The Rise of the Youth Intelligentsia

George Bush at a Young Leaders' Summit.

Being a part of the urban youth population today, doesn't mean what it mean what it meant before. At the risk of sounding clichéd, an undeniable truth is that today's young generation is highly empowered! 

    There has been a unmissable boom in youth related events, actions and organizations. Conferences, donation drives, NGOs and social service initiatives that are 100% founded and run by young persons are an extremely common sight, and what is even more evident is their inherent efficiency and success.

Many of these initiatives are by highly driven and motivated students from some of the best institutes across the country, who have the requisite support systems, ideas and verve to brainstorm solutions to current day  and execute them. This can be seen in organizations like CACR itself, where we have tie-ups with students from social service cells of some of the finest colleges in Mumbai, as well as a tie-up with IIT-Bombay for the computer literacy programme.

Tapping into this potential is essential, especially from a social perspective. Majority of college and school students have summer holidays and vacations at this time, and again the vast majority of them have a desire to have a productive summer, making this the perfective time for undertaking such initiatives.

A youth related NGO leads relief efforts in Nepal.

The only thing that is between the youth and making a difference is a direction.

      The good news is that opportunities are abound for contributing to any cause that you hold dear. Not only can one try to start their own initiative with a couple of equally driven friends, or intern at an NGO, one can also volunteer with multiple NGOs over the course of months.

Not only is this is a highly productive and beneficial thing to do from a career and CV building perspective, but it imbues one with a sense of satisfaction and personal fulfilment. Realizing that you are a part of something that is larger than yourself, and incessantly dedicating your time, efforts and energy towards a social cause is something that is internally fulfilling and rewarding, and teaches you empathy and dedication, qualities that are highly admired and looked upon in today's day and time.

Additionally, in a time when the majority of students while away and waste the precious summer months, productively working toward a social cause is no mean feat, and definitely sets you apart!

So, what are you waiting for? Head to your nearest NGO now and make a difference.

- Anand Banerjee is a social media intern with CACR , a education non-profit based in Mumbai ,India. 

CACR +Citizens Association For Child Rights works to improve the quality of education and health of school children in municipal (inner city) schools

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The Sweet Delight of Working for a Child Rights NGO

My first brush with the world of child rights and its sorry state of the neglect, came one afternoon in college, when a tall, burly man walked in to talk to us about his organization, and how he had pledged to work towards upliftment of this cause.

Mr. Nitin Wadhwani addressing the CACR interns.

Soon after, almost all of my friends began to get involved with this organization. ‘CACR’ would be mentioned in almost all of our conversations and I would be bombarded with stories of the successful initiatives it had undertaken, and achievements that had accrued to it. And now, here I am, a little more than half a year later. The organization, the Citizens Association for Child Rights, that had taken HR College by storm is a place where I can proudly say I am a blogger and intern. That man, Mr. Nitin Wadhwani is now my boss. This is my story of how I got involved with a cause that deserves a lot of attention, but gets only a little.

The "sweet delight" of CACR (pun intended.)

I do have a history of being involved with NGOs and social issues in the past; I was in charge of the marketing operations of SevaConnect, an NGO which seeked to provide a platform for other organizations to interact, and also tried my hand at teaching underprivileged children, among other similar activities.

Sadly, all of these endeavors, while successful, were short lived. Poor coordination, waning enthusiasm, and a myriad number of other factors caused these to go south.

But after having completed one internship period at CACR, and on the brink of my second, I am proud to say that this is far from what is happening here.

It is one of the few NGOs I have seen, that is gifted with a team of dedicated, and experienced individuals, that swear by its cause. It is one of the few NGOs I have seen, that has successfully managed to create for itself a network of student interns, and a network of tie ups with respectable organizations such as the BMC, social service cells of other colleges etc. It is one of the few NGOs I have seen, that has strived not only to sermonize about the cause they are working for, but has strived to actually make a difference.

The MustRun Marathon

Whether it is holding talks with the BMC, checking the quality of mid-day meals, or hosting marathons, dance sessions and organizing computer literacy sessions and other activities for underprivileged children, I am proud to say, CACR has the unique distinction of being an NGO that not only preaches a cause, but actually works extensively to support it.

My personal experience too has been one providing few matters to complain about. Being active in various spheres of academics and extracurriculars, I wasn’t fortunate enough to dedicate myself completely as a volunteer, but could only find it in myself to contribute to this organization through helping in handling the blog of CACR.

This has provided me with a wealth of knowledge on many issues, and has helped me hone my writing and content creation skills. Having a relatively free reign in choosing of topics to write upon, I discovered a number of topics and issues that I previously knew nothing about, and this strengthened my desire to be more involved.

I am truly proud to be a part of this organization. Not only am I gaining invaluable experience and honing my skills, but I also feel I am able to contribute, no matter in how small a quantum, to a cause that deserves the attention of every person who has a heart.

-By Anand Banerjee

Anand is a creative intern at the +Citizens Association For Child Rights , handling the CACR blog.

Website :www.ngocacr.com
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Images from :

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The good old Radio: The new educational change agent?

During my MBA induction, we were made to form a team and come up with an idea of a product or service and present it. We came up with the idea of creating our own FM radio channel.

Sadly, our idea flopped, as we had no concrete factual data to support our idea and no plan on profits and ROI (return of investment).

It was our first step in the world of management and our first lesson was to be creative.

Today I look back at this incidence and realize how important that one simple lesson is, for one to  survival in today’s world. Every generation is facing the same problem; food clothing, shelter, and poverty. And every generation is the same, only a select few wish to be creative and find a solutions, while the majority fall by the wayside and simply follow the creative ones.

Today, CACR has taken the initiative to come up with ideas to solve the problem of “access to education”. My monthly articles are focused on finding these ideas. One such idea came to my mind when I was watching the show “50 Gadgets that changed the world”.

Can you guess the top two gadgets?

They were mobile phone and radio. Radio has been an influential gadget since the early 20^th century. It had solved the problem of communications then, but has it now?

So, I started pondering as to its usefulness in the current scenario?

 I was sitting in my father’s office and listening to music when the thought struck me of creating an FM School channel.

While aspersions may be cast on the originality of my idea, how many of us have seen this idea actually come to fruition?

The next thing after television that has huge penetration in rural India is radio. Why not use it as a virtual school?

If mobile phones (the Idea Internet Network) can be used a learning tool, can’t we use radios too? The FM channel can teach the same subjects that are taught in school; history, geography, science, and languages.

Remote villages do not have access to school or teachers. Children drop out of school because it is difficult for them to travel long distances. It is also not possible to set up school in every village and there is also the issue of availability of teachers.

If we can access banks from home, communicate with people overseas, isn’t it time for Digital India to get access to basic education at home?

Go into villages, and you will see people traveling with a transistor wherever they go. They have a radio in their farms so they can listen to music while working. Can’t they learn maths or language while working?

Your notebook is your field, and your stick is your pen.

What  I have mentioned here is just a seed of an idea. I truly hope we can get together, brainstorm and help it blossom into something great.

- Author: JZ  a volunteer with +Citizens Association For Child Rights                                                                 Editor: Anand Banerjee is an intern at NGO CACR, an education startup working to improve the functioning of public schools in India.

Images are used only for representation purposes. 

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The politics of education

“In line with the goal of nation building, India has been committed to providing free and compulsory education to all children. Towards this end, Indian Parliament has enacted a legislation making free and compulsory education a Right of every child in the age group 6-14 years which has come into force from 1st April, 2010- The RTE Act. Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan has been launched recently as a step to universalize secondary education. Simultaneously, efforts are being made to create a robust and vast system of higher and technical education.”

Or so reads the inaugural paragraph of the website of the Union Ministry for Human Resource Development.

While our central as well as state governments have always purported to be active supporters of the cause of education, announcement of policies and schemes and commissions is simply not enough for progress to be made in this field.

“The Central Advisory Board of Education (CABE) is the highest advisory body to advise the Central and State Governments in the field of education. Recent years have seen certain important committees and commissions deliberate on education. National Knowledge Commission (2006) Report on higher education supports a strong reform agenda through public investment. Recently, the report of the committee on renovation and rejuvenation of higher education (Yashpal Committee) has recommended protecting the intellectual autonomy of educational institutions and the creation of an all-encompassing National Commission for Higher Education and Research (NCHER) to replace or subsume the existing regulatory bodies.“ 

 While all these initiatives may paint a rosy picture, one begins to wonder about how much is actually being done to enforce these actions.

The ‘strong reform agenda’ through public investment is a stellar idea, though it is one that lacks the backing of ancillary facts and supportive ideas.

In a first in over 30 years, the Modi government announced it’s plan to launch India’s ‘Education Policy,’ something that was last done only in 1968.

A slew of reform measures like public-private partnerships (PPPs) to finance education, seeking ways of upping India’s spend on higher education to 1.5% of gross domestic product (GDP) from less than 1% now, and emphasize on research and development etc were announced, with no concrete steps to follow so as to achieve the targets mentioned.

The current central government has been earmarked by political pundits and scholars as being a ‘show and tell’ government,  that does little to act upon, and more to talk about. One can only hope that this does not turn out to be the case when it comes to government policies on education.

Other than the measures announced, the Education Policy should also ideate about possible measures to increase enrollment in existing government run schools, through schemes such as the phenomenally successful ‘Mid-day Meal Scheme,’ and about improving quality of existing schools as well.

The PPP model for education and granting of further funds for research and development to institutes of higher learning are concrete ideas that are capable of being implemented with ease.

CACR sincerely hopes that along with the new promises that are being made , we are also blessed with some action that will be taken in this regard.

No government can ignore education, and we hope that the current one uplifts it to the levels of importance it deserves to be at.

- Anand Banerjee is an intern at NGO CACR, an education startup working to improve the functioning of public schools in India. 

To view the presentation on RTE-Right to Education Act CLICK HERE

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The Paradox of Present Education System

  

                               

The above quote cheerfully assumes that the basic purpose of education is all round development of a person.

But does this actually happen in the world today?

This question casts a shadow of speculation on our entire education system.

Education is supposed to be a process through which an individual becomes a better person & empowers himself. Which begs the question, what is the use of an education where a person is not taught moral values to be implemented in life? Instead he is taught the concepts of corruption, black money,and other social issues without any comment on their moral and social ramifications.

The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals.

There exists a stark contrast between what we read in our books and what we see in real life.

Education should also hone one’s skills for quick, resolute and effective thinking. To think incisively, independently and profoundly for oneself is very difficult. This is due to our susceptibility to let our mental faculties be invaded by legions of half-truths, prejudices, and propaganda.

Even the press, our teachers in our classrooms, the pulpit etc.on  myriad instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths.

This again begs the question whether education is actually serving its purpose? Great majorities of the so-called educated people do not think logically and rationally.

If we are not careful, our institutes will produce a group of close-minded, unscientific, illogical propagandists, consumed with banal thoughts and recycled ideas. These people will have no civic sensibilities, no respect for women and their elders, no personal actualization or self developmental goals.

To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, should be one of the chief aims of education.

The intrinsic purpose of education is the penultimate development of one’s personality.

Everyone is endowed with certain capabilities and talents, which remain dormant, until harnessed. Our education system only aims at harnessing this pre-existing potential rather than developing further moral and social sensibilities and ethics. 

This total development of human personality includes intellectual as well as moral development. Most of our present day institutes aim solely at the intellectual development of pupils.

Getting educated should not just be equivalent to getting capable, intelligent, and job-oriented. Getting education should include education of ones minds, ones heart as well as ones moral and spiritual notions.

For the majority of us, anywhere between the first 18-25 years of lives is spent pursuing education. In all that time, is it prudent for some sort of moral and social conditioning to occur?

Yes, the current system may produce brilliant engineers, doctors, lawyers and workers.

But then again, what about kind-hearted, morally upright people?

- Anand Banerjee and Hitesh Wadhwa are interns at Ngo CACR a education startup working to improve the functioning of public schools in India. 

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