Sustainable Education
COVID-19 hit everyone differently, but it made sure no one left unaffected. I, as an individual felt there were a lot of infrastructural gaps that COVID-19 reflected and change was not only long due but also very essential now. Be it health, education or any other field, we saw how broken everything was.
Being a student who had the best of opportunities, I felt that despite all the amenities I myself was struggling with a lot of things. Mental and physical health, incapable of doing well in online classes as it was an entirely new idea, to stressing over how long the lock-down would be making our lives crippled until it lasted, I’ve gone through the worse. But my troubles come with so much facilitation. I always found a way out for myself. I always had enough resources to look for myself.
However, talking to my domestic help and few more people from the colony, I realized what sufferings actually meant and how the poor suffered in all aspects with no amends to make their lives better.
One of the major concerns my house help talked about was how staying idle for too long had made her children incapable of any work and now they’ve been adamant of not going to school anymore!
This wasn’t alarming for me because I had a perception how hard work makes your bones ache after you’ve been idle for so long. These children weren’t just at home, they also had no access to education all this period.
Tele-school was a great initiative by the government but it was wasted because it couldn’t reach out to these masses. These people lacked the infrastructure to have an access to it. The priorities of the governments have been questionable in a lot of aspects but this technology back water has most severely affected the poor of this country.
Analyzing everything, I was determined to do something for them. Be it one person in the community, I wanted to make a life better. Owing to my limit resources, and difficulties posed due to COVID-19, I couldn’t have thought of something grand. I contacted my friends circle and proposed that we all take a step to help these children. Based on the model of The Citizens foundation which has a program of how university students or graduates can provide old books to these children and educate them on weekends in their spare time.
We decided to make our weekends useful by teaching 5 children from our own locality, providing them books and stationary ourselves or if needed, take donations from our immediate family. From basic concepts to guiding them about their future prospects.
I have worked in the SOS children’s village before and I realized established institutions and NGO’s are working in a lot of dimension and we as individuals need to take responsibility as well. I started from my house help’s child and I aim to target the kachi basti- the slum area in my locality to educate more children around. This allowed me to diversify my perspective on empathizing with people around me. And also made me mindful of the fact that I had to give back to the society from what I have.
Our initiative was to be the agents of change, starting small and expanding to more people but promising sustainable future for these children, not something that a pandemic takes along with itself!
