“Ma’am, main bade hokar IIT mein aana chahti hu, main kya kar sakti hu?”
Reflections of online sessions from Curiosity Program running in 12 Indian states.
It was one of our usual live sessions of Curiosity Program on a Tuesday evening.The
session was almost over and it was time for some interaction with the girls of KGBV
schools. With 400+ KGBVs joining on zoom, the girls usually raise their hands seeking
permission to unmute them and ask their questions. During this particular interaction,
among the 30,000+ girls present on zoom, a girl named Drishti from KGBV Kantrodi,
Gujarat also raised her hand. Drishti, who studies in 9th grade, asked me,
Listening to her question made me extremely happy. And though the happiness was
partly because of her beaming curiosity to know how to get into an IIT, there was
something more that I witnessed that day. I could see a confident young girl, with a
sense of identity in building, who held the belief in herself that she could join an IIT
when she said, “Ma’am, main Math karke aaungi.” And the story does not end here. Her question struck the chords of my memory, making me recall the words of Shri. Sanjay Kumar, Secretary, Department of School Education & Literacy, Ministry of Education who visited our lab last year. He remarked, ”This program, if nothing, is a window to the outside world for these girls who come from such remote areas, stay in these KGBVs and have little access to the world outside.”
His words made a much deeper sense that day, bringing out the realizations that hadn’t
hit before. While we, as a team, focus on making the sessions engaging and impactful
with interesting toys and activities, something more always happens in the background.
Like Drishti, there might be many more girls who are beginning to develop their own
identities. An identity that gives them the belief that ‘I’ can do Mathematics and Science
and even pursue careers in these fields. And for these girls who come from the remotest and the most underprivileged areas of India, seeing this shift in perspective is
both humbling and satisfying at the same time.
This episode further reinforces our belief that it is not these subjects that the students
run away from, but the way in which we present and teach these subjects in our schools
and classrooms. And once we bring that shift in our ways of teaching, we surely can see
that shift in identities from not being Math and Science persons to finally being confident
of doing Maths and Science.
Author : Neha Garg
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