Could you tell us about the Teach For Nepal program?
It’s basically inspired by Teach For America. We want students to invest two years of their lives to help educate young children who’re in need of quality education. These students, or Teach For Nepal fellows, will work with public schools in rural areas where the failure rate of the SLC appearing students are really high. We’re focusing on Lalitpur District for this year and it’s been almost three months since our fellows have started their duties. We have 33 fellows who are teaching in 16 schools. We’re teaching English in all schools and either math or science, depending on the need of the school.
Teach For Nepal is a leadership program, not a teaching program. After two years with us, we hope the fellows continue to be involved with us as Teach For Nepal alum working to end education inequity. Our larger goal is to see these individuals emerge as leaders in the sector they choose and leave an impact.
Do you have any specific criteria when selecting a Teach For Nepal fellow?
We ask for a Bachelor’s graduate in any stream. They have to be academically sound, have leadership skills, passion for social change and a desire and interest to be part of our mission. When we’re saying outstanding university graduates we’re looking at a combination of these qualities. The candidate should be able to stay at a remote place for two years as well as live and adjust to a community that is different from the one they have grown up in. They go through an intensive six weeks of training before they leave for their schools.
What are the components of the training?
The majority of the fellows don’t have teaching experience. The training is to ensure that they are ready to be a teacher on their first day. We are not going to teach them content because we assume that they can teach junior level school kids. However, it doesn’t mean that because they know the content they also know how to teach. We have professors and other experts who train them how to teach, how to deliver classroom lectures, how to plan their lessons, decide the objective of their class, what and how they’re going to teach, the materials they’re going to use, and classroom management techniques. We also have a fulltime staff of Teach For Nepal who’ll visit the classroom, observe the class and give them feedbacks on how they can improve their lessons. They’ll also get refresher training that includes what issues they face in the classroom.
What are the deciding factors that point to which school needs your fellows the most?
Of the 68 public schools in Lalitpur, eight are doing really well and hence we distributed our forms to the 60 schools. Of the 30 that applied to us, we looked at the demand and the need of these schools and their students. We look at different types of data, starting from the SLC performances and the grade achievement level which is our primary focus. Our fellows teach only Math, Science and English as these are the subjects that the students are mostly failing in.
The schools that started allowing SLC examinations after 2054 BS are called prasthapit madhyamik vidhyalaya. While the government has allowed these schools to give SLC exams, not all teachers are supported by the government. So because of low resources, the schools do not attract good human resource. These schools are in our priority.
What are the responses from the fellows and the school at this stage?
What we’ve been hearing is that the achievement level of students is really low. Our fellows are saying that a class nine student doesn’t know the Nepali alphabets, in class eight they’re still not able to differentiate between B and D. These are indications that many students in public schools are really far below their grade level. But having said that, what I’m learning from school principals is that our fellows are working extremely hard. The fellows have plans to start a book collection drive so that their students have storybooks to read. One principal was amazed that a fellow was using local tools to teach students. The other teachers have also spoken about the positive effects on their own teaching methods.
While it will take a lot of time to improve the grade level, the changing behavioral signs where the students are very eager to learn and are interested in learning, asking questions, working in groups and coming to schools more often are very important. Witnessing these changes in two months is very encouraging. And because the grade level is low, our fellows have started extra classes, even on Saturdays. The good part is that the students are attending these classes, and some even come walking three hours each way. If a child is walking six hours a day just to come to school on time but still doesn’t know how to count in class eight, it clearly shows that he’s not getting the education he needs.
Teach For Nepal has another call for application. What are the plans for the next year?
While our fellows are teaching students from class 6-9 this year, it will be class 7-10 next year. The new applications are for April 2014 and our goal is to place 50 fellows in Sindhupalchowk and Dhanusha districts by the end of January.
What are the changes that need to be brought in the education system in Nepal?
Teaching is teacher-centric in Nepal. But that’s not learning, that’s teaching. We need to inspire children to think and encourage them to ask questions. Our entire education system is based on spoon-feeding but that doesn’t take a person far, especially in the 21st century where we put a lot of value on innovation. If the children are not encouraged to ask questions, then they are not going to be innovators because they are going to accept everything they are given. We must focus on developing children in the issues of critical thinking and vision, and for that they must be in the center of learning.
Why do you think these fellows applied for the program?
We think that there is a strong desire among young people to be part of something that is bigger than them. That is something that I sense a lot in Nepal right now. We are looking for relatively fresh graduates and we’re telling them that you could become engineers, doctors but then you could also start your career by changing lives.
Nepal doesn’t have many platforms where you can contribute to directly changing people’s lives. It’s not just talk; it’s actually something that people can do substantially and here you have the opportunity to do something every single day to change a child’s life.
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