HEALTH

Need in Numbers: According to the Government of India and UNICEF, only half the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) Schools have safe drinking water and only 1 in 10 has sanitation facilities. Lack of hygiene leads to frequent diseases like diarrhoea and dysentery. Plus the absence of a toilet is a big reason girls drop out of school. UEEM estimates 1.8L children ar out of school today, mostly girls.

Worse, parents surviving day to day as manual labor can't afford time off work or money for medical care and proper nutrition. Per WHO, there are only 6 doctors and 13 nurses per 10,000 residents. Per National Family Survey, child malnourishment is 35%. Almost equal to Sub-Saharan Africa.

Sakshi believes that health is a basic building block for a better future for a child and her family.  We run several projects with the goals to prevent disease, reduce school drop-outs and provide medical care. Please click on links below to learn more. 

Water, Hygiene & Sanitation Project

Sakshi builds toilets at MCD schools and provides hygiene education to slum children and the families and communities they come from to prevent the frequent epidemics of diseases like diarrhoea. Toilets also dramatically reduce the drop-out rate of schoolgirls. 

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Health Services Project

Sakshi runs several programs with the twin goals to prevent disease and provide access to medical care. Improving the health of children and mothers is an important goal. Programs include ensuring health and nourishment of children in our education centres, educating mothers about nutrition and family planning, holding community health and nutrition camps. 

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EDUCATION

The foundation of every state is the education of its youth - Diogenes Laertius

Need in Numbers:

Per UEEM, 1.8L children are out of school today and out of 100 children admitted in government schools, only 14 reach Class X and only 7 clear it.  Further, secondary education is insufficient for regular employment at a liveable income. The Government has admitted an 8 Million capacity shortfall in vocational training these youth need for jobs.

Result - Without education, children remain socially and developmentally marginalized, and without employable skills, are doomed to follow their parents as manual labor or ragpickers.

 

Sakshi’s mission is Universal Education and Full Employability. We believe Education:

          ...is a child’s right and need.

          ...mainstreams a marginalized child, enlarges her world view, gives her confidence to

             chart her own destiny.

          ...must end by conferring the ability to earn a dependable livelihood as an adult

We run several projects covering the spectrum of ages and development needs taking care of pre-schoolers, mainstreaming marginalized children and providing vocational training to low-literate youth. Please click on the links below to learn more:

 

Early Childhood Care & Development Centres (EECD's)

Sakshi EECD's care for young children below 6 yrs (whose day labor parents must work every day), attending to their health, nutrition, education, social development and preparing them for primary school  in a friendly encouraging environment where going to school is a desirable and  normal activity. Importantly also, now their older siblings do not have to drop out  of their own school to look after them.

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Non-Formal Education Centres (NFE's)

Sakshi NFE's prepare MCD school drop-outs for mainstreaming by proactively tracking them down, motivating them to go back to school, helping them catch up on the studies they missed and getting them admission to MCD schools. Convincing the parents who are themselves illiterate (day labor, farm workers) and therefore unaware of the value of education, while daughters are needed to help at home and sons to supplement family income, is a complex task.

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Remedial Centres (RC's)

Sakshi's Remedial Centres prevent drop-outs at MCD schools working after school hours with pupils who need help in keeping up with the syllabus. These can be students who are in danger of dropping out for the first time. Also, former drop-outs who have been bridged and mainstreamed back into MCD schools through Sakshi's Non-Formal Education Program are put into RC's to provide help adjusting.

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Library Program

Sakshi builds and equips libraries at MCD Schools. Children are provided with books, games, posters and craft material. A specially trained Sakshi librarian holds session in story-telling, arts and crafts and role play helping each child learn and bloom. The libraries also tracks the progress of Sakshi Non-Formal Education Centre graduates, former drop-outs who have been mainstreamed back into MCD schools, ensuring they do not drop out again.

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Vocational Training Centres

Secondary education is insufficient to earn a dependable livelihood. Class X graduates from destitute areas scrape a miserable existence like their parents as day labor or in desperation take to crime. Sakshi provides vocational training to low-literate youth to enable them to earn a dependable livelihood generally at twice their previous combined family income and with growth potential, thus fully empowering them to break the cycle of poverty for their families and future generations.

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Events, Trips & Extra-curriculars: Having Fun!

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COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT

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Building Awareness and Action around Education

Going to school is not an obvious component of life in the communities Sakshi works in. Parents who are poor and illiterate themselves are not aware of the benefits of education and how it can help their children to a better life, especially girls. Sakshi educates parents in these communities about education and convinces them to send their children to school in many ways from door to door drives to public recruitment drives and street theatre in which our children participate.

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Mission Convergence Partnership with Government of Delhi

The Government has hundreds of programs for the upliftment of the poor and marginalized esp. women which have been only marginally effective because of poor delivery mechanism. To address this, the Govt's recent Mission Convergence mega-initiative seeks to leverage the strength of the best grassroots NGO's. Sakshi was selected as an MC partner in the areas it operates in and is now responsible for building awareness and filtering government programs to the needy.

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Upliftment of Girls and Women's Empowerment

 

 

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