Kolkata Education Festival held Nov 17 th -20 th 2006 - hosted by Swanirvar

1. Kolkata Education Festival held Nov 17th-20th 2006 - hosted by Swanirvar Summary of festival presented by Madhavi Valluri AID-Austin

2. Outline • Introduction to Swanirvar • Festival-at-a-glance • Organization • Planning committee • Fund-raising • Publicity • Inaugural function • Colloquium • Workshops • Interactive stalls • Rangmanch • Film screenings • Lessons learnt

3. Introduction to Swanirvar • Started in 1990 in Andharmanik, West Bengal • Wide experience in running innovative education programmes for the underprivileged • Two primary goals in education • Run experimental schools to develop an alternative, vocationally-oriented secondary curriculum for the underprivileged children and eventually for all (ORC) • Develop an Education Resource Centre for secondary education where teachers, parents, educationists, policy makers, NGOs – can all come, learn, teach, act together. • Key coordinators – Sujit and Sudheshna Sinha

4. Education Festival – “Harek Rakam Ba” • For children, teachers, NGOs, educationists, policy makers • Bengali medium govt aided schools of Kolkata and some of the NGO education programmes all of which cater to children from lower middle class and slums • Teachers from these schools as they suffer from lack of quality inputs • Initiate a debate among teachers and policy makers on the need for more a more vocationally-oriented curriculum • Comet Media Foundation organized “Bal Vividha”, a similar festival in Mumbai for 7 years, Swanirvar approached by Comet media to hold festival in Kolkata • Festival was held at Birla Industrial and Technology Museum from 17th to 20th November 2006

5. Festival-at-a-glance • Attended by • 5000 middle school children, • 160 teachers, • 200 young adults • State Govt. level policy makers from SCERT, NCERT, Vocational • Education Board, State Govt • 25 Interactive corners held: where children learned through hands-on activities • 17 full-day workshops for teachers and parents: leading experts passed on their skills and insights on specific subjects. • 7 film screenings : featuring a selection of films for children • 26 performances at Rangmanch: a performance space for children • Colloquium on Education : day-long conference on “Vocationally-oriented curriculum” – 130 registered

6. Organization – what goes into planning such an event? • How many people were in core team? • 15 core members, Children of Shikshamitra, Members of Sahay, College student volunteers • How many months of planning went into the festival? • Almost 6 months • Best venues to host festivals? • Museums, zoo, other suggestions? • Number of times Shikshamitra wanted to pull out of mela? • Twice! Too young! Perhaps 4-5 strong organizations should come together to organize such a large-scale event

7. Fund-raising • CSH Activity: Brainstorm fund-raising ideas • Brochure advertisements • 5000 coupon books with 10 coupons each – Bata showed interest but dropped out – no sponsor • Competition among children – 5Rs per form – had to distribute them for free in the end – no takers when charged • Charge organizers of interactive stalls • Charge teachers for workshops – did not work – teachers refused attendance if there was a fee • Contact organizations like ASHA, AID • Not enough corporate funding – could be improved next time

8. Publicity • CSH activity: Brainstorm publicity outlets – when and how to publicize • Visit shcools with poster, folder with workshop details, comptetion forms – started in Sept • Posters in puja pandals, book stores, other children’s celebration, Muesums • Samosa posters ? • Newspaper ads just before the fair (13th – 15th Nov) • Radio mirchi, FM channels • All TV/radio channels turned up for inauguration

9. Inaugural function • What was the biggest challenge in organizing the inaugural function? • Who would make an ideal chief guest? • Governor of WB, Mayor or Calcutta, State Minister for School Education – hard to get dates • Chandi Lahiri, the ace cartoonist and Partho Ghosh, a radio personality • Talks centered around Tagore’s “Tota Kahani” about a parrot that died of excessive education • Children interacted in lawns with chief guests

10. Colloquium • Several prominent speakers • Dr. Asfa Yasin of Pandit Sundar Lal Sharma Central Institute of Vocational Education • Bhavani Prasad Pal of the West Bengal Council of Vocational Education and Training • Bhavani Prasad Pal of the West Bengal Council of Vocational Education and Training • Ardhendu Chatterjee, Director of DRCSC • Yogesh Kulkarni of Vigyan Ashram in Pune • Janaki Rajan from Jamia Milia Islamia, New Delhi • Issues faced: Not enough publicity • CSH activity: what could they have done?

11. Workshops • What were the main objectives? • Teachers learn about various teaching methods and student management • Create network of resource persons and teachers • Feedback for resource persons • Workshops held • Life skills – child rights, identity, know your body etc • Environmental science • English • Math • Heritage • Child health • 114 attended workshops; Which were most popular? • Curriculum-oriented

12. Interactive stalls • Making news, toy making, draw a story, maze of maps, know your city, cartoon drawing sessions, career counseling, microscopic world*, mask making stall, many others • Challenges faced • Space • Could not get participants from outside WB or even from too many districts (traditional craftsmen) • Language – Bengali only? English only? • How to evaluate effectiveness of stalls?

13. Movie Screenings • Screened indoors • Short duration movies so children could enjoy stalls outside more • Lessons learnt • Should cater to ALL kids including handicapped (deaf) – though unprepared, situation was handled well at the festival • Children were more interested than expected – so chose films very carefully

14. Rangmanch • Very good performances but since they were in the evenings kids did not stay for many of them • Try to plan them as part of mela • Many many unexpected delays and changes in schedule • Organizers and even participants need to plan for these and be flexible to change schedule in the last minute

15. In retrospect • Most tangible success – request for follow-up workshops • Visit by Bengali-medium schools • Shikshamitra made contacts with several Govt. schools – ERC got a kickstart • Dialogue has began on VE curriculums • Several missed opportunities is miniscule compared to the list of opportunities tapped and contacts established

16. Suggestions for next time • A quick feedback mechanism to assess the impact/effectiveness of the fair should be implemented • There should be a budget to videotape the fair • There should be a press conference prior to the fair, particularly to drive home the topic of the colloquium • Make more multi-lingual • Improve stalls by inviting out-of-state, out-of-city craftsmen/performers • Invite more children from districts • Involve more schools in planning stages