Boosting enrollment numbers for Mumbai's municipal schools. Enrollment numbers for class 1 and 2 were a mere 12000 across their 1200 schools and the numbers were worse for the higher grades. While many children were found to be dropping out of school due to financial difficulties, many more were simply switching to private schools because of poor quality teaching and poor school administration.
Although as per government policy, all school education costs, including cost of uniform, books, school fees, school bag and midday meals, were now being borne by the government, parents still preferred to send their children to private schools. It was clear that enrollments had to increase.
Since Balwadis (pre-primary schools in Mumbai city) are considered feeders to enrollments in Grade 1, it was now imperative to improve the existing Balwadis so that on attaining 6 years of age, the Balwadi students would naturally join the local municipal school. At the time, the day-to-day operations of Balwadis had been outsourced to NGOs, teachers’ salaries were low, their minimum qualifications at just 10th standard pass and curriculum varied from centre to centre. In order to offer these young children their best shot at a bright future, better teaching at Balwadis became imperative.
Today, Ampersand Group is a proud partner with the MCGM for the operations and management of Balwadis across Mumbai. With a structured curriculum, phygital (digital and non-digital) learning resources, multilingual content with integrated assessments, use of local materials for teaching aids, enrollments have doubled.
Not just a doubling of enrollments, studies show that these Balwadis students have shown substantial improvement in their language, literacy and communication skills, along with cognitive, sensory and perceptual development.
A strong foundational-level learning environment goes a long way in enabling the school-readiness of young children and the increase by 100% in enrollments is a valid testimony to it.
Livestock plays a crucial role in mixed crop-livestock farming, which is a predominant farming model in India. In this type of farming, a majority of all economically significant livestock species and indigenous poultry breeds are owned by marginal and small farmers as well as landless individuals. It has been observed that more than half of the total household income of marginal farmers and the landless is derived from livestock rearing.
Mixed crop-livestock farming is a common practice in Karnataka. As per the 2019 Census, Karnataka is endowed with a large livestock population in all 31 districts, with a livestock population of Cattle - 84.69 lakh, Buffaloes - 29.84 lakh, Sheep - 110.51 lakh, Goats - 61.69 lakh, Pigs - 3.24 lakh and Poultry of 594.21 lakh.
Given the sheer size of livestock population in Karnataka and the dependency of small farmers on their livestock, there is an acute need for doorstep veterinary services. As per the recommendations of the National Commission on Agriculture, there should be at least one veterinarian for 5000 cattle heads. However, infrastructural gaps have historically limited farmers’ access to veterinary services, resulting in a loss of livestock due to unavailability of timely intervention.
Determined to find a solution to farmers’ woes, the state government of Karnataka has now initiated an innovative solution to take veterinary services to the farmers’ doorstep: Introducing the 1962 Emergency Helpline for Mobile Veterinary Units. Eduspark International Private Limited is a proud Project Implementation Partner for this project.
As PPP partners with the state government, we run 1962 Emergency Veterinary Services comprising a dedicated team of telecallers that is connected with a state-wide network of 275 Mobile Veterinary Units staffed by Veterinary Doctors, Para-Vets, Driver-cum Attenders as well as Emergency Vets.
Let us understand how this works.
From August 2023 to November 2023, we've so far answered over 1,60,000 calls and treated more than 1,00,000 animals, ensuring that our farmers receive the support they deserve during times of crisis.
Ampersand Group is on a mission to provide free emergency veterinary services to all livestock in Karnataka at the farmers’ doorstep. The health and happiness of their animals directly impact the livelihoods of countless farmers, and we're committed to making a difference.
The incredibly successful job fair with an impressive placement rate of 81% was held for the trades of Healthcare, Hospitality and Retail on 07th and 8th Aug 2023 in Bihar under DDU-GKY by Ampersand Group.
SBPS Healthcare Pvt Ltd, 2050 Healthcare Pvt Ltd, Shine & Standard, Skillfy Global Management, Mahavir Healthcare, Efos were the participating organisations. These success stories are what inspire us to keep striving for excellence every day.
Ampersand Group is the preferred Project Implementation Partner for the #DDUGKY, a skilling and placement initiative programme of the Ministry of Rural Development. Our short-term skill training courses act as a bridge between skilled labour and industry vacancies and cover every step, from the enrolment to the placement journey.
Self defense is a basic human right. Training our girl students in self defense techniques can ensure that they can defend themselves when in danger.
Across the country, especially in tier 2 and tier 3 cities, girl students often travel long distances to attend school, on foot or using bicycles or using public transport like government buses. However, the growing rate of crimes against women and girls discourages parents from letting their daughters from attending school. This has led to high rates of dropouts of girls across government schools, leading to decreased participation of women in the national workforce and a resultant drop in national productivity.
Keeping this in mind, the Government of India has created a solution to provide Self-Defense Training to girl students under Rani Laxmibai Atma Raksha Prashikshan.
Under this programme, girl students receive martial arts training, encompassing various techniques derived from Judo, Taekwondo, Wushu, Boxing and Karate by certified trainers, over a period of 3 months.
Eduspark International Pvt. Ltd. is a proud implementation partner with the state government and has successfully implemented this project across 800 schools in Haryana.
The education sector has seen many changes and innovations over the years. Teachers need to upgrade their skills continuously to match students’ learning methods and new-age technology tools.
Ampersand Group provided over 90 hours of online teacher training, across 36 modules to cover 21st century approaches to Learning, Pedagogy and Evaluation, features of smart classroom with activities covering:
Teachers acquired in-depth knowledge of each topic, encompassing:
Teachers showed a marked improvement in all courses. Ampersand Group is proud to have enabled continuous professional development for teachers in Assam, thus ensuring that teachers see a progression in their careers as well as students benefit from teaching that is more exposed to innovations, technologically savvy and customised to their students.
Ampersand Group strongly believes that success in the critical sectors of Education and Skill Development is crucial for any developing country to ensure the nation’s progress in the coming years.
With 36 schools present in 13 cities in 7 states across India, VIBGYOR, a part of Ampersand Group, is counted among the leading K12 schools in the country. VIBGYOR offers a variety of boards for its students to choose from, including CISCE, CIE and CBSE. Thus, VIBGYOR is a key part of Ampersand Group’s “Education-To-Work” journey.
Keeping in mind the needs and challenges of our times, VIBGYOR creates a holistic experience of learning for students, which blends academics, sports, performing arts and experiential learning through ed-tech, state-of-the-art infrastructure, optimum student-teacher ratio and an academic curriculum that incorporates global best practices as well as NEP 2020.
The early years of childhood are considered as young children have tremendous potential and can benefit from mental stimulation for optimum development. At the same time, young children are also extremely vulnerable and need protection, timely immunisation and care.
However, while parents working in organised sectors can avail of creche facilities, children of women working in the unorganised sector remain largely ignored. This divide comes into sharp focus given the context of India’s rapid development and urbanisation that has led to changing patterns of migration and family support systems.
A large section of daily wage construction workers migrates every year with their children across states for work. While parents work on-site, the children are often left unsupervised and bereft of education. This makes them extremely vulnerable in terms of health and safety and they also miss out on regular education, leading to a huge lacuna in their all-round development.
As Project Implementation Agency with the Karnataka government, the Ampersand Group partnered with the Karnataka Building & Other Construction Workers Welfare Board in 2022 to set up creches for children aged 6 months-6 years of their workers who are registered with the welfare board.
The key objective of this project was to manage and operate Shishu Palana Kendra (Smart Creches) across Karnataka in order to provide their young children with a safe, nurturing and stimulating environment that will enable their all-round development across key physical, social, emotional, language and cognitive parameters, thus preparing them for entry into grade 1. After careful geographical mapping of the state, we currently operate and manage 45 smart creches, 27 in Belgavi and 18 in Bangalore division respectively across 5 divisions, 25 districts and 8 clusters.
These creches meet critical parameters as per the National Minimum guidelines such as close proximity to labour camps, adequate space for minimum 30 children to play and sleep during the day, as well as a kitchen area for preparing fresh food, supply of clean drinking water, electricity, washroom and internet facilities for conducting smart classes.
Additionally, our smart creches have a smart phygital learning environment with cloud-based learning resources and in-classroom equipment that provides early stimulation for children below 3 years and age-appropriate preschool activities for children aged 3 to 6 years. Our creches also offer scripted curriculum as per NCERT guidelines based on the NEP framework, supplementary nutrition with 3 meals a day, regular health check-ups, timely immunisation and growth monitoring by empanelled doctors. Our teachers receive Continuous Professional Development, while our school ERP equipped with MIS and dashboards enables effective all-round real-time monitoring. Parent and community engagement remain an ongoing priority for our team.
With a capacity to scale up without any compromise on quality outcomes, we support the government in its twin objectives of social welfare and human development, in order to create a nurturing early childcare support system where every child, regardless of their background, can learn, thrive and grow.