the NGO will be requested to monitor the perfor-mance of the child by visiting the centres. These clubs might not have sponsored these children but they will oversee the programme, just like some children that they have sponsored in some other part of the country is being supervised by others.

Asha Kiran … the numbers keep swelling, have crossed 26,000

64 ROTARY NEWS JANUARY 2016

Literacy Focus.indd 64 4/27/2016 5:37:57 PM

l The NGO should conduct daily classes for the children and provide a bridge course along with the following:

v Motivate them to attend class regularly. v Motivate them to go to State funded schools over a

period of time. v Community mobilisation of the parents and other

stakeholders to send the children to school. v Make learning interesting and attractive. v Ensure that their attendance is regular both at the

centre and once they enroll in State funded schools. v Maintain a progress report of every child in a pre-

determined format.l Every donor can track the progress of the child they

have sponsored by logging into www.rotaryteach.org. We have already put names of 1,000 children who can be tracked as per donor’s name. The total list of children being undertaken by the programme is available at the website; however their pictures are not available due to vulnerability issues.

l The process is time consuming and extreme care is being taken to make the procedure as transparent as possible. Many of you have made contributions, how-ever you have to wait till sometime, for the procedure to be completed. We hope to achieve the commitment made soon.

RIPE John Germ and Judy with RILM Chair Shekhar Mehta.

At the ‘Book Sorting Day’ event held in Rotary Sadan, Kolkata on December 10, in honour of

RIPE John Germ’s visit to the city, District 3291, made a commitment to set up 100 libraries across West Bengal benefitting 10,000 students. Germ volunteered in sorting the books received as per classes I to VII.

RIPE John Germ & Judy help sort books to create

100 libraries

The day began with a flurry of activities as 100 volunteers registered for the job. The books were unpacked and sorted into G-R-0-W-B-Y sections, each letter denoting colour codes for specific class. About 45,000 books were segregated, labelled, packed into boxes as per language and class and readied for library set up. The clubs that donated books on this day were: RCs Calcutta South City Tower, Calcutta Harmony, Kabitirtha Calcutta, Calcutta Victoria, Salt lake Metropolitan Kolkata, Calcutta Suncity, Salt Lake City Calcutta, Calcutta Megacity.

Children being screened at Lucknow, UP.

JANUARY 2016 ROTARY NEWS 65

Literacy Focus.indd 65 4/27/2016 5:37:58 PM