In broad terms we want to bridge the gaping digital divide in the country. Hence our mission is to provide Computer Knowledge and Training with passion and commitment, to deliver Value in the form of Computer trained people, who use this skill for betterment of their lives in every possible way.

We are not the typical NGO which directly develops and works with various communities. Our strength areas are our skills are in IT, Training and Management. We have adopted a B2B or let us say NGO to NGO approach for the entire endeavor. This entails supporting other NGOs whose skills are community development but who lack the ability to provide computer literacy. Our partner NGOs have their constituencies but they are not able to provide Computer Literacy Programs. And this is where we add value. Our approach is to identify such NGOs and provide them with our expertise.

We enable these NGO/Govt. schools and provide them the full ecosystem so that they can deliver computer education effectively to their children.

We provide support in arranging required hardware, offer support for maintenance of this hardware, provide in-house developed Self Learning Videos along with bilingual Trainer’s manuals, offer online monitoring of the live classes on Internet/WhatsApp, provide assessment services, train the trainers, and award certificates.

We intend targeting all sections of our society who are not computer literate. We started at the bottom of the pyramid in enabling those who have the least hope of getting computer literate in the near future. We began with a community school called Nai Kiran in Ardee City Gurgaon. These children were in the range of 6-14 years. We have now moved on to include older children into the fold too. Now we have students of Grade XI and XII too undergoing lessons. So, right from nursery students to 12th standard students, we teach all.

We are in the process of expanding our footprint in the existing locations where are already are present and also to other Hindi speaking states, where we are not yet operational

The courseware is designed by expert IT trainers from industry. The course is divided into 3 parts, viz. Basic, Basic Plus and Advanced. The basic course gets covered in 12 to 24 weeks, Basic Plus in 19 to 38 weeks and Advanced in 24 to 48 weeks. The variability is due to flexibility in school’s design of time table for these courses. Students get certificates for each module that they finish.

As explained above in, the model that we follow, we provide full ecosystem to our partners enabling them to deliver computer education effectively. We take full responsibility for the end to end delivery.

We develop Self learning Videos, create Bilingual Trainer’s manuals, train the trainers, help arrange hardware, help maintain the hardware, monitor the classes live through internet/WhatsApp, asses the students, award certificates, basically provide support to each and every activity in the value chain of delivering computer education.

No we are not going to follow school curriculum. Based on the experience of working professionals we have chartered out a syllabus which is our assessment of what anyone needs to know to be called Computer Literate. Following are the broad contents of our course –

• Learning Uses and Parts of a computer
• Computer Start Up and Shut Down
• Using the Keyboard
• Using the mouse / touch pad
• Using Paint to draw
• Naming and organizing files
• Text processing & formatting
• Using spreadsheets as database and calculator
• Presentation Skills
• Internet applications for browsing & searching
• E-mails

Each Module is typically 9 hours and would take 6 weeks to be covered. Depending on the target population this might mean that IT skilling of a small batch of children spread over various topics should take 15 to 18 months. After this is accomplished the project will be considered over and would be revisited next year to upgrade the class to the next prescribed levels. Here we have to understand that this might not be always true because the children in these schools are migrant population and every few months the entire lot might change in which case we would repeat it with the same school multiple times a year depending on the requirement. The NGO will thus run need based projects at multiple sites.

Each child has an independent machine to work on. The Lead instructor is basically the Self Learning Video developed in-house supported by a Computer Shiksha trained trainer

An LCD projector is used to project the trainer’s desktop on a screen to enhance understanding by children. Detailed Instructor manuals have been prepared for each module – these manuals are quite elaborate so that uniformity of instruction is maintained irrespective of variations in instructor competence levels. The manuals constitute of slide packs for the instructor accompanied by detailed instructions on how to conduct the class.

Given where we have reached from 60 children in May 2012, we are very keen to scale up and reach out to touch more lives. Here is how we plan to do it – In our new model of delivery of computer education, we have shifted from delivering computer education ourselves to being an enabler and provider of full ecosystem to our partner schools so that they can deliver computer education themselves. For this purpose, we have developed Self Learning Videos and Bilingual Trainer’s manuals which are sufficient to deliver high quality computer education.

We are tying up with Corporate to donate their 2nd hand hardware to us, which after refurbishing is supplied to the partner schools, and the maintenance is looked after by Computer Shiksha.

Computer Shiksha trains the trainers, monitors the live class using CCTV on internet, provides assessment services, and awards certificates. We are however mindful of the challenges as we grow. Getting funds and people committed to the cause continues to be a challenge. checklists before we move in that direction.

There are two kinds of challenges that we face currently –

• Funds
• People

Needless to mention the model that we are following needs a lot of investment in IT hardware.

The second challenge is finding rather locating like-minded people who share our passion and can work with us on a sustained basis to help us sustain our initiative.

For funds we will continue to keep our current base of donors engaged to seek regular support from them and also keep working at expanding this base. We also intend to expand our Corporate supporters and access their CSR funds.

Download ‘Computer Shiksha action plan’ from the Documents tab, please go through it carefully, and write to rakesh.suri@computershiksha.org for any queries that you may have

To begin with do sign up for our Friends of Computer Shiksha programme.

• You can help by donating computers
• You can help by contributing any amount to the running of this initiative to cover costs of paid trainers, permanent staff and other expenses.
• You can volunteer to shortlist schools who can become our partners.
• You can help us by becoming an active network of fund raisers. This is actually the need of the hour!

If what you can do is not there in the list – just reach out to us – we are sure there will be something you could do!

Write to either
rakesh.suri@computershiksha.org
Or
pradeep.marwaha@computershiksha.org