TIL Desk New Delhi/ On International Literacy Day, 8 September, 2023, DEVI Sansthan, a leading non-profit dedicated to literacy and education, addresses global literacy challenges. Literacy around the world needs urgent attention.
DEVI Sansthan’s primary focus is on foundational literacy and numeracy, “an urgent national mission” without which, India’s New Education Policy underscores “the rest of education becomes irrelevant.” Recent studies, like the ASER report in 2022, post Covid, show a concerning decline in basic reading and math skills, similar to 2012 levels. While current data is scarce, efforts from both government and private organizations are underway to reverse this trend.
DEVI Sansthan is taking a groundbreaking and experimental approach to scaling up basic literacy and has introduced a new ‘learning’ method called ALfA (Accelerated Learning for All) to address this challenge head-on. In this the children learn in pairs and there is a vastly different pedagogy. The results have been impressive, proving that children can learn rapidly when provided with the right approach.
“ALfA was first implemented in Shamli, Uttar Pradesh, last year and quickly gained recognition and support from the Department for School Education in Uttar Pradesh. It is currently being rolled out in 15 districts of the state, with significant progress already observed in four districts, including Lucknow, the State’s capital,” says Dr Sunita Gandhi, the ALfA program’s author.
Harvard Graduate School of Education, USA, has published results from ALfA trials, demonstrating that children can achieve a high level of reading and math proficiency within just 40 days. This innovative approach is a game-changer for India’s education landscape and beyond.
DEVI Sansthan has further democratized access to its educational materials by developing an app that allows teachers to access resources in multiple languages. The impact has been so profound that entire nations, such as the Maldives, have adopted DEVI Sansthan’s approach to literacy.
On International Literacy Day 2023, DEVI Sansthan calls for a collective effort to multiply these groundbreaking initiatives across the nation and the world. It underscores that the paradigm of education itself must evolve to meet the challenges of the 21st century and beyond, with the ultimate goal of making a quality education accessible to all, of which foundational literacy and numeracy is the first step.
