int Youtube Blogger Linkedin Twitter Facebook

Our history

Sikshana was started in 2002 by a small group of professionals with a common cause: improving the state of public education in the country. This small group has since been strengthened by the induction of other like-minded persons…and the varied and diverse expertise they have brought with them.

Our focus:
Largely the primary level in government schools…
We chose to concentrate on children between the ages of 5 and 12. Our reason was simple: the primary stage is the foundation of the larger education system. And we believed that consolidating the foundation was the best way to ensure the healthy growth of the bigger structure…and the environment and society to which it was attached. However, we are slowly extending our initiatives to cover high school levels too. With nearly 90% of the children in this category attending a government school, the natural focus had to be on primary education in public schools.


How we took our ideas further
Our first tasks included understanding the educational scenario, identifying areas in which we could be of help; establishing initial engagements with schools, seeing how we could best assist state governments and how best donors could assist our schools….

We invested time in studying the field in some detail, in order to create the most appropriate strategies. We felt that our pooled expertise would enable us to come up with a model that would improve the existing system. And very importantly, would be both sustainable and replicable.

Incidentally, we found that a report prepared by PROBE (Public Report on Basic Education, 1999) served as a good indicator of what could be expected in the sector. Many of the PROBE Report findings are common knowledge, but their importance and relevance to our work have led us to reproduce excerpts which you can read by clicking here. It is worth noting that PROBE Report findings have since been reconfirmed by the ASER Reports of 2005 and 2009, showing that the situation in the schools has not changed much.

 

Sikshana today: 285 schools, 30,000 children
Today, Sikshana is involved in 285 schools (including all primary schools in Kanakpura taluk of Karnataka) in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh and touches the lives of over 30,000 children. Operating with an annual budget of over one crore, we have partnered with state governments and donors (both individuals and organizations) to improve and enhance the process of learning.

 

As to the future…
We would like increase our coverage to 1000 schools or 150,000 children. We would also like to offer the benefit of our experience and model, free of cost, to anyone who can put it to fruitful use.

 

"I have been covering my personal experiences during the early days of Sikshana in my talks to various fora and my infrequent writings. I was asked quite often why I have not gone ahead and documented them since some of these could be useful for those who may want to enter into the field of public education system now or in the future; at the least, it will help those who are interested in Sikshana to understand the programme and its evolution better. Whether it really serves these goals or not, it would most certainly be a very happy and satisfying exercise for me…"

 

To read this very personal account of Sikshana's evolution, written by founder E.S. Ramamurthy, click here.