RISE School

RISE School, located in the remote village of Samiyandhipudhur, Tamil Nadu, provides education to over 300 children from kindergarden to 8th grade. The school has over 14 classrooms, a computer and science lab, a library, an administrative block, a large playground and 4 transport vehicles. Currently there are 14 teaching, 4 extra-curricular and 8 non-teaching staff. The School is affiliated to the Tamil Nadu State Matriculation Board and also levergaes the Montessori method of education for a strong foundation.

To develop well-rounded individuals, the school pays special emphasis to extra-curricular activities such as Yoga, Karate, Indian classical dance and athletics. Gender equality training is an activity based program where students are engaged in discussions to understand the stereotypes and biases they carry and how society conditions them in a certain way. Life skills training is also provided where students are taught to do basic cooking and housekeeping activities by themselves. Since these villages are agriculture-dominant communities, staff that is trained on organic farming practices, is utilized to teach students about best practices in agriculture. Computers and technology are extensively used to supplement and make learning fun. The school campus is WiFi enabled and students starting from 1st grade are encouraged to use tablets and laptops to facilitate self-learning. We are also starting to use online live tutoring to help both students and teachers get better understanding of specific topics in subjects that are more complex such as science and maths.

The curriculum at RISE school is designed to make learning fun. As an example, the school holds regular campaigns like "Ask Why?" where children are encouraged to ask questions fearlessly and teachers help students find the answers. It is amazing to see the curiosity children have on their surroundings and lives.

The school organizes programs like food festivals and food carvings where children showcase their creativity by preparing simple meals and carving vegetables and fruits in very innovative and presentable ways (like carving lotus flowers out of carrots, swans out of radishes and so on).

To provide an exposure to the importance of democratic processes, elections to appoint student leaders are held every year. Secret ballots are used and everyone at school participates in the election process. Students are also given a chance to campaign as a part of the election process and lay out their policies and agendas before voting begins.

Our mission is to provide quality education to children from underpriviledged communities in rural India. Running a school in rural India comes with its set of unique challenges such as meager infrastructure, bad connectivity, lack of skilled labor, shortage of resources, low income levels and poor literacy levels.

Most schools find it difficult to set up good infrastructure, find and retain qualified teachers and get parents to enroll their children in schools. Rural schools are also plagued by poor attendance and quality standards. To get over some of these hurdles, RISE has partnered with various organizations and leverages their broad range of resources and skills to work towards the school's objectives.

Over the years, RISE school has developed partnerships with organizations that have helped further it's goals of providing quality education for all children.

AID India

RISE school partnered with AID India (Eureka Child) through its Eureka SPARK (Skill Progress through Assessment and Remediation for Kids) Program to ensure that every child attains age appropriate arithmetic and language skills. AID India brings abundant experience of working with large government and educational institutions and has helped improved reading and mathematical skills of students at different grades. Equipped with their processes and tools, our teachers have worked towards making every child in our school attain their grade-appropriate skills.

Schools of Equality

RISE India Trust in partnership with Schools of Equality implemented an activity-based gender equality training program to enable students to examine the concept of equality, power and injustice in the context of gender and its attendant issues including class, religion, sexuality, disability and caste. Facilitators engage students and help them articulate their views on equality and social justice using multiple modes of expression. The program helps students understand social stereotypes, inequality, different forms of social injustice and its impact. Students identify different ways to stand up and speak out against various forms of social injustice. Students are then encouraged to conduct street plays where they use theater, dance and music to share share their personal stories, classroom conversations and learnings with not only their parents but also the community at large.

Pratham Education Foundation

RISE partnered with Pratham Education Foundation and utilized a methodology CAMaL (Combined Activities for Maximized Learning) to train our teachers. The training focuses on helping teachers find innovative ways to improve basic reading, writing and math skills of students.

English Learning Foundation

English Learning Foundation (ELF) is a social enterprise for the promotion of English language learning in India. The goal of this program is to get children to read English fluently. At RISE, children from Kindergarden are part of this program and utilize ELS Video applications via IPADs to learn English starting with simple letters and progressing to reading sentences and short stories.

Qrius Learning Initiatives

Qrius helps RISE school teachers with powerful teacher training programs that increase the depth of learning that takes place in classrooms.

Firki (Teach for India)

Fikri is an open-source, free, online teacher-training portal which focuses on the why and how of teaching used by teachers across India. Through online learning, in-person training, 1-1 coaching and classroom observation and feedback, Firki helps teachers at RISE identify their strengths and leverage them to build an effective practice, leading to improved student outcomes.Our teachers get trained in modules like Lesson Planning, Independent & Guided Practice, Assessments, teaching values, etc.

Vedantu

Vedantu is a live online tutoring platform that uses technology to bring together teachers and students, living in different parts of India, on a single platform to enable live learning between them. Vedantu's technology enables teachers to provide LIVE teaching to students in an interactive manner using whiteboard, audio and video technology and is very optimized for low bandwidth conditions perfect for rural schools like RISE. RISE uses Vedantu to supplement those classes that local teachers at the school find hard to teach students. This helps both students and teachers understand these topics better.