Attendees : Murali, Anita, Sanjeev, Karthik, Harpreet and Santhosh.
 
Agenda : Since parking was a problem and the turn-up for the meeting
was less. We discussed only one item in the agenda. The rest of the
items would come up in the meetings to be held in the coming weeks.
 
The proposal for 'Udhay' from the 'Gramin Sikshan kendra samithi' - a
school that is an intiative of the community of Sawoi Madhopur was
discussed. More about the proposal and the concept can be read at:
 
http://www.ashanet.org/austin/proposals/uday/
 
About the proposal and murali's perspective from the site visit in brief:
 
The school is based on alternative education techniques. Activity
cards are use. The main idea is to increase the spirit of questioning
and independent thinking in the students. The approach to different
subjects are also totally different from those seen in formal schools.
For e.g. A history class could be a trip to the local canal and trying
to find the history of the canal based on questions asked by the
children themselves.
 
There seems to be no political tensions in the village. People from
diffeent classes of the society mingle easily and the atmosphere as
such is pretty informal. There also seemed to be no social problems.
The problems the villagers face seem to be more of the economic kind.
 
Most of the villagers are people who resettled in the area after their
land/village was claimed by the govmt. for the Ranathambore reserve.
The primary occupation is agriculture and most of the people are
agricultural laborers at the village.
 
Q&A:
 
(Note: This section mostly has questions that murali could not answer
for us, but would be getting the answers soon)
 
1. What is the range of contributions from the community ?
 No stats on these. But, it could be 'shram-dhan' (or help with
labor) from the poorer sections and monetary contribution from the
other sections of society.
 
2. Right now, the school can take about 70 kids. But, there are a lot
more kids in the district. If more kids want to join, how does the
school decide which kids get to go ? What happens to the kids who are
left out ?
 
3. Why does the community beleive in this school rather than the govmt. school ?
 The people of the community have seen kids go to the govmt. school
and grow up as jobless youth. They genuinely feel that the returns
from the education in a govmt. school are not relevant to the kids and
they also seem to be of little value in terms of understanding
problems/issues etc. pertaining to the local area. The alternative
school itself is as a result of this feeling.
 
4. Can we get an example syllabus ? How is this set ?
 The syllabus is very dynamic and each kid gets individual attention.
Teachers assess every kid's progress on a daily basis. We don't have
an example syllabus. We will be getting it soon. The curriculum as
such is set based on inputs from the parents and the community as
well.
 
5. The proposal doesn't seem to give details on the existing social
structure in the village. What is the occupation of the different
villagers ? Can we get more stats on these ?
 The proposal does mention at a few places, the occupation of
different people. But, we don't have formal stats as such. We will ask
for it.
 
6. How are women treated in the community ?
 
7. The agricultural loaborers don't seem to get the minimum wages as
per law . Can we check on this ? Is anyone/ any organization working
on this ? What other issues are addressed by the 'Samithi'.
 
8. Alternative education needs more teachers than in a formal system.
How is this managed ?
 
9. What are the qualifications needed for teachers ?
 This is mentioned in the proposal. To get better teachers, the
salary has to be high. They don't have lady teachers right now. They
recognize this and are actively looking to hire lady teachers.
 
10. We need more details on the three month training program.