Although our Indian education is a well renowned and the best-considered system of education in the world, however, we lack in the proper deliverance of education

Sumeet Mittal awarded with ‘Make in India’ award for its contribution in social development

‘When you educate a woman, you educate the society’ – a famous saying from the earlier times proved to be satiated when a woman from Rajasthan determined to change the notion of education in the society. Sumeeti Mittal is the founder of Pratham Sikhsha, a charitable organization in Jaipur, Rajasthan laid the initiative to promote the core of primary education for the impoverished section of society.

The beginning of Pratham Sikhsha

Sumeeti with her students in school

While touring across the world, Sumeeti realized that there is a fine line between Indians and western countries which alienate us from them. She learned that the point of difference was lying in the primary education of underprivileged section of society. It was then she discerned that there was a dire need for primary education in India.

“Ever since my childhood, I wanted to help people in a way that cultivates a sense of Independence in them. I have been very passionate about my own education as well, hence I wanted to impart education in every way possible – because I believe that with education you can achieve anything in life.”, told Sumeeti Mittal to Newsgram.

‘Pratham Sikhsha’ is a Hindi word meaning – ‘First Education’. It was started in 2005, with the aim of imparting education to deprived children who has no access to basic education and empower women to improve their lives and earn a respectable job for themselves.

Redefinition of Education by Sumeeti Mittal

Although our Indian education is a well renowned and the best-considered system of education in the world, however, we lack in the proper deliverance of education. With the lack of qualitative education and callousness of teachers as well as parents, one realizes too late that the child can not indeed read or write well.

“We are blindly following western education, little do we realize that there is more to be done to meet the quality standards of western countries. There is no concern over the child’s performance in class, and with the rules like – No failing of students has impaired the education scene furthermore. Ultimately it is the teacher who is responsible for the student’s failure. Teachers will never be found at the backfoot if such system persists.” told Sumeeti on the education system of India.

She also emphasized the importance of ‘Moral Education in schools. Learning should be adorned with discipline and values to inculcate a moral behavior in a child.

The Founder of Pratham Sikhsha also stressed the role of a woman in the society. She quoted by saying “Females have to be become powerful and realize their inner strength.”. Women of the backward class no longer have to stick to conventional methods of earning, they can easily find a reputable job with help of Pratham Sikhsha. Her future objective is to align education with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s mission Skilled India, and for the same purpose, she has introduced some courses in her organization.

Here’s how Pratham Sikhsha is distinctive from others in the field of education:

• Practical learning in Plumbing, electrician, stitching and other related courses
• Employing women from slum as teachers to set a live example and propel other women to earn a respectable earning
• Every Saturday of the month sessions are conducted for child’s female relative to counsel and educate the basic health care routine
• The student is advised to repeat the class if he or she fails to grasp the core of learning in the respective grade
• Moral education introduced in schools with a better approach, students enact plays on these moral values
• Imparts nursing education to women who have completed their 12th and thus contracting them in government hospitals

Initiatives like Pratham Sikhsha are a boon for the society. Sumeeti faced resistance from her surroundings when she was in the thinking phase of the initiative. Despite the unpropitious situation, she was able to lay the foundation of her charity trust. Sumeeti believes that one can achieve anything with the extract of faith within oneself.

Visit here to know more about Pratham Shiksha.

Source: https://www.newsgram.com/exclusive-how-is-one-woman-army-changing-the-notions-of-education-in-society/

Sumeeti Mittal’s Pratham Shiksha, a Jaipur-based non-profit, has educated over 5,000 slum children in the city, helping them end their poverty cycles.

The recent ASER 2016 result that collected data from 589 rural districts of India paints a rather grim picture. Over the last decade, the percentage of children who can read a Class II text has dropped to 48 percent in 2016 from 63 percent in 2006. And the percentage of Class V students who can perform division has also declined to 26 percent in 2016 from 42.5 percent in 2007. While the government is ramping its efforts rather slowly—between 2006 and 2013, public expenditure on education increased only from 2.2 percent to 2.68 percent only—there are countless startups, non-profits, and individuals who are working relentlessly to ensure every child has access to quality education, and ultimately, economic opportunities.

Jaipur-based Sumeeti Mittal’s Pratham Shiksha is one such humble attempt. Sumeeti (43) understood the power of education at a very early age. She recalls her father’s words, “He used to always say education is paramount. It’s the only weapon to succeed in this world.” And that became the cornerstone of Sumeeti’s life, who went on to complete her Civil Engineering from Jodhpur. Later, she appeared for the Rajasthan Public Service Commission (RPSC) exams and worked as an Assistant Engineer in Rajasthan’s Public Health Engineering Department for two years. But her passion for entrepreneurship made her quit her job and, along with her husband, she started Pratham Software, an offshore IT services company, in 2000.

Her work enabled her to travel to UK, US, and Europe frequently. Sumeeti says, “Even the most underprivileged children in the developed countries are educated. This gives them a fighting chance in the world. Even a child born in an immensely impoverished family can become something big – a lawyer, doctor, author, or anything so long as they are determined. That’s because they already have the most important tool – education.”

Armed with this realisation and an upbringing wherein education was paramount, Sumeeti started Pratham Shiksha, an attempt to provide quality education to slum children and equip them with the skills to exit the vicious cycle of poverty.

The growth of Pratham Shiksha

Sumeeti started the school as she fondly calls it “Kachi Basti” in her garage in 2005. She chuckles and says, “I called our neighbourhood children, who at first refused to come. So, I bribed them with sweets and that’s how I found my first 20 students. Slowly, ‘Kachi Basti’ became ‘Pratham Shiksha’ and today, it has 350 students enrolled. If we were to look at the numbers since inception, it’s an admirable 5,000 students who have been part of the Pratham Shiksha family. The school teaches children till Class VIII and later, assists in placing them in higher studies as well.

The struggle, Sumeeti says, isn’t in finding the children, but retaining and instilling in them and their parents the importance of education. “Poverty in slums is so deep-rooted, families are perennially living in a hand-to-mouth situation and this forces parents to send their children to work, just so, they can live another day,” she explains.

Jaipur, which is famous worldwide for its jewellery, carpets, handloom and handicrafts, naturally has thriving industries. “If you take the jewellery industry, child labour is in demand. Boys have small hands which makes it easy for them to hold a stone and give it a perfect finishing touch. Girls, on the other hand, are either married at a young age or are made to do household chores. Burdened with responsibilities, children drop out of school as quickly as they enrol. It’s nearly impossible to convince parents to stop sending their children to work. So, we had to devise ways to make our school work, for both parents and children,” Sumeeti explains.

To counter this problem, Pratham Shiksha came up with many pioneering initiatives.

1. Flexi-classes – Apart from introducing pre-primary classes enabling children to get accustomed to school environment from an early age, Pratham Shiksha has flexible timings. At the beginning of each academic year, students can opt for a timing convenient to them, enabling them to do both; work and study. All these cost Pratham Shiksha Rs 8,000 per child per annum and the entire expenditure is borne by Sumeeti and her husband.
2. Incentivising education – Round the year, students are provided free healthcare and nutrition. Along with this, they also receive uniforms, bags, stationery, and get an opportunity to go on cultural tours and participate in extra-curricular activities. The reason? As Sumeeti puts it, “Healthier students lead to more productive, more successful students. Given that they are nurtured, they work hard to succeed in the school. And those who consistently don’t, are replaced with the many students who are on our wait list.”
3. Classroom size – At Pratham Shiksha, classes are capped to manageable sizes of approximately 25 to ensure teachers are able to give personalised attention to each student, many of whom might be entering the school for the first time. The school has 14 teachers and one principal.
4. Involving parents – Sumeeti says, “Earlier, every time we held a meeting for the parents to discuss their child’s progress, the attendance was abysmal. This was because parents can’t afford to miss a single day at work. So, we started holding the monthly meetings on the day of Amavasya – a day where Rajasthan’s labour class don’t work.” This has increased regularity and seeing children’s progress, encouraged parents to change their mindset of prioritising work over education to a great extent.

Doctors, engineers, and future changemakers

As of today, Pratham Shiksha has educated over 5,000 slum children, in the city of Jaipur alone. Though the school has facilities only up till Class VIII, Sumeeti and Pratham Shiksha’s staff ensure that interested students are placed in partner schools and continue their education. Deepesh is one such alumnus. His mother, a simple teacher earning Rs 3,000 per month, would spend all her salary treating his father’s cancer. There was little money left to sustain her two children’s education. She brought her son to Pratham Shiksha when he was in Class XI. Realising his potential, Sumeeti helped him complete his education and he secured admission in Poornima College of Engineering. After his first year, Sumeeti helped him get a bank loan to complete his education and today, he’s a software engineer.

Talking about the impact of this humble effort, Sumeeti says, “There are at least 40 students who have completed their Bachelor’s in Arts and over 100 who have completed their nursing.”

It’s indeed a matter of pride what Sumeeti has achieved. For her unrelenting efforts, Sumeeti was recently selected as #100Women in India by Government of India’s Women and Child Department and her school, Pratham Shiksha, was recognised at the Make in India Awards for Excellence – 2015 under the NGO category for its contribution to social development.

More work to do

In 2012, Sumeeti also started RoboGalaxy, to provide her students access to the universe of robotics, by building a platform for practical application of science and mathematics. Since then, students have represented the company at the World Robot Olympiad for three consecutive years in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Russia.

Sumeeti now plans to expand Pratham Shiksha till Class X and start vocational courses for her students equipping them with skills in areas such as tailoring, plumbing, electrician, and more, for children who are keen on pursuing both; education and work.

The article was first published on YourStory.com on 7th February 2017.

During my third year BA class in feminism, my professor discussed how Jyotirao Phule, an activist for women’s education of his time faced trials and tribulations. He, a great man, embarked on his journey to educate women by educating his wife first. Savitribai Phule was the 1st educated woman in her village in rural Maharashtra and this sent shock waves in the country.

In fact, he and his wife, Savitribai Phule, were pioneers of women’s education in India. While Jyotirao Phule lived over 100 years ago, there were states in India where not only women’s education but amenities for education, on the whole, are missing!

Sadly, not much has changed today as remote villages or slum areas in the cities have no proper schools where children can be educated. Government initiatives like the ‘Beti Padhao, Beti Bachao’ are limited to girl child education drive only but both young boys and girls are deprived of education.

But basic education is every human being’s right and therefore, Sumeeti Mittal, a resident of Jaipur established the Pratham Shiksha school in Jaipur Rajasthan.

She is the founder and trustee of this institution which is run as a charitable organization and began with a goal to promote basic education among underprivileged children living in the slum areas of Jaipur.

Sumeeti, born to a family of engineers always believed in the power of education and her father’s support and enthusiasm in her own academics cemented this thought further. As a bright student, she excelled as an all-rounder in academics and curricular activities in school. Her mother too played an important role as she imbibed the virtues of equality, empathy, and honesty in young Sumeeti.

Therefore, when Sumeeti realized that the slum regions of Jaipur lacked a proper school let alone a decent education system, she founded this school and trust. She, unlike others who pretend to be concerned but do nothing, acted on the quest for knowledge for the children not waiting for a miracle or the government authorities taking notice of them!

She established Pratham Shiksha,(i.e. education first) in 2005. What really made her act on her thought to make education accessible was when she was on a trip to the USA, she realized that education was being made available to the underprivileged and poor children in the country but back in India, the case was very different.

When she first began the school, she was shocked to see that the slum dwellers were not even aware of their basic rights and education was a very distant dream. However, she convinced them and the children started come to Pratham Shiksha for classes. Over the years, the school functions like a proper educational institution. By 2017, i.e. the present year, Sumeeti has managed to educate over 5000 students.

The Pratham Shiksha school has plans to be upgraded till the 10th grade now as it focuses on eradicating illiteracy among the children in Jaipur who are deprived of their most basic rights.

About Pratham Shiksha

A school that started in a portion of the garage, Pratham Shiksha is now a full-fledged school with classes up to 8th grade with 7 classrooms. The school also gives vocation training in electrical works, plumbing, and stitching to both boys and girls. This is so that they can support their families.

Pratham Shiksha has recently collaborated with a private hospital with the help of which, it imparts certified nursing training to 100 students to ensure they live a healthy and better life.

Mittal, discovering a high number of school dropouts in the region started a flexible timing for students so that they could take up part-time jobs and focus one education in their free time.

About Sumeeti Mittal:

After clearing the RPSC exams, she got the post of Assistant Engineer in Public Health Engineering Department. However, social service was her calling. This was not just limited to children but she has been helping and motivating women entrepreneurs to do better in their businesses.

Sumeeti Mittal: Achievements at A Glance

•She has been awarded 100 Women Achievers Award by the Ministry of Women and Child Welfare, Government of India.

•Awarded with Bharat Gaurav Lifetime Achievement Award on July 2, 2016, for her contribution in the field of education. The event was held at the House of Commons, British Parliament.

•She was a part of Speaker Panel in the Third National Conference on Youth 2025 at Jaipuriya Institute of Management, Jaipur.

•Her organization- Pratham Shiksha has been recognized at Make in India Awards for Excellence – 2015 under NGO Category for its contribution in social development.

She has bagged several other awards and is one of the biggest inspirations for people who want to come forward and help the slum children lead a quality life and make India, a better place to live in.

Source: http://www.speakingtree.in/blog/meet-sumeeti-mittal-whose-efforts-will-now-ensure-brighter-future-for-at-least-5000-slum-kids