Meet the organisation paving the way for quality education for every child in Punjab
When it comes to Punjab, not just the education sector but other areas were equally challenging. Problems such as substance abuse, polluted groundwater, depleting soil quality, excessive migration of the youth etc., were and still are intertwined in the form of a vicious circle.
Realising the need to intervene, a group of friends came together in 2017 with a dream of Chadhda Punjab, thus leading to Sanjhi Sikhiya.
Recently, Punjab Education Collective won the Collective Social Innovation Award from the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, per the organisationโs LinkedIn post.
Punjab Education Collective (PEC) began in 2019 when Sanjhi Sikhiya, Mantra4Change, Samarthya, and ShikshaLokam came together and partnered with the Education department. PEC exists to transform the public education system of Punjab, India, and improve its educational standards against global benchmarks.
The award can be considered a token of appreciation for the work the organisation has been doing relentlessly for the past several years.
Impact creation
The educational crisis had a cascading effect that included:
- The dropout rate at the secondary level in Govt schools in 2017-18 was 24.03%
- In just two years, Punjab saw a 66% growth in the number of visa applicants (2019)
- The unemployment rate of youth between the ages 15-24 was 30.3% in 2017-18 (more than the national average)
In 2018, the group began from Fatehgarh Sahib with the assistance of the local authorities. They created a Cluster Transformation Approach after a year of working closely with primary schools to enhance governance and educational procedures.
Soon, started the Punjab Youth Leaders Program (PYLP) is a two-year program that trains and develops potential leaders to improve education and governance in government primary schools in Punjab. Participants work to build their leadership skills and values while working towards transforming Punjab into a land of opportunity within the next 30 years.
Based on the research conducted since July 2018, the team has identified a number of problems that Punjabi instructors, local government officials, and schools confront. These problems range from declining enrollment and learning levels to a lack of confidence in public schools and community involvement.
Similarly, to further improve the level of education, the group is working with the goal of improving the public education system in Punjab. To that end, Punjab Education Collective was formed in August 2019. This collective is a joint collaboration of four organizations in the education field, working together to impact 23 lakh students across 19,000 government schools in Punjab.
The collective aligns with the goals of the state’s flagship program, “Padho Punjab Padhao Punjab,” by helping the department to improve the academic support structure through capacity building and data-driven strategies, which directly improves the teaching and learning process.ย
To conclude, the organisation is working on a mission to provide the children of Punjab with the best education, ultimately resulting in a bright future. To read further about the organisation and their mission, one can read here.
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