Dream Connect – Part 1

Time flies by way too fast and I just like all the other AIF Fellows, have the unique opportunity to positively impact the lives of hundreds to thousands of youth due to the work and programs we implement within 10 months.... yep, no pressure at all.

I am working with the NGO Dream A Dream, whose main focus is to empower children from vulnerable backgrounds by developing life skills and at the same time sensitizing the community through active volunteering. Over 90% of the children Dream A Dream works with are young children in the age group of 5-14 years old. However, since 2007, they have started seeing children grow into young adults and continue to struggle in making a successful transition from the dependent environment of a school / shelter / institutional care system into an independent living environment. Children are being lost at the last mile, during one of the most crucial periods. Due to this, Dream A Dream felt that it was critical to close-loop life skills intervention by bringing to the young adults employability and higher educational opportunities so they are able to make wider choices and have a greater chance at becoming successful. This is where I come in.

My project is to launch 'Dream Connect', a network of life-skills centers for underprivileged 16+ young adults who are 10th/12th standard drop outs, unemployed, and those who are not actively pursuing higher education. We want to 'connect' these young adults into a meaningful career and adulthood by providing a location where they can enhance their situation through foundational life skills development (English, technology, communication, self-confidence, decision making, etc.), mentoring, career guidance/counseling, training/skills enhancement modules, and a knowledge resource library. The goal is not to be a vocational training center, but to be the connection to other training/vocational centers, personality development courses, government/corporate schemes, scholarships, work and study programs, etc.

This is my first exposure into the world of life skills and education (I'm from a IT consulting background), so my approach is to use technology as a tool to deliver life skills as well as developing content and a curriculum based on real environments and scenarios. I want to be able to develop a dynamic and innovative content delivery methodology / framework that is not dependent on facilitators, locations, vocations, etc. so it can be easily scaled.

Last week I launched the Dream Connect pilot. A 16 session / 8 week course on problem solving, communication, and creative/analytical thinking through the use of technology. My main goal is to remove the assumptions and repetitiveness of memorization that is so prevalent in the Indian education system. I want to remove the stigma that larger opportunities aren't in scope for these children, and why not strive for something more. Being completely optimistic, if I can turn 25 students, who haven't touched a computer into researchers trying to enrich and develop their own lives out of their own volition, we would have succeeded. Our first 3 classes have been more successful than I ever could have imagined, and I owe most of the credit to my very skilled instructor who delivers in English and Kannada, but there are still 13 more classes of content that has to be developed and delivered.

There are many challenges due to the fact that these young adults don’t have the communication tools necessary for staying in touch. Many of our students could drop out due to livelihood pressures from the immediate family, so how do we keep these youth motivated enough to keep attending when they are so accustomed to immediate gratification? What will be our final take-away and value-add? What is the market demand, and how do we make the program self sustainable? There are just a few of the issues that I hope the pilot program will shed some light on in these next few months. Stay tuned for Part 2.

Posted by Nandan Satyanarayan