Akshara Foundation’s new project in 1,400 govt schools

t’s been a good year in Bangalore and Karnataka for primary education. The Right to Education Bill will soon become law and the state is gearing up to put mechanisms and resources into place to get the last child into school. The numbers of children enrolling into class one, has shown continuous improvement. Some infrastructure […]

What is a good time to introduce a child to books? Different parents may have different answers. I found the right age to be six months. For both my children, I had cloth, plastic or board books about animals or very simple stories with repetitive words. I would show them the books, and slowly read […]

The COVID-19 crisis should push us to re-imagine education in radical ways that we’ll be thankful for. At six, in grade 1, my daughter returned from school in a chirpy mood. “What did you study today?” I asked. She was puzzled. “I didn’t study anything,” she replied, “but I learnt a lot.” Education in the […]

Just recently, I happened to be standing outside a rather new-looking government school, high up on a scraggy hillock in Kolar district in South India. Two young boys, aged about 12, were our curious onlookers and we picked up conversations. One I knew to be a student, because he wore a school uniform, often the […]