Sampark Foundation to invest Rs 40 crores to help transform primary education in Jharkhand

One of the largest primary school transformation program in partnership with Jharkhand Education Project Council, Government of Jharkhand

India CSR Network

RANCHI: Sampark Foundation in collaboration with Jharkhand Education Project Council, Government of Jharkhand flagged off Sampark Smart Shala Program across all government primary schools in Jharkhand today with the signing of MoU. Chief Minister of Jharkhand Raghubar Das and Vineet Nayar, Founder Chairman, Sampark Foundation and Former CEO, HCL Technologies Ltd. announced the state-wide launch of the Sampark Smart Shala Program.

Sampark Foundation would invest upto Rs. 40 crores to help reach Sampark Smart Shala Program to 26,000 primary government schools and bring smiles to over 40 Lakh children. The objective of this joint initiative is to ensure that 80% of children are able to do basic Maths operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) and use 500 new words to speak and write in English after a year of implementation. Sampark Smart Shala Program for Maths and English is a first of its kind intervention that uses FOUR new innovations:

(1) Audio Sound Box to assist the teachers in teaching English and Maths.

(2) Audio lessons with music, songs, stories and games.

(3) 3D teaching learning aids to make learning fun.

(4) Tracking and monitoring learning outcomes through a mobile app.

Raghubar Das, Chief Minister, Jharkhand graced the occasion and said, “We thank Sampark Foundation for investing in Jharkhand and brininging this innovation to our 26,000 primary Schools and 40 lakh children. Sampark Smart Shala is a path breaking initiative which will make our schools interactive, innovative and imaginative. I am sure our young state Jharkhand will see significant improvement in quality of primary education with such a strategic partnership and I wish all our children and teachers the very best.”

Vineet Nayar, Founder Chairman, Sampark Foundation said, “I did my final education in Jamshedpur and was looking for an opportunity to give back to the state which had the biggest impact on my life. I would like to thank Shri Raghubar Das ji and State’s Education Department for believing in this innovative approach and we are happy to invest INR 40cr to bring smiles on the faces of 40 Lakh children in 26,000 government primary schools. Based on the tremendous success in Chhattisgarh and Uttarakhand I am confident we will suceed in Jharkhand in partnership with the State Government, teachers and children. Sampark Foundation would not receive any financial support for this change from the Government.”

Under this MOU, Sampark Foundation is focused on 4 goals:

(1) Train over 60,000 teachers on the Sampark Smart Shala

(2) Distribute over 26,000 Sampark Smart Shala Math and 26,000 Sampark Smart Shala English kits

(3) Monitor progress of 40 lakh children on a monthly basis through “Sampark Smart Shala App”

(4) Create an Education Quality resource group for Math and English at the Block, District and State level to focus on improving learning outcomes of children in primary government schools through Sampark Foundation Master Trainers located in each district alongside the State Government leadership team.

Sampark Foundation

With ‘Innovation led large scale social change’ as the central idea, Sampark Foundation founded by Vineet Nayar, Former CEO, HCL Technologies Ltd. and his wife Anupama Nayar, is impacting lives of 3 million children studying in 50,000 schools in Uttarakhand, Jammu & Kashmir and Chhattisgarh; making it one of the world’s largest primary school transformation initiatives by a Foundation. They have committed an investment of Rs 650 cr to drive transformation in 200,000 schools bringing smiles to 10 million children by 2020.

Sampark Smart Shala is a learning outcome focused frugal innovation that uses technology, a voice mascot called “Sampark Didi”, toys, folklore, games, teacher training modules combined with rigorous monitoring in collaboration with state governments bringing smiles on the faces of 3 million children across 50,000 schools at the cost of just $1 per child/Annum.

Vineet Nayar is Founder Chairman of Sampark Foundation and former CEO of HCL Technologies Ltd.. He is also author of the highly acclaimed management book Employees First, Customers Second: (Harvard Business Press, June 2010). Forbes Asia in its ‘Heroes of Philanthropy’ 2016 list has cited Vineet for ‘Innovation led large scale social change’. He was recently featured as a ‘Global Thinker 2016’ by Foreign Policy magazine for ‘unplugging technology so kids can learn’.

Vineet is also an acknowledged management visionary and a radical thinker who architected HCLT’s transformation from $0.7 billion in 2005 to a $4.7 billion Global Technology Services Company with over 85,000 employees across 32 countries. This radical transformation led Fortune to recognize HCL as “the world’s most modern management” while Business Week named HCLT as “one of the world’s most influential companies”; which led HCL’s innovative management practices to be taught as a case study at both the Harvard Business School and London Business School.