Greetings from OPEN.We wish everyone a happy start to the school year. Schools and colleges in India are up and running post-pandemic, but our impression is that children have lost a lot of ground due to school closures during the pandemic.
Post-secondary education: Ignite scholarship program
We are happy to report that 100% of final year students for the 2022-23 academic year graduated on time, and 86% found jobs or had higher studies planned at graduation.
We have 48 continuing college students, have accepted 24 new college students, and have a total of 25 students from IRT Polytechnic College. We expect our budget for this academic year to be around $30,000, benefiting about 100 children. Scholarships are capped at Rs.20,000 per year for 2 and 3 year college/polytechnic students; and are capped at Rs.30,000 per year for and 4/5 year college students.
Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 2-3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8,000 per month, and we only admit new students to this program after income verification and house visits or video calls, as appropriate.
We are happy to share some follow-up videos from past students who are now doing well in their post-scholarship careers. Santosh continues at Zilker/Ernst&Young and Anjana is now working on her MS at Texas A&M. We wish them the very best as they make their own paths through life.
Supplemental education: English classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust and delivered their Easy Learning Englishsupplemental classes to 3400 children, mainly in classes 5-8, at 9 Government schools in Chennai. Our budget for academic year 2022-23 was approx $33,000 and will remain the same for year 2023-24.
The plan is to continue classes at these schools for multiple years so that a child that starts in class 5 for academic year 2022-23 will receive 4 years of instruction in English.
Skills involved are tested for each students using about 5-7 minutes of questioning and evaluation. Letters, words, sentences, paragraphs, negative sentences, jumbled words organization into sentences - are some of the skills tested. These metrics are closely aligned with the ASER reports released by the NGO Pratham, and measure actual outcomes. The final chart shows that the children in general had decent grasp of the basics at the beginning of the year and towards the end started to do better on the more complex metrics.
Keeping slum children in school: After-school center run by Turning Point Trust
The Turning Point Trust aims to keep children of slum dwellers in Kannagi Nagar, Chennai, in school. An after-school center for 65 children is being supported by OPEN. Students come to the center for help with academics, and are obtaining about 67% marks on average. Monthly family income averages Rs.8,500 in these blue collar families. Turning Point conducts various activities for children to increase their exposure to the world, and counseling sessions about staying out of trouble. A Public speaking training event was organized, and the children were taken on an outing to Dakshina Chitra, a living history museum in Chennai.
K-12 Education: Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition and uniforms scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for morning breakfast. Our budget is approximately $8,500. The school recently held an interschool science exhibit competition that was covered in local media. Click here for a Facebook video from Kumudam.
OPEN needs you
The OPEN community has supported over 39,000 students in the past 18 years with over $1.15 million in grants. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity. OPEN is a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible.
Contributions in USD may be made online or by check.
Checks payable to OPEN Inc. may be sent to one of:
Sriram Sankaran, 7213 Lembert Hills Dr, Dublin, CA 94558
Rajesh Ramadoss, 21 S Mountain Rd, Millburn, NJ 07041
Cheques in INR may be sent in favor of:
Open India Charitable Trust # 26/91, 3rd Street, Karpagam Avenue, R.A.Puram, Chennai - 600028 Phone : +91 77086-79797.
You may also donate online in INR thru NEFT/IMPS:
Bank: Canara Bank Branch: St. Mary’s Road, Chennai Account Number: 1 2871 01 01 8901 MICR Number: 60001 5037 IFSC Code Number: CNRB0001287
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
Sincerely,
The OPEN Team
2022 H2 Update
Greetings from OPEN. We wish everyone a Happy Holiday Season 2022, and a Happy New Year 2023. Schools and colleges in India are up and running post-pandemic and we are doing our best to support. We have scaled up the normal budgets both for our IGNITE college and polytechnic scholarship program, and for the English supplemental program for schoolchildren that is being run for us by Vidyarambam Trust.
Post-secondary education: Ignite scholarship program
We are happy to report that 100% of final year students for the 2021-22 academic year graduated on time, and 86% found jobs or had higher studies planned at graduation. Our partnership with the IRT (Institute of Road Transport) Polytechnic College is really bearing fruit in terms of funding employable children. Graduates are getting entry level jobs at monthly salaries averaging Rs.10,000.
We have 48 continuing college students, have accepted 24 new college students, and have a total of 25 students from IRT Polytechnic College. We expect our budget for this academic year to be around $27,000, benefiting about 100 children.
Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8,000 per month, and we only admit new students to this program after income verification and house visits (or video calls, as appropriate in these pandemic times).
Supplemental education: English classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English supplemental classes to 3400 children, mainly in classes 5-8, at 9 Government schools in Chennai. Our budget for academic year 2022-23 is approx $33,000.
Owing to the nearly 2 year interruption in education during the pandemic, Vidyarambam are making a fresh start. This year, the same syllabus is being taught to children whether they are in classes 5 or 8, and as the class 5 students of today continue these classes in subsequent years, they will leave class 8 with a better mastery over the language than the class 8 students of today.
Vidyarambam have completed their mid-year test at these schools and are in the process of summarizing the results.
Keeping slum children in school: After-school center run by Turning Point Trust
The Turning Point Trust aims to keep children of slum dwellers in Kannagi Nagar, Chennai, in school. An after-school center for 65 children is being supported by OPEN. Students come to the center for help with academics.The center continued to be open for children through the pandemic and was somewhat of a safe haven for these children. As children continue to stay in school, increasing numbers are graduating and going to colleges and polytechnics. Turning Point conducts various activities for children to increase their exposure to the world, and counseling sessions about staying out of trouble. The children went on a trip on the Chennai metro and had a great time. A chess competition was also organized at the time of the Chess Olympiad in Chennai.
K-12 Education: Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for morning breakfast. Our budget is approximately $2,500.
OPEN needs you
The OPEN community has supported over 39,000 students in the past 18 years with over $1.15 million in grants. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity. OPEN is a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible.
Contributions in USD may be made online or by check.
Checks payable to OPEN Inc. may be sent to one of:
Sriram Sankaran, 7213 Lembert Hills Dr, Dublin, CA 94558
Rajesh Ramadoss, 21 S Mountain Rd, Millburn, NJ 07041
Cheques in INR may be sent in favor of:
Open India Charitable Trust # 26/91, 3rd Street, Karpagam Avenue, R.A.Puram, Chennai - 600028 Phone : +91 77086-79797.
You may also donate online in INR thru NEFT/IMPS:
Bank: Canara Bank Branch: St. Mary’s Road, Chennai Account Number: 1 2871 01 01 8901 MICR Number: 60001 5037 IFSC Code Number: CNRB0001287
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
Sincerely,
The OPEN Team
2022 H1 Update
Greetings from OPEN. We wish everyone a Happy 75th India Independence Day. Education is returning to normal in India. We are seeing a post-Covid bump in applications into our IGNITE scholarship program and are scaling up our normal budget by 35%. We are also scaling up the budget for our English supplemental program, to benefit 3400 children in 9 Government schools in Chennai. Government school K-12 children have been massively affected by school closures during the pandemic. Since children are poor, there was no attempt to provide online education. The state government of Tamil Nadu has called for make-up evening classes and is hiring special teachers for these classes.
Post-secondary education: Ignite scholarship program
This program is returning to normal strength. We saw a big bump in applications from fresh students, and expect to accept around 50 students, and a fresh crop of 16 students from the IRT Polytechnic College. We expect our budget for this academic year to be around $30,000, benefiting 110 children.
Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8,000 per month, and we only admit new students to this program after income verification and house visits (or video calls, as appropriate in these pandemic times).
In partnership with the IRT (Institute of Road Transport) Polytechnic College, we expect to induct a fresh batch of 16 students in addition to the students who respond to our normal applications process (we already have 32 IRT students from the last year). The IRT program has been a success - though annual tuition is only Rs.9,000, it is still a hardship for families with multiple children, especially families that have seen income destruction during the pandemic. Graduates are getting entry level jobs at monthly salaries averaging Rs.10,000. Since we aren't able to conduct live counseling sessions, and exams are being conducted on an ad-hoc basis by the different colleges and polytechnics, it has been difficult to run this program in orderly fashion.
We are still waiting on results from the final year students of the 2021-22 academic year. On average, 80% of final year students have graduated on time and half of those on-time graduates have obtained jobs or planned for higher studies at the time of graduation, which is very creditable for such a disadvantaged cohort.
Supplemental education: English classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English and Math supplemental programs to partner schools in Chennai. Our budget for academic year 2021-22 was $10,600. Government schools in Chennai opened in person after a 1 1/2 year shutdown due to Covid. Vidyarambam conducted an abbreviated one-quarter session at 4 schools for the Math program, benefiting approx 1500 students; and at 7 schools for the English program, benefiting approx 1900 students. The charts below show that children see marked improvement in their skills with supplemental coaching. We have approved an English supplemental class in 9 schools for 3400 children, mainly for classes 5-8 students at a budget of $35,000 approx for academic year 2022-23.
Supplemental education: Ashraya libraries, Book of the Month, Arts and Science, Computer clubs
The Ashraya Trust runs libraries and Science and Arts, Book of the Month and Computer clubs at 9 schools in rural Karnataka. As the pandemic closed schools, Ashraya pivoted to remote learning and teaching using smartphones and Zoom classes, and eventually to lessons loaded onto YouTube and streamed to low-cost Android tablets. Our budget for academic year 2021-22 was $4432. Ashraya was able to run annual day competitions for their children where the children uploaded their submissions using their tablet cameras, and teachers were able to grade them online.
Keeping slum children in school: After-school center run by Turning Point Trust
The Turning Point Trust aims to keep children of slum dwellers in Kannagi Nagar, Chennai, in school. An after-school center for 65 children is being supported by OPEN. Students come to the center for help with academics.The center continued to be open for children through the pandemic and was somewhat of a safe haven for these children. They were taken on a field trip to the Chennai Photo Bienniale at the Government Museum, Egmore. They performed a street play at Elephant Gate, Kannagi Nagar, on the dangers of alcoholism and on water conservation.
K-12 Education: Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for morning breakfast. All 34 children who wrote the Xth standard board exam passed, with 5 girls scoring above 400 marks out of 500.
OPEN needs you
The OPEN community has supported over 38,000 students in the past 18 years with over $1.1 million in grants. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity. OPEN is a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible.
Contributions in USD may be made online or by check.
Checks payable to OPEN Inc. may be sent to one of:
Sriram Sankaran, 7213 Lembert Hills Dr, Dublin, CA 94558
Rajesh Ramadoss, 21 S Mountain Rd, Millburn, NJ 07041
Cheques in INR may be sent in favor of:
Open India Charitable Trust # 26/91, 3rd Street, Karpagam Avenue, R.A.Puram, Chennai - 600028 Phone : +91 77086-79797.
You may also donate online in INR thru NEFT/IMPS:
Bank: Canara Bank Branch: St. Mary’s Road, Chennai Account Number: 1 2871 01 01 8901 MICR Number: 60001 5037 IFSC Code Number: CNRB0001287
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
Sincerely,
The OPEN Team
2021 H2 Update
Season's greetings from OPEN, and a Happy New Year 2022. We hope everyone is staying safe as we go through the Omicron variant of Covid-19. Education is still unsettled in India as we progress through the pandemic. Schools were open for classes 9-12, then closed due to the heavy Tamil Nadu rains. Colleges have conducted exams in ad-hoc fashion. Some of our partners have been able to accomplish meaningful education - albeit with a smaller target population than pre-pandemic - and others have not. The OPEN web site has also been impacted with a crash that led to the loss of some of our 2020 updates, which we are in the process of recreating.
Post-secondary education: Ignite scholarship program
Students are predominantly in college for B.Com., B.Sc., 3 year Polytechnic, or 4-year Engineering degrees. Most students in this program are poor, with average family income of Rs. 8,000 per month, and we only admit new students to this program after income verification and house visits (or video calls, as appropriate in these pandemic times).
In partnership with the IRT (Institute of Road Transport) Polytechnic College, we expect to induct a fresh batch of 16 students in addition to the students who respond to our normal applications process (we already have 16 IRT students from the last year). We also inducted 15 students through the normal application process. Since we aren't able to conduct live counseling sessions, and exams are being conducted on an ad-hoc basis by the different colleges and polytechnics, it has been difficult to run this program in normal orderly fashion.
Supplemental education: English classes by Vidyarambam
We continue working with Vidyarambam Trust to bring their Easy Learning English and Math supplemental programs to partner schools in Chennai. Our budget for academic year 2021-22 is $10,500. Vidyarambam opened a learning center for students as schools were closed initially due to the pandemic and more recently due to heavy rains in Chennai, but have now trained teachers and are hoping to restart classes in Chennai soon, as government schools in Chennai reopen.
Supplemental education: Ashraya libraries, Book of the Month, Arts and Science, Computer clubs
The Ashraya Trust runs libraries and Science and Arts clubs at 9 schools in rural Karnataka. As the pandemic closed schools, Ashraya pivoted to remote learning and teaching using smartphones and Zoom classes, and eventually to lessons loaded onto YouTube and streamed to low-cost Android tablets. Our budget for academic year 2021-22 is $4800.
Keeping slum children in school: After-school center run by Turning Point Trust
The Turning Point Trust aims to keep children of slum dwellers in Kannagi Nagar, Chennai, in school. An after-school center for 60 children is being supported by OPEN. Students come to the center for help with academics.Online classes were started for improving English and Math skills at Kannagi Nagar through an NGO called ACE STEM, and in addition to staff salaries, we are also paying for data access for these classes.The centers continued to be open for children through the pandemic and were somewhat of a safe haven for these children.
K-12 Education: Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School
We continue our support of Ganapathy Iyer Girls’ Higher Secondary School, Gopalapuram, Chennai, with tuition scholarships for poor children, and operating expenses for after-school classes (chess, karate) and breakfast/evening snacks. The school has been open for classes 9-12 and the HM Mrs.Sharadha Manee is looking forward to the entire school's reopening.
OPEN needs you
The OPEN community has supported over 36,000 students in the past 15 years with over $1 million in grants. As always, our ability to fund these projects depends on your generosity. OPEN is a non-profit charitable foundation in India and in the U.S. Contributions in both countries are tax-deductible.
Contributions in USD may be made online or by check.
Checks payable to OPEN Inc. may be sent to one of:
Kumar Thiagarajan, 25470 Gimbel Dr, South Riding, VA 20152
Rajesh Ramadoss, 21 South Mountain Rd, Millburn, NJ 07041
Cheques in INR may be sent in favor of:
Open India Charitable Trust # 26/91, 3rd Street, Karpagam Avenue, R.A.Puram, Chennai - 600028 Phone : +91 77086-79797.
You may also donate online in INR thru NEFT/IMPS:
Bank: Canara Bank Branch: St. Mary’s Road, Chennai Account Number: 1 2871 01 01 8901 MICR Number: 60001 5037 IFSC Code Number: CNRB0001287
Please consider investing in India's future. To delay may mean to forget.
