Our Work

Who are our beneficiaries?

  • Kadam works for the upliftment of children born in communities that are way below the poverty line. Most of the children and their families are homeless and are either daily wage labourers, rag pickers or beggars. 
  • Kadam aims to help the children from these communities to break out of the crisis they are born into through education and a long term support system.

Our Model

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Identify street children in slums who do not go to school and motivate them to join school

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Educate them in Bridge school and prepare them to join regular schools asap.

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Sponsor/Support the child, till the child meets his/her career aspirations

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Once Bridge Course is completed, Integrate these children in Regular schools

Schooling & Education

Bridge Schooling

Bridge Schools are special training centers that provide “Bridge Training” to children who have never been to school and/or to those who have dropped out of the system. As the name suggests, the curriculum is designed to ensure that gaps in the knowledge/skill levels of these children are closed in less than 2 years’ time (18 months), in accordance with the norms drafted as per Rajiv Vidya Mission that falls under Right to Education act.  The curriculum and teaching methodology is prepared and standardized by Rajiv Vidya Mission.

As per Rajiv Vidya Mission, every government school in India is supposed to have Bridge Schooling as part of their program. However, most of the government schools are under-resourced and are unable to meet the demand. Kadam is one of the few schools that caters to this specific segment of the child population in India.

We recruited 4 full-time B.Ed teachers to teach all the 70 plus kids in our school. Teachers are encouraged to make use of audio visual teaching aids to make the education more effective and interesting to students. We provisioned equipment like laptop, continuous internet connectivity, projector, speaker and supporting peripherals to make the learning seamless. We also make sure that all the kids get free textbooks, notebooks and other stationary on a timely basis. 

So far, we have helped 80+ children, in completing bridge school, a program specifically designed to give basic education to children with no prior schooling or dropout cases. This program focuses on helping these children with guidance and skill improvement sessions over the period of 24 months to prepare them for admission/re-admission into the mainstream schools.

Here is why Kadam is different from other schools. 

1. Curated nutritious meals

  • Children at Kadam are provided with 2 free meals on all days. The menu has been set as per the nutritional guidelines laid out by Rajiv Vidya Mission to ensure a sound body and a sound mind to every child.

2. Ideal student to teacher ratio

  • Kadam is stringent about the student to teacher ratio and consistently maintains this at  20:1. 
  • As these children are coming from difficult backgrounds and do not have any support back  home, they require individual attention so that they are able to stay interested in learning, eventually graduate from Bridge school and join mainstream education.

3. Interactive classroom learning (audio visual)

  • Although Kadam is a not for profit organization and depends on trust funds and donations for its operations, it is at par with other private schools in the use of technology and latest teaching methodologies. We use good quality  audio visual equipment as part of our daily tools to teach our children about the world outside.

4. Interaction sessions with industry renowned experts

  • Trustees and Friends of Kadam are constantly connecting our children with industry experts who have been very generous with their time. While some of the experts have one time/multiple knowledge sessions with our children, some others even mentor our children over committed periods of time. We believe this exercise will keep our children motivated and give them a good understanding of what good education can do for them in the future.

5. Live monitoring of premises/ classes

  • In order to ensure safety and security of kids, CCTV cameras are installed at school. This provides live feed that can be monitored by a classified list of trustees/volunteers/donors. 
  • This also helps trustees to monitor teaching and other academic activities at school, real-time. 
  • Surveillance cameras helped us in identifying child traffickers who tried to abduct one of the children near school premises. 

 

Mainstream Schooling – launch & support

Kadam not only prepares its children for mainstream education but also ensures admissions in mainstream schools. We have active collaborations with some of the reputed private schools and Lingampally Government School. This ensures that all the children graduating from Kadam get admissions and continue their high school education. In addition to providing financial aid at every stage, we arrange for private tuitions to help our children through all their educational endeavors long after they have completed their bridge schooling.

Kadam aims to encourage its children to pursue college education in the long term and continues to support them until they are well settled in their jobs.

 

Community Support

Kadam strongly believes in the thought that it takes an entire village to bring up a child. In addition to schooling, community welfare and an extended support system is crucial for seamless child education. Kadam provides specialized support on various fronts to address some key issues that families of these children face on a day to day basis. 

Mental health:

Our children have been and continue to be subject to many of society’s evils that impact them in ways big and small. At Kadam, we try to distract them through meaningful engagement that will eventually pave a way out for them. We also engage with professional counselors, on a need basis, to help children with severe conditions cope with the trauma. 

Employment for parents:

Kadam actively employs parents of the children admitted in our schools. The problem we solve by doing this is two fold: financial support for the family and more importantly, we are sure the child need not discontinue schooling to go back to rag picking or a petty jobs to feed his/her family.

We also reach out to other organizations/households/businesses to find jobs for parents we may not be able to employ.

Healthcare support

Children from the communities we are engaging with are prone to critical illnesses that stem from malnutrition and unhygienic home/work conditions. To address this issue, we, at Kadam, have associated ourselves with doctors and clinics that help ensure our children and their families are healthy through free periodic medical check-ups. We also provide sponsorships for treatment of critical illnesses for family members.

       

Housing needs for the homeless

Children are extremely vulnerable and, more often than not, succumb to the crimes that they are victim to. A safe house for them to live in is the first step toward providing them with basic security. Kadam helps some of these families in securing and sponsoring rental premises to live in.

Child Protection

Kadam takes child protection very seriously and goes to any extent to ensure that every child is protected against trafficking, abuse, violence, etc.

Trafficking

  • We liaise with child welfare committee and the local police to ensure protection for minor children who are at the risk of getting trafficked or abused. We have surveillance cameras installed at all gates of the school as an additional security measure. 
  • Kadam has successfully brought back children from trafficking racketeers with the help of the local police. 

Child Marriage

  • According to www.girlsnotbrides.org, 27% of girls in India are married before their 18th birthday.  Kadam continuously fights for the rights of these little girls and has averted many children from becoming victims to child marriage.

Domestic Violence

  • Violence at home is terrible, and in many impoverished communities, it happens everyday. Although we have no direct control over this, we try our best to offset its impact on children by directing their attention and energy towards education and play.

Child Labour

  • Unfortunately, child labour is a reality for many children. To keep them out of the workforce, Kadam provides the children with amenities that suffice their basic survival needs and at large educates their parents about the potential of the opportunities that come with education. 
  • The growing strength of our classrooms validates our success in our attempt to convince families to let their children come to school rather than work for petty