Community Participation in Schools An action research in CFSI, Shorapur

1. Community Participation in Schools An action research in CFSI, Shorapur Manthan – Annual research Conference Date: 4th of July,2012

2. Background • Community play a significant role in development activities. The success of any development program lies in participation of the community . • Since education is also a development activity, it demands active participation of community to make it a meaningful and sustainable process. • Community participation is one of the key component in CFSI program which focuses on enhancing the community participation in the school activities along with other components such as school environment, classroom environment, teaching Learning Process, teacher development

3. Initial attempts in community participation • School Improvement Plan had 65 indicators out of 214 • Community stake holders like SDMC is involved in developing School improvement plan in all the schools • Bio intensive garden in 35 schools developed with particapation of the community • To involve the community Shramadana was conducted by CFSI team in 17 schools. Reflections: review of the initial activites in community participation Provided us with the following insights; • Schools were not vibrant in terms of community participation in spiTe of majority of the indicators being met • It was not possible to get community involved actively in either bio intensive garden or in Shramadan. In fact, in a few schools community destroyed garden after school hours • One day interaction does not help community to bridge gap between the school and community

4. Focus group Discussion There was a big question about why community is not actively participated in the school activities and contradiction between the indicator progress and actual participation of community. Hence, we tried to understand the community and its dynamics through direct interface with the community we conducted Focus Group Discussions in 76 villages: • FGDs were conducted with SDMC, GP members, CBOs, youth organizations, SHG members, parents of drop out students and community members

5. Findings of FGD • School has not provided any information about the school and its activities • No respectful invitation for parents and community from the schools to involve in the school activities • Parents/community have willingness in participating school events • There is no meaningful role for community in the school activities • Teachers only complain about his son/daughter if he attends meeting or visit school • No space for general community to share their opinions in school meetings

6. Finding of FGD • Women participation in school meetings and events were very less and no space for sharing her opinions • Lot of mistrust between the teachers and community • Single person/family dominates in SDMC or in school activities • No transference in academic and administration issues – school will not share the results of students, learning levels of students, aids, fund etc. • Girl child drop out was very high because of access and basic facilities • No parents meetings were conducted in appropriate manner

7. Interventions Based on the findings/observations of FGDs, we designed the three interventions to make enhance community participate in the schools. • Jaths – To go to the people, to make them aware about importance of education and role of community in school management. • Mela - To create space where community can participate meaningfully • Working with SDMC and Gram Panchayath – To motivate GP to play a role in the management of the school and bridge the gap between the community and school.

8. Community Jatha The CFSI team went to a village and interacted with the community one full day with the following strategy: – home visits, information about school, street theater, image theater, songs, discussion, wall papers, hand outs, discussion with SHGs and CBOs The team trained itself in street theatre , facilitating discussion , exibition and in three teams visited 110 villages. Jatha day – Process: 1. Information to stakeholders in advance 2. Home visits by members 3. Display of wall papers 4. Meeting with local leaders, SDMC members, GP 5. Performance starts with sharing the information about school and village 6. Theater and image performance followed by discussion (5-7 min theater and 20 min discussion on each theme) 7. Distributing hand outs 8. Discussion with SHGs and Youths

9. Insights of Jatha • Community participated in Jatha since we invited personally by visiting their home • Discussion/interaction on importance of education, social evils like gender discrimination, child marriage touched their heart • They felt empowered when information was shared related to schools, students learning, village and govt. facilities • Parents were motivated during Jatha and came forward to send their drop out girl child to Kasturba schools • They realized that participating in school activities were their responsibility • Awareness is the first step to participation. Jatha

10. Melas What is mela ? Mela is a event where community and teachers together organize event where students perform activities on different subjects and around 1000 students and teachers of other school participate in the event. Since it is big event, mere school is not able to organize with out the support of community – resource intensive, energy sucking Hence it is inevitable for school to get community support Total 70 melas were organized; science-25, maths-29, history-1, language-5, geography-1, astronomy-1, Folk-1, health-4, teen age girls-1, Ayurveda-1 and agriculture -1 etc. 60% of schools participated with content stalls in melas

11. Mela Objective of mela: • To create meaningful role for the community in the school activities • To bridge gap between community and school • To make them aware the school activities – inside and out side • To build respectful opinion towards each other -teachers and community Process of mela: • The community was respectfully invited by school for the mela • Community involved right from vsioning and designing • Community involved with meaningful role in preparation of the mela • Youths helped in TLM preparation, leaders supported in mobilizing resources, setting up stalls etc • They took lot of responsibilities in inviting guests, cleaning and clearing ground, designing program • Whole responsibility of providing food is with community • On Mela they play host to all the invited schools and community

12. Insights - mela • It is important to involve community from visioning of the melaso that they can own the program • Just invitation does not help, it is important to create meaningful role and responsibility • Since school is neutral (from political point of view), two groups even they had clashes came together to make mela successful • Many issues related to school got solved during mela – clashes related to land, road, compound, removing old buildings • If schools have a good program, community will come forward to contribute and take responsibilities • Parents impressed about their children performance in mela, in turn their perspective over school gets changed, turned in to respectful place • It turned as village event rather than school event where community invites representatives and offices. They were able to get facilities to their village. Mela

13. Intervention with Grampanchayth Background • With seven years of experience in CFSI programme we felt that the expected community participation in school is less • To make community to participate actively in the school activities started community intensive work in 8 gram panchayats Process of Grampanchayth Intervention : • Understanding Grampanchayth • SDMC formation in schools • Helping to Conduct monthly SDMC meetings • Linking SDMC to CAS and GP • Working with GP to take up education as one of its important agenda.

14. Increase in community participation 1. Increase in SIP meeting – average 8 parents participated in 2009 - 18 members in 2010 - 25 members in 2011 2. Lots of donations from community - land to schools - Buildings - Infrastructure – computer, table, chairs, water filters, plates for mid day meal, racks - Sports materials - Services like ground leveling, plantation etc - contribution from GPs – compound wall, paining, repairs 3. Continued interaction of community in schools where we had mela 4. There are some anecdotes where parents stopped taking children to other works 5. SDMC meetings are regular in many schools 6. Community members started monitoring mid day meal quality 7. Community started demanding facilities for their school 8. Community actively participating in SDMC formation

15. Key insights • If you want to work with people, go to people, be with them and listen to them • It is important to create meaningful role for community to enhance their participation in the school management • If people get democratic space, they could use that effectively • Be honest, be sincere, be transparent and be simple to work with community • It was key to inform SDMC and community well in advance to make them actively participate in school activities • Community Based Organizations take lots of responsibilities/issues if they get proper guidance and identity • It is important to involve community from the beginning -visioning and planning

16. Way forward • CFSI program would create different space like mela, annual day program, old student union, community club, community resources for community to meaningfully participate in the school • Promoting parents meeting at least two times a year in appropriate manner • Supporting to schools have SDMC meetings regularly and effectively • Formation of Civil Amenities Committees in 8 panchayaths initially and build the capacity of CAC to play powerful role in educational scenario • Building capacity of SDMC to play their role efficiently • Bringing back drop out students to schools by involving SDMC and GP • Empowering women to participate actively in GP and SDMC • Motivating GP and SDMC members by organizing exposure visits to places where GP is vibrant

17. Thank you Presented by: Mahadevappaand Shambanna