HARNESSING THE POWER OF EDUCATION FOR GROWTH
Education is one of the most critical areas of empowerment for women. It is also an area that offers some of the clearest examples of discrimination women suffer. Among children not attending school there are twice as many girls as boys, and among illiterate adults, there are twice as many women as men.
– UNICEF
ShikshaUnnati is a school education programme extending from pre-school to class 12. It is formed with the border aspiration of improving the impact of schooling effectiveness measured in terms of equal opportunities for schooling and equitable learning outcomes. We believe offering girls primary education is one sure way of giving them much higher power – of enabling them to make genuine choices over the kinds of lives they wish to lead.
Life skills session with girls
Our programme guiding principles
Our guiding principles provide clarity about what SledgeHammer stands for form the core of the culture of the programme activities and guide the way we conduct the programme.
A spirit of freedom : Adolescent girls account for a large population in India. However, they remain an invisible group because society usually fails to respect their human rights, leaving them powerless to act in a way that improves their lives at home, school and work. We provide adolescent girls training and understanding for them to operate with freedom in their local environment and communities.
Open mindedness : We train youth – girls and boys – to be open to other perspectives and social changes. We always strive to do the right thing, exercising our responsibility to them and the communities. We teach the to respect differences and enjoy togetherness, harnessing diversity as strength.
Investing in nurturing strong youth through holistic education
SledgeHammer Foundation is continuously working towards girls’ education and providing them a holistic approach to life. We understand that in order to impart education, school need infrastructure and in order to be able to learn, students need basic facilities. Hence, we focused on building a strong infrastructure to implement the programme.
Basic infrastructure and facilities
Scheme for Infrastructure Development in Minority Institutes (IDMI) In the year 2017-18, we were able to reach out to over 1500 students. In 2018-19, we continued to support these 1500 students, plus added more number of students. The Government municipal school adopted by the foundation now boasts of:
Painter corridors
- Refurbished classroom walls
- Blackboards
- Attractively painted corridors along with inspirational quotes
- Hygienic and well-maintained toilets
- Attractive landscaping
- Playground maintenance
- Electrical fittings
- Fans in classrooms
- Setting up of computer lab along with refurbished computers for ready use
- Clean water tanks
- Sanitary pad disposing of unit
- Life skills sessions
- A dedicated security guard at the main gate
- Play zone with swings, see-saw, slides
- Timely workshops on career counselling
- Library making in progress
- Field visits for better exposure and learning
- Donated cycles for quick and safer transport to school
Cycle distribution