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"The capacity to care is the thing which gives life its deepest meaning and significance"- Unknown
Through this survey, Pratham gave us an opportunity to care which has provided a new path to our thoughts
Pratham dip stick survey
Pratham had to conduct a dipstick survey in 17 states in India to assess the education level of children, the results of which, were to be presented to the Planning Commission on 31 August 2004. One of the 17 such states was the state of Harayana and for the survey Pratham needed some volunteers.
 Eight people from McKinsey Knowledge Centre in Gurgaon volunteered for the initiative. Anish Kumar, Avantika Mital, Megha Mital, Payal Shah, Pooja Gupta, Rahul Rathi, Richa Jain and myself, along with 8 volunteers from Pratham Rajasthan, came together on a Sunday to help Pratham complete the survey.
The survey was carried out in Pataudi and Firozpur Jhirka blocks of Gurgaon district in Haryana. Two teams of, eight people each, were formed to cover 5 villages in each block.
Workshop - Saturday, 18 August 2004
Since most of the volunteers were residents of Gurgaon, a workshop was organized for them in Gurgaon itself. The purpose of the workshop was to teach everybody the survey techniques and also to allot responsibilities within the group. It was also a chance for everybody to meet the other friends of Pratham from Rajasthan(we call them the 'old friends of Pratham'), who had prior experience in carrying out surveys. In the special workshop, on Saturday Anuj Sharma from Pratham Rajasthan, briefed the volunteers on survey techniques. The old friends of Pratham shared their experiences of previous surveys that they had done in other parts of India. In each of the teams, one volunteer from McKC was paired with an old friend of Pratham.
Sunday, 22 August 2004
Survey details
The day of the survey was one marked by uncertainty. At the onset itself the volunteers were clueless about the directions we had to take and the distances we had to travel, during the course of the day. On the day of the survey, the volunteers met in Gurgaon in the morning at 7:00 a.m. The volunteers, then, went in two different directions of Gurgaon district. Fruits, biscuits and water packed in a Qualis to help everybody survive the long day. Rain gods may not have been too generous to Delhi and Haryana this year, but when one sets out for a noble cause, they also give their contribution. The weather was exceptionally pleasant that day. After an hour of traveling into the suburbs of mall city of Gurgaon, the teams reached the respective blocks in the districts. Some of the villages that group covered were Khanpur, Gadaipur, Uncha Majra, Turkapura, Agon and Ahemdabas.
On reaching a village the team leader took a broad overview of the village by enquiring about the structure of the village and the casts/communities in it, the number of people and houses etc. Then the team members were sent out in different directions to survey the children. A team of two surveyed the schools in the village, talked to the village head, teachers, principals, parents etc. in the village.
The teams that surveyed the children, went from house to house, testing children on their 3 R's of Arithmetic, reading and writing, using Pratham's testing tools, In arithmetic, they were made to do simple calculations on subtraction and division and children were graded on a scale of 3 to 0, 3 being total comfort with all sorts of calculations and 0, where children couldn't even identify the digits. Next was assessment of reading skills. Children were made to read a paragraph, a set of lines, words or were made to identify the letters in Hindi alphabet. The grading for reading was done on a scale of 4 to 0. Last was the assessment of writing ability. If children could write a 2-3 lines dictated by the volunteer, he/she was given a 1 otherwise a 0.
One team went around the village to see the condition of Anganwadi and Govt. school, meet the teachers/principal and parents of students. The schools were assessed on the basis of the condition of floor, roof and walls; number of classrooms availability of facilities for drinking water etc. From the parents we gathered information regularity of classes and whether the teachers actually come to teach or no. Volunteers talked to parents about the quality of food that was being dished out to children under the Mid day meal program run by the government. Both qualitative and quantitative comments were collected in the survey.
Experience
All of us had lot of apprehensions when we went for the survey. 10 minutes into it, and the apprehensions vanished. The villagers were extremely hospitable, the children extremely enthusiastic and bright and parents extremely concerned about their ward's education.
The people in the villages were extremely helpful it would have been difficult to complete the survey without their cooperation. Some people walked around with the volunteers to help them assess children. Others helped us in surveying the schools and talking to parents. Many even invited us to have lunch with them!
Children were the most enthusiastic of the lot. They came in droves from the far end of the village to where the volunteers were testing children. At times it was difficult to manage them because all of them wanted to be tested. The most surprising part of the whole survey was the confidence education had brought to children who knew how to read or write. They walked behind us as we surveyed other children, as we went into schools and talked to teachers, parents. By the time we completed the survey in a village, there was a huge trail of children following us!
The parents, who themselves were not educated wanted the best of their children. They clearly understood that education could bring to them those pleasures that they had been denied. They actively discussed the condition of the education imparted in schools and they felt improvement was needed. Their spirit was evident from the fact that they were not hesitant to send their children to private schools, 3-4 kms away from their own village.
Challenges
The group faced a few challenges as it carried out the survey. The rain definitely slowed our progress at the beginning, when it took us 2.5 hours to finish the village. The volunteers didn't mind seem to get wet. We all knew that the time was short and the distances to be traveled were long. We didn't have more than 1 - 1.5 hours per village. Such was the enthusiasm, of the volunteers, that the whole day everybody had just survived on fruits and biscuits. We didn't have time to stop for any meals. The other problems were the distances between villages. The villages were selected by random sample and some were far separated from each other making the distances unfathomable in the given time. And some were too close yielding similar results. We had to decide the villages and take directions from the villagers to next village and make sure that the group fulfills the objective of the survey in the given time. The fun and enthusiasm motivated us during the day kept them going till the survey was completed at 7.00 p.m.
How we felt
Dusk had begun to set in by the time we finished the last village. We were moving away from the villages back to the glittering town city of Gurgaon. At the end of the day, it was not fatigue that everybody complained of, but how can they make a difference in the life of the people whom they have met. How can we take this forward? The experience was more refreshing than tiring.
The survey was a first time for all the new friends of Pratham from McKinsey Knowledge Center and was a great learning experience for all of us. At the end of the day when both the groups met, we couldn't stop talking about the experience. Each group in two very different parts of Gurgaon, with totally different people, had common things to share, the amazing people and the wonderful experience.
The group that has come together because of Pratham, wants to continue to take forward the mission of Pratham "Every Child in School and learning well".
Maansi Gupta
(McKinsey Knowledge Center)
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