THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:Building, inventing, designing and testing machines is what an engineer would usually do. While pursuing his mechanical engineering course at SET College of Engineering, Anand Gopakumar thought he would be doing the same. But, destiny took him to a startup, where he could do something for the society.
In 2015, he decided to join ‘Teach for India’ in Pune as a full-time teacher. He says, “It was then I understood that children are not able to do what they want. Nobody asks them what they want to learn. We never have diversity as children don’t have a choice.” Keeping this in mind, Anand along with his friends Prashant Kumar and Monica Pesswani started ‘The Apprentice Project’.
The Apprentice Project is something that evolved from the experiences of a few fellows working for Teach for India.They noted that besides the challenges of basic behaviour management, there was a lack of engagement in the learning process. The common observation was that many students had no interest in coming to school. They did not feel any motivation or sense of belonging. They did not feel education connected with their world and did not have a sense of purpose for a better tomorrow.
Stories of transformation happened in these classrooms when the trio introduced different non-academic programmes which the kids had an opportunity to enrol in. Be it football or model United Nations or origami or dance, the space for them to engage in activities they loved excited them in a way the fellows didn’t even anticipate.
The classrooms were also transformed spaces. There were investment, joy and learning in classes. Children started loving school. Thus, its success in the first year led to the setting up of this idea as an enterprise by registering it as a non-profit organisation. TAP now provides opportunities to children to build essential skills to succeed in the current world. They also have a programme for volunteers ‘Teach what you love’ where interested people can come and teach anything they like in slums and government schools.
TAP places high-skilled individuals in under-resourced schools where students pick skills from one of the four verticals- performance arts, visual arts, sports and cognitive skills.“We aim to foster a world where children are empowered to realize their unique potential by productively utilizing the available interest clubs space in schools and using the tools of creative and critical thinking, collaboration, self-reflection, and communication,” said Anand, the co-founder of TAP.
Currently, they are working with 1,100 children in 11 schools in Pune with the help of 83 volunteers.
They are also planning to extend their project in Mumbai and also in Kerala in the years to come.