Digital Sakshar

Nome dell'ente che lo ha realizzato /ORGANIZATION/INSTITUTE PRESENTING THE PROJECT: *:

Pratham InfoTech Foundation

Regione/Region:

Maharashtra

Paese/ Country:

India

Città/ City:

Mumbai

Descrizione del progetto/Describe the project :

Digital Sakshar works on an innovative hybrid digital and group learning model where along with classroom training, students in a group of 4-5 are given laptops in community for self and group learning. Due to this students from different age groups and background come together in the community to learn and gain Basic Computer and IT skills. Placement assistance is also provided to jobseekers during and after the duration of course. Apart from application software trainings, the youth are also introduced to various online platforms like banking, shopping, paying utility bills, etc. They are encouraged to use IT as one of the sources to enhance their knowledge base. The emphasis is on exposing them to basics of IT and instilling the confidence in them to implement what they have learnt. The project aims to channelize their energies for positive and productive purposes through basic IT and soft skills training, thereby making them more efficient and employable. Laptops are provided to the students for self-study and group study. The beneficiaries of this project consists of youth from employment age group, college going students, graduates, housewives and job seeking youths from employment age group and employed people willing to learn new skills to move ahead in their job ladder. Multiple job fairs are conducted during the each 2 month long batch to assist the trained youth in job placement. Pratham InfoTech Foundation and Larsen & Toubro InfoTech partnered in the year 2016 and initiated the Digital Sakshar project, to impart basic digital literacy in IT Operating Systems-Applications, Internet Usage, Communication and Employability skills to help the youth from disadvantaged families in career planning and for job readiness. This project is currently being conducted in 70 centers across Mumbai, Thane, Navi Mumbai and has successfully reached 53749 youth

Categoria del progetto/Project category :

Inserimento dei giovani nel mondo del lavoro/Helping youth step into the job market

In che modo il progetto usa le tecnologie in modo innovativo/Use of technologies ...:

Digita Sakshar believes in the use of technology to reach and impact maximum people. Digital Sakshar project is working in line with the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Over 650 laptops & 300+ internet dongles are provided to students in 70 different communities during the duration of each batch. These laptops provide the much needed access to the youth and their families. The internet dongles adds on the access provided by the laptops and opens the world of internet for the youth. Internet helps the youth gain exposure to the multiple global platforms available online. Sessions are conducted with the youth on safe practices while using internet to make sure th youth are aware of using the internet responsibly. The innovative idea of trusting youth with the responsibility of a laptop has been well received and helped make the project successful. Digital Sakshar project uses online and offline mediums to train students in Digital literacy, Soft Skills and Employability Skills. The students are trained through various online and offline videos available on Youtube and the Digital Sakshar website. (http://digitalsakshar.com) Digital Sakshar has a free android and iOS mobile app which is available on the playstore and App store. The app provides the students access to all the content they used during the training and more, even after the end of the course. Creating the application ensured that the youth can keep learning even when they are not the part of the project and they don’t have access to the laptops. (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.sancharinfotech.digitalsakshar) As mentioned above there are different ways in which Digital Sakshar uses technology innovatively and tries to achieve multiple goals from the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development . Goals 1, 4, 5, 8 and 10 are some of the goals that the Digital Sakshar project tries to achieve through the innovative project model and use of technology in implementation. Digital Sakshar trains youth making them employment ready and helps place them in different sectors through the multiple job fairs conducted in each batch. Employment will help end poverty for the beneficiaries and families opening new and horizons for all of them. The youtube channel, mobile app provide open and free platforms where the youth and their families and community can learn and access information through out their lifetime even after graduating from the project. This use of technological platforms also ensures complete inclusivity as same information is available for all without any discrimination. Access to more employment opportunities would help reduce poverty inturn reducing the inequality with the country. Digital Sakshar has always worked towards inclusion of women/girls with 60% of the beneficiaries being women/girls for almost all the batches. The platforms online also help women/girls study and continue learning through the comfort of their homes and communities.

Indicare gli elementi di innovazione del progetto:/ What are the technological aspects of the project?:

The model of the project is a hybrid model, where youth learn through a combination of platforms of classroom learning, group learning and self learning. The Digital Sakshar centers are run in schools after school hours. The school computer labs which are shut after the closing of the school are used to run the Digital Sakshar project. This innovation helped save a lot of infrastructural investment which could then be used to provide laptops to the students who were a part of the project. This innovation also helped in keeping the project costs low where the per beneficiary cost is less than 30 dollars for a two month IT and employability training Providing laptops in communities helped provide the much needed access in the community. This helped youth as well as their families use a digital device on a regular basis. Digital Sakshar content is available on free online platforms, this ensures that youth have access to technical knowledge even after they have graduated from the project. Door to door mobilization has been to key to mobilize in the communities for the Digital Sakshar project. Facilitators go in the communities in groups and visit each household to talk about the course, this has helped reach maximum people in the community. Digital Sakshar has trained people from the communities to be trainers for the project, this created more employment opportunities in the communities Digital Sakshar has a three party model where the organization works with a corporate and has worked with 100+ educational institutions for the implementation of the project. The educational institutions are based in or around the community making it easier for the youth to be a part of the project and also encouraging more community involvement.

Quali sono gli aspetti tecnologici del progetto?What are the technological aspects of the project?:

Technology plays a big role at every step of the Digital Sakshar Project. Multiple online platforms have been created to ensure the smooth running of the project and complete transparency. The first portal is the organization’s ERP system, where the entire operational data is entered and stored. Entire data from the enrollment of the students to attendance, to their assessment scores, everything is maintained on the same portal. The same portal helps generate reports and all the team members involved in the project have access to the portal as per their profile requirement. (http://www.piferp.org.in/) The second portal is for the placement of the youth who undergo the Digital Sakshar training. The entire data about the recruitment partners, their available vacancies is maintained with the data of the jobseekers along with the details of all the job fairs conducted for each batch. This is single platform where all placement related information of the project is available. This is a like an internal job portal exclusively for the project. (http://adorejobs.com/) The third portal is a partner portal, all partners have access to their project details through this portal. The data is directly reflected in the form of numbers, basic graphs and diagrams from the data entered in the ERP system. This portal helps maintain complete transparency between the organization and the partners. (http://sahyogi.piferp.org.in/) Digital Sakshar uses technology to optimize the project efficiency.

Con quanti utenti interagisce il progetto?/How many users does the project interact with? :

Till date Digital Sakshar has directly trained 53749 youth. With the help of the different tools and platforms used by Digital Sakshar we have indirectly interacted with more than 250,000+ people. 14000 youth from Digital Sakshar attended the multiple jobfairs and close to 10000 youth have got job placements through the job fairs. This project itself has created more than 200 employment opportunities for people from the community. Successfully implemented a three party partnership model with more than 100 Education service providers and a corporate and an NGO

Di quali mezzi o canali si avvale il progetto?/Which media or channels does the project use?:

The project is community and school based and involves online and offline training through classroom learning, group learning and self learning.

Il progetto è già stato replicato? /Has the project already been replicated? :

The project started with 10 centers in Navi Mumbai and on successful implementation and excellent response from the community, it was then replicated to 60 other centers in Mumbai, Thane and Badlapur. In 2019 Digital Sakshar also started with five community centers in Pune. Hence the Digital Sakshar model has proven to be easily replicable in different cities.

Quali sono le aspettative future?/What are future expectations?:

To directly implement the Digital Sakshar project in different parts of the country To collaborate with local organizations as knowledge, training and monitoring partner to implement the project locally To partner with different corporate and local state government to scale the project.

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