~ Pehlay Akshar Foundation is engaging with 1.5 Lakh children across India to promote learning during this pandemic ~
Mumbai, 14th July 2020: Pehlay Akshar Foundation, is an NGO founded by Ms Radha Goenka, Director of RPG Foundation. This NGO works under the aegis of the RPG Group and funded by its group companies. Recently, Pehlay Akshar has launched a campaign “A Story a Day” to support learning for children from low income backgrounds from across the country. The campaign aims to continue learning via simple English stories for these children who are currently out of school during this pandemic. According to UNESCO’s estimate, nearly 321 million children (most of these from government schools) are out of school in India. The campaign encourages a heterogeneous mix of volunteers to read and record simple English stories and impact as many children as possible. Eminent personalities such as Sonakshi Sinha, Sunil Gavaskar, Ajinkya Rahane and Mayank Agarwal have supported this campaign by reading stories for these children. Currently, the initiative has a bank of 200+ stories within a month of its inception.
Pehlay Akshar Foundation has partnered with Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and Nashik Municipal Corporation (NMC) and has successfully reached out to 1.5 Lakh children so far. Furthermore, they have also received support from Mr. Akash Patel -TPEO, Halol, Gujrat and Hingna and Nagpur Panchayat Samiti, Nagpur in response to this initiative. RPG Group Companies such as CEAT, KEC and Zensar are also supporting Pehlay Akshar’s campaign as their CSR initiatives.
Pehlay Akshar Foundation is engaging with children through their existing government partnerships, parent-teacher WhatsApp Groups, their YouTube Channel, and Facebook page. The Foundation is also exploring partnerships with National television and radio channels to promote this campaign nationally.
Ms. Radha Goenka, Founder, Pehlay Akshar Foundation quotes, “We are delighted to gain the support of renowned personalities such as Sonakshi Sinha, Sunil Gavaskar, Ajinkya Rahane and Mayank Agarwal. Our cause is to teach children English in a fun and interactive manner through the joy of storytelling. We have received overwhelming participation so far and are looking forward to taking this campaign to every household. We hope that more celebrated personalities come forward thereby encouraging people to volunteer for this cause. Helping students continue learning during the lockdown is a small gesture of us giving back to the larger community. We are also working on partnering with various other states to help as many children as we can.”
About Pehlay Akshar: Pehlay Akshar, is an NGO focused on improving learning outcomes for students in government schools by developing safe learning spaces and peer networks for teachers across primary and upper primary government schools in India. The larger goal is to increase employability of children by developing their English communication skills. The Pehlay Akshar program was initiated in 2008. As a part of the program, they implement a “Functional” English program in 67 schools (BMC and Zila Parishad schools) across 11 locations in the country, through their “Schooling” vertical and trained 6000 teachers through their “Training” vertical. (As a larger plan for 2019-2022, Pehlay Akshar has collaborated with BMC to train all Primary and Upper Primary teachers from the 24 wards in Mumbai alone).
About A Story a Day Campaign: This Pehlay Akshar initiative was launched on 19th April 2020, one month into the Maharashtra statewide lockdown. Owing to the Covid-19 Pandemic, children have been forced to stay home and many are devoid of learning. The purpose of “A Story a Day” campaign is to get one simple English story to children everyday. The objective is to reach out to volunteers to read stories and build a bank that can then be circulated to children. Currently with a bank of 200+ Stories, this campaign continues to grow. The initiative aims to reach 1000 stories by September 2020 through continued support.
Link: Instagram
Pehlay Akshar calls all good samaritans to join this campaign and contribute to this cause. To volunteer and join this initiative, please visit the page www.astoryaday.in
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