Headquarters New Delhi | Founded 2003 | |
Going to School Going to School, is creative not-for-profit trust that creates design-driven stories to empower all children with the skills they need to participate in the world around them, solving problems like poverty, unemployment, and inequality. The organization takes its name from a children's book, Going to School in India, published by Penguin Random House in India in 2004. The children's book was published in the USA by Charlesbridge Publishers in 2005. Registered in New Delhi in 2003, the organization’s content has been incorporated in national curriculum- National Council of Education Research and Training (NCERT) textbooks in India where it’s read by over 10 million children every year.
Contents
- Mission
- Founder and Director
- Girl Stars
- Girl Stars movies on Youtube
- Be Schools
- With children in their communities
- Childrens Scrappy News Service
- Financial Skills Radio
- Digital Games to learn skills Gaming for Change
- Skool App Free stories for children
- Be Movies
- Be Fund
- Be Fund movies on Youtube
- References
Going to School has MOU’s with the Government of Bihar and Jharkhand, working directly in 1,300 secondary schools reaching 150,000 kids every week with skills, story and weekly action projects. Previously their movies have aired on STAR Utsav, POGO and National Geographic Channel. They were a finalist in the Google Global Impact Awards 2015 pitching their vision to create 12 digital games to teach skills to kids.
Right now millions of children across India are dropping out of school without the skills they need to get a job or create a job. Even if they stay in school they are not learning the skills they need to succeed. India’s pressing youth unemployment crisis is real. By 2020 there will be over 200 million people below the age of 30 who will be out of work. In the last three years, they printed and delivered 1.4 million skills stories that taught skills to more than 350,000 children across three of India's poorest states. They work directly in 1,300 secondary government schools, empowering 8,829 teachers to deliver skills and ensuring children continue to be inspired and identify their own opportunities, enterprises, and solutions.
Mission
Going to School believes the most beautiful, powerful story we could ever dare imagine to create can change the way millions of children learn. They believe in the Power of Stories
Founder and Director
Lisa Heydlauff leads Going to School and is an Executive advisor to Be! Fund. Lisa has lived in India for 15 years, travelled across India to write the children’s book, Going to School in India. She provides leadership for Going to School’s stories, research, monitoring, new projects, management and Government partnerships. Lisa also runs Be! Fund that works in partnership with Going to School skills stories to provide new access to capital to the poorest young people in India so they can become entrepreneurs. Lisa Heydlauff is an Ashoka Fellow, a Ted India Fellow and a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum. She shares her passion for stories and her mission to use the power of media to reach out the poorest of kids on this link
Girl Stars
The organization's most well-known project is Girl Stars. In 2006-7 supported by UNICEF, Girl Stars created new role models for girls, 15 movies, books, radio shows about 15 young women role models who used their education to transform their lives. Popular stories are Anita the Beekeeper and Kiran the Junkyard Dealer.
Girl Stars movies on Youtube
Be! Schools
Be! Schools is a series of 50 design-driven stories that each teach children an entrepreneurial skill from identifying a problem, to taking initiative and making a plan. 10 stories are epic graphic novels of setting up a sustainable enterprise. Every year based on feedback from 150,000 kids, they create new stories about new heroes and new enterprises. They work directly in 1,300 secondary government schools in Bihar and Jharkhand, reaching 150,000 children in Grade 9 with skills stories and skills challenges for them to solve problems they see in their communities. Every week children get the opportunity to learn entrepreneurial skills by creating innovative projects in their community. They go out and interview entrepreneurs around them, identify problems in their neighborhood,prepare business plans and do market research for innovative products.
Their stories are available for online reading at the click of a button in their digital library.
With children in their communities
Children’s Scrappy News Service
The Children's Scrappy News service is the first news service run by kids for kids in India, solving India’s biggest problems with design-thinking, scrappy skills, interviewing stars, heroes, entrepreneurs and asking kids (their parents, grandparents) from across India to send in their problems to be solved. Every episode would be structured around solving a problem in a community somewhere in India. Parents, families, send in the problem to be solved by postcard, tweet, letter. Kid reporters in a newsroom made of junk (and once-loved things) present the problem and interview famous people to get insight into how to solve it. Then, getting to the bottom of the problem, kids go out of the newsroom and into the streets to find out ‘why the problem exists’ interviewing everyone they meet. The show format has segments to interview anyone and everyone who has a job to ask about the skills you need to get that job. There’s a giant red post box where kids send their ideas for the next episode. At the end of every show, kids report on what they found and inspire millions of kids to take action by building newsrooms, becoming reporters, sending in their problems to be solved or downloading content to learn skills. First Episode: Plan Bee More updates on Scrappy news are available on their facebook page everyday.
Financial Skills Radio
Paison Ki Paathshala, a radio feature that aims to educate India’s youth population in Delhi, Mumbai, Pune and Chennai on the financial literacy skills they need to get a job, create a job, start a business, manage their money. The show will hosted by RJs who are also young and trying to find answers to the questions that their peers across the country have regarding money and experts will answer questions, give money tips. The show will be a powerful platform to encourage financial habits and ensure young people become a part of the financial system.
Digital Games to learn skills: Gaming for Change
Being the finalist in the Google Global Impact Awards, 2013, they are committed to create 12 digital games to teach skills while playing. Maya, an adventurous 12-year-old girl goes on exciting journeys to learn and teach 12 entrepreneurial skills to kids in government schools in India. In Bihar and Jharkhand, kids will have access to the games in their computer rooms. On Google Play Store, the games will be there for kids around the world.
Play here
Skool App: Free stories for children
Skool is a collection of beautiful design-driven stories for children, made in India for the world. Immerse yourself in the world of young Indian entrepreneurs to see how they make wild honey in sunflower fields or millions of bio-degradable plates out of leaves; learn how they solve problems by setting up successful businesses and make a positive impact on the people around them.
This is an educational APP to teach 21st century skills through real-life stories, art, and in an engaging guided flow format. Currently there are 18 books, all available for free.
Right now, millions of children are dropping out of school in India (and around the world) because they are not learning the skills they need to succeed. In five years there will be over 500 million young people globally who won’t have jobs. And while they search for work, our planet is heating up, climate change means there’s less and less water, less food, less of everything. These stories equip the children with the skills to identify, take responsibility for and find solutions for such problems around them.
Be! Movies
Be! Movies is a series of seven epic action adventure movies, each 22 minutes long, Bollywood inspired stories where young hero entrepreneurs take on their community's biggest problems and solve them, taking on evil slum lords and building libraries out of bamboo. The movies premiered on STAR Utsav prime time and were seen by millions of young people. At the end of each movie a simple question was asked- Do you have a business idea that solves a problem where you live? Through this, they received 68,000 calls from young people who live in poverty.
Watch Be! Movies
Be! Fund
Be! Fund is India’s first risk capital fund for young people who live in poverty who have an idea to start an enterprise. The link which comes full circle for children learning skills to be an entrepreneur and have ideas to solve problems in their communities.