UNICEF to expand education access in western India

Kalyan Singh Kothari
OneWorld South Asia

29 May 2008

Inspite of all the efforts made by the government of Rajasthan, UNICEF and NGOs, there is urgent need to address the issue of out of school children in the State. In this direction, the Rajasthan Education Initiative through the Public-Private Partnership model has launched a new project.

During the third partners update meeting of Rajasthan Education Initiative (REI) held in Jaipur on May 2008, the Education Ministry has signed a memorandum of
Understanding (MoU) with five different private partners to enhance the quality and quantity of education in the schools of the State.

Launched in 2005 by Vasundhara Raje, Chief Minister of Rajasthan, the REI has evolved as a platform for the corporates, foundations and NGOs. The initiative is being driven by four core partners - Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), the Global e-Schools and Communities Initiative (GeSCI), Government of Rajasthan and the World Economic Forum (WEF).

Building Public Private Partnership

The REI has more than 30 partners under its umbrella. The Learning Guarantee Programme - a joint initiative of Azim Premji Foundation (APF) and the Rajathan government along with other states was awarded for innovation for education. APF provided educational content in the form of Computer Aided Learning Programme (CALP) in primary schools.

Inaugurating the meeting, the Education Minister of Rajasthan Kali Charan Saraf said that the State was surging ahead in providing quality education to school children through several projects on Public Private Partnership formula. This initiative had put forth Rajasthan among forward states of the country, he claimed.

The partners attending the meeting felt the need to address the issue of out of school children and problems concerning mainstreaming in education. Participants felt that efforts in the educational sector have been recognised at national and international levels.

The government claimed that they are taking it up like a mission to educate every single child of the State with special focus on marginalised children including girls.

"These efforts are in the direction to achieve the two main Millennium Development Goals (MDG) related to education", the spokesperson of REI claimed. The participants shared experiences and discussed the gaps/interventions in the policy through different presentations.

Generating funds

The Education Minister gave details of special efforts to encourage children to go to schools and informed that the State has registered over 41 percent of hike in enrolment, conducted residential bridge courses for 1.62 lakh dropout children and 5.75 lakh teachers were imparted computer training.

For ensuring educational opportunities for children among marginalised communities, the Government of Rajasthan and UNICEF signed a MoU on May 26 during the meeting in Jaipur, which describes that 18,000 children in 680 villages of 22 blocks of seven districts will be targeted under this project. The district selected under the project are Udaipur,Banswara,Rajsamand,Chittorgarh,Jhalawar,Dungarpur and Baran.

Shikha Wadhwa, Programme Manager of Rajasthan UNICEF, who signed MoU on behalf of UNICEF, said that community support would be a major part of this project. This project will be jointly funded by the Government of Rajasthan and UNICEF.

The State government will support funds as per Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) norms and UNICEF will mainly fund community mobilisation, special academic packages. NGOs will also contribute and will be running hostels, community schools, and accelerated learning course and will also send teachers.

User comments

"Some more details..."

Author: Nitesh Mathur

Time: 30.05.2008 17:06

Comment: The 3rd REI Update meeting was held on 26th May at the SMS Convention Center of Rambagh Palace in Jaipur. The meeting was supposed to be inaugurated by the Chief Minister Her Excellency Vasundhara Raje but due to reservation agitations in the State, she was unable to attend the meeting. The State Education Minister, Mr. Kalicharan Saraf was the chief guest and inaugurated the meeting. He released the newsletter of REI and went away for some Cabinet meeting. The other dignitaries on the dias from Government and Core Partners of REI were

1. Mr. Sudhir Bhargava, Principal Secretary, School Education
2. Mrs. Veenu Gupta, Secretary, School Education
3. Mrs. Shubhra Singh, Commissioner, REI
4. Mr. Pial Islam, WEF
5. Mr. Alok Vajpayi, GeSCI
6. Mr. Apoorva Kumar, CII

The meeting progressed with presentations from the Commissioner, REI providing updates on REI with information on REI Core partners and Co Partners (ICT and Non ICT) and shared the REI Partnership models and themes. She also invited support from partners in the following areas:

� Support for District Quality Cells, Activity Based Learning (ABL) and Teacher training.
� Partnership for using existing facilities of EDUSAT in the state by establishing and maintaining ROTs (Receiving Terminals) in the nodal schools.
� Partnership for operationalizing the Mobile Computer labs (Buses) in 27 districts.
� Partnership for establishing ICT Resource Hubs at the block level in Block Resource Centers.
� Adopt a KGBV (Residential Girls School)
� Strengthening REI PMU
o Gender, ICT, Quality, Communication, MIS Specialist

The underlining points were
� Commitment for extension of MOU till 2011. Long term and annual action plan.
� Quarterly reports by Partners.

Afterwards, five new MoUs were signed between
1. Govt of Rajasthan (GoR) and World Vision � For un enrolled and dropout students.
2. GoR and Amer Trust � To adopt 15-20 schools of Jaipur district.
3. GoR, UNICEF and One World International - helpline for teachers of Udaipur district.
4. GoR and Room to Read � For establishing libraries and study rooms in 400 schools of Ajmer district.
5. GoR and UNICEF � For unenrolled students and Gender gap.

The partners were then invited to provide updates with their presentations. In total 15 presentations were made by different partnering organizations which continued till the post lunch session.

Mr. Pial Islam shared in his presentation that WEF will not be able to extend its commitment beyond 3 years which will end in Oct /Nov 2008. He also praised the efforts of Cisco, Microsoft, and Intel in supporting REI and requested the partners to continue.

Mr. Naimur Rehman from One World gave an elaborated presentation announcing the agreement with the State Government of Rajasthan, OneWorld and UNICEF to bring our �Lifelines� project to the REI. He also stressed on the contribution of Cisco in the same. Mr. Naimur Rehman and Mr. Shakeel from One World gave a demo of the Lifeline Project to all the participants with the Principal Secretary asking a query on the IVRS.

The presentation made by Cisco showcased the following key points:
1. REI and Cisco � a look back
2. Current status
3. Challenges faced and the proposed solutions by Cisco
� Cisco collaborating with Qualcomm for provision of last mile connectivity.
� Cisco bilingual (Hindi/ English curriculum) being made available in the new academic session
� Agreement with the State Government of Rajasthan, OneWorld and UNICEF to bring our �Lifelines� project to the REI.
4. Road ahead
5. Message from Sr. Vice President Tae Yoo officially announcing Cisco�s partnership with State Government of Rajasthan, OneWorld and UNICEF to bring our �Lifelines� project to REI.
6. Cisco REI instructor Mr. Anil Kumar Sharma shared how the Cisco IT Essentials training helped them as well as how the IT Essentials curriculum is assisting in building skills for showcasing Rajasthan as a new knowledge economy state.
7. One of the videos depicted a girl student sharing her experience on the course and how it�s honed her IT skills.

An Exhibition was also put up on the same day. Space was provided to the participating organizations for displaying their material

The meeting concluded with a vote of thanks from the Principal Secretary inviting partnerships on the areas mentioned by Mrs. Shubhra Singh in her presentation.