By Fr Johnson Kshirsagar for BISMumbai

A five day residential workshop for the teachers of the Supportive Education and Empowerment Programme (SEEP) was conducted in Bosco Samajik Vikas Sanstha (BSVS), Walvanda, from 14 to 18 September 2022.

30 local youth were selected by BSVS to conduct remedial education classes daily for the primary school children in 30 villages. The residential workshop was conducted to prepare these youth to teach effectively.

At the inauguration of the workshop held on the morning of 14 September, Fr Anaclete D’Mello, the Rector, addressed the participants and stressed the importance of education for empowerment of the society. Fr Johnson Kshirsagar then spoke about the importance of making a strong foundation in education for future growth and development of society. He also gave them guidelines on conducting the classes regularly and assessing the improvements of the students. Fr Monty Rodrigues concluded the inauguration by talking about the qualities and role of teachers.

The goal of SEEP is educational rehabilitation and social empowerment of children from vulnerable and marginalized communities. 900 school-going children between the ages 6 to 14 years from vulnerable and marginalized rural families from Jawhar and Mokhada are set to benefit from this programme. This programme is implemented in collaboration with BOSCONET, New Delhi. A total of 30 remedial education centers will be set up (15 in Jawhar and 15 in Mokhada). Each remedial education center will be managed by one tuition teacher, and each center will cater to an average of 30 children.

These remedial education classes will be conducted for the children in the morning for about three hours, five days a week. The children will be provided with educational materials and the centers will be equipped with educational aids to enhance learning outcomes. Regular internal assessments will be done to ensure that each child is making academic progress. In case of continued poor performance, special attention will be paid to the identified children.

Thus to train the teachers for such an extensive project, various teaching methodologies of subjects like Mathematics, English and Marathi, Importance of child rights and formation of children parliament and ‘Don Bosco Way’ were topics covered during the five-day workshop. Fr Robert Pen, Sr Sagaya David, Mr Krushna Shende, Mr Pradeep Ghute and Mr Ravi Bhasra are the resources persons for this workshop.

Ms Vandan Bhoer, one of the participants, said that she was very grateful to BSVS for giving the opportunity to learn and work as a remedial education teacher. This workshop helped her to develop the required skill and knowledge to work as a teacher”