Dr. Ashok Kumar Malhotra and Ms. Linda Marie Drake just returned after a fabulous 3 week long trip (March 12-April 2, 2012) to India where they visited all of Ninash Foundation’s 6 Indo-International Schools educating more than 1200 female and minority children. They were accompanied by 10 members of Ashok’s family from India who enjoyed being part of this educational venture to spread literacy among the poorest of poor children. Six members of Ashok’s family made commitments to support six children yearly at the Ninash's Indo-International Schools!
During their visit to the Indo-International School in Dundlod (Rajasthan), a sister city of Oneonta, they opened Hari Chand Chopra Culture Room , Jack Finestone Music Room and a newly built electrically operated well (funded by the Empire Toyota of Oneonta) to provide water to 550 children and 30 teachers They also held an assembly at the school where 550 children and teachers participated by asking questions of the visitors.
They also visited the Indo-International Culture School in Mahapura where the teachers and students displayed their recent art work in stained glass windows. They went to the classes from nursery to the ninth grade where children recited poems, sang songs and read their lessons in Hindi and English. They also held an open assembly with students and teachers to receive and answer questions.
Their last visit was at the Indo-International School in Kuran, where children performed dances and music as well as showed their acumen in using and understanding the basics of computer skills. Linda gave a demonstration of different kinds of things that could be done with the recent version of the IPAD. They held assembly at the school where 280 children and 6 teachers participated by asking questions of the visitors.
A special session with the local government (Panchayat) of Kuran was held. The entire day was spent visiting the families, their art and crafts as well as the new houses built for the community through the financial help of the local government. In the evening, the community got together to present a folk musical performance for the visitors. They also saw the completion of the High School building that will be in full operation by the next academic year.
Ashok and Linda met with an NGO group that provided free computer service to the children and teachers at the school in Kuran. They proposed to help tie up the six Indo-International Schools in Kuran, Mahapura and Dundlod by holding conferences through SKYPE and other means to share information on technology use, obtaining grants from the government and other items to help the schools to coordinate activities.
They also met with the staff of each school and held discussions with them regarding their needs and suggested direction and vision for the future. They suggested to the staff that the schools needed to provide more extensive computer skills so that AKAASH tablets (similar to IPAD) be bought and provided to the teachers in each school who could master the use and then teach these skills to others teachers and then teaching them to the children. To lure the teachers to learn about the AAKASH Tablet, two awards for the teachers were proposed for acquiring mastery of the tablet. Also teachers were asked to make commitment that they would have mastered the basic skills regarding the computer use during their next visit.
Moreover, since the water filtration unit at Kuran school was successfully providing clean water to 280 children, it was suggested and proposed to explore the possibility of first digging a bore well for sweet water and then providing a filtration unit to clean it for the entire village of Kuran. This would make the village self-sufficient as well as provide clean water to the entire community. A firm was consulted to check out the quality of water and come up with recommendations. Ashok and Linda promised to raise funds in the United States from generous donors like the Empire Toyota of Oneonta that provided financial assistance for the newly dug bore well in Dundlod.
This International Education Effort of the Ninash Foundation in cooperation with the SUNY Oneonta “Learn and Serve” study abroad program that built the first one-room school house with 50 underprivileged has now grown to 1200 children getting education in the six state- of- the-art schools. Founded by Dr. Ashok Malhotra, Distinguished Teaching Professor of Philosophy and co-directed by Linda Drake, Director of Center for Social Responsibility and Community, the “Learn and Serve in India” is one of the longest running SUNY study abroad programs in the SUNY system. Since 1979 the program has brought to India more than 300 participants consisting of students, faculty and members of the community by immersing them into India’s culture.
The Ninash’s six schools educating 1200 female and minority children are dependent on donations from generous people of the community. Please donate to the Ninash Foundation, a 501 © (3) charity, by going to the website at www.ninash.org and through PayPal. Donations are tax deductible.
Dr. Ashok Malhotra
