SWIRD (Society for Women in Rural Development) Proposal Overview

1. SWIRD (Society for Women in Rural Development) Proposal Overview Kriti Modi Asha SF Feb. 11th, 2009

2. Overview • SWIRD (Society for Women in Rural Development) • Social Development NGO established in 1991. • Run by a group of rural women especially housewives • Aim: to initiate sustainable development of people in a comprehensive manner to become self-reliant. • Focus areas: women self-help groups with some economic activities, savings and micro credit programs, leadership development for women, community health awareness, environment protection and pollution control, various issues affecting social development, relief assistance etc.

3. Education Related Activities • Run 10 pre-primary schools (Balwadi centers) in remote rural belt in West Bengal, to support elementary education for the poor children. • Children are provided basic education to make them habituated to school atmosphere, prepare them for admission in primary schools. • Currently approx. 300 children enrolled; age group 3-5. • Children belong to lower income families, parents are farmers or laborers. • Schools run either under community sheds or teachers’ houses or open spaces. • At present, 10 teachers and 2 other staff. • Asking for funding for all 10 schools. • Want to expand to 40 students per school.

4. Parents pay Rs 10 per month per student. > 15% of total students unable to provide fees. Current funding from SWIRD general fund, raised locally. Requesting funding for 3 years. Current Funding

5. Proposal $39,940 for 3 yrs.

6. Answers to Queries from Asha SF ---- Are the teachers in these schools housewives? By marital status, out of 10 teachers all of them are housewives but so far their other occupations are concerned they are involved in various types of rural development activities including this teacher ship. All of them are the members of Self Help Groups run by SWIRD ---- What are the sizes of individual schools? Presently total number is 296 students with an average roll strength of nearly 30 , while we assume , as to when the project would be funded by Asha, there will be an visible change in the school which will motivate more parents to send their children to our schools. Consequently the average students strength will increase . Assuming 40 being the future average ,we have projected 400 children in 10 schools in our budget.

7. ---- Who runs the org/schools? Is it an individual or a NGO? All these 10 schools run by SWIRD the registered NGO. Since SWIRD doesn’t have any school building , the schools are run in teachers’ individual houses but ultimately these are run under the ‘Balwadi’ project of SWIRD. The overall management of the schools is done by SWIRD. ---- What other activities do the women in SWIRD do to generate money There are many other activities taken up by SWIRD, Formation of Women Self Help Groups (SHGs) to cross the poverty situation with some economic activities. Savings and micro credits programs for individuals and groups activities. Livelihood trainings for the women SHG members Leadership development program for the women Community health awareness program for basic knowledge about the preventive health care Environment protection and pollution control programme Organizing seminars and street rallies on various current issues, affecting social development Providing relief assistance in emergency situation in case of natural disaster Organizing cultural programmes, sports and games on various occasions only the savings and micro credits programs for individuals and groups activities are oriented to money generation directly.

8. ---What's the correlation between women's activities and education/schools? The women members of this organisation are engaged in an all round rural development. They are engaged in social services through awareness generation in the community on various issues, extension of literacy, livelihood training for poverty elimination and motivation on different matters like women empowerment, leadership development, health care, child development programme etc. In order to improve the quality of lives of their family members, the women empowerment being the basic area of our work to enable the women to take part as equal associate along with the men to strengthen the family support mechanism, it is imperative to put their children in the schools. Our Balwadi schools are considered as the stepping stone of the formal education of the children. Thus the women’s activities are correlated with these pre-primary schools. ---- What's the role of a field monitor? We have proposed to engage two field monitors cum social animators of SWIRD for Asha project. They will be monitoring the approved activities and will supervise the entire programme to be implemented in our 10 schools so that the overall objectives are achieved. They will be working as social animators of the schools in the respective villages on behalf SWIRD for Asha project. These two field monitors will also act as inspecting the schools so that the programme is not distracted. They will be engaged to supervise the progress of school children and performance of teachers, home visit of the children if required, checking the attendance registers, to monitor the health care aspects of the project, to supervise the cleanliness and overall environment for schools, organizing workshops for preventing dropouts, organizing teachers’ training, submitting report to the secretary for this project etc.

9. ---- If Asha funds the entire budget, will school fees be abolished? (The proposal mentions that each child pays Rs 10 per month) If Asha funds the entire budget, the school fees will certainly be abolished. ---- Is it possible to take a look at previous years' financials? Given hereunder a short break up of last 2 years’ financials under main heads of expenditure only for this ‘Balwadi project’ as per audited accounts of SWIRD

10. ---- The project mentions that there are other government schools as well in the neighborhood. Are these govt. schools also involved in pre-primary education? If yes, can you please provide more detail about why the children would come to SWIRD schools instead of govt. schools? As we have mentioned that, in our rural belt SWIRD pre-primary schools have some special reputation. The little children who are trained in our schools do better result in the admission tests for primary schools. Parents in our community have a faith on our system of grooming up the little kids or in the process of nurturing children which we follow in the nursery level. As a consequence parents always prefer to bring their children to our pre-primary schools instead of putting them in the Govt. Balwadi school. ------in the budget, there is a miscalculation for the annual expenditure for monthly salary for 10 teachers. It should amount to a total of 720,000 (The proposal says 72,000) Hence, the project total comes to Rs 19,97,000/- for three years in place of Rs 13,49,000/-. Necessary correction has to be made for our projected yearly budget for recurring cost (para no-29), which will be Rs 6,49,000/- in place of Rs4,33,000/- .