SPONSOR EDUCATION OF STUDENTS IN RURAL INDIA

What are we raising funds for:

We, friends of Shloka Missionaries, are running this campaign to support students for the academic year 2016-2017 at an English medium school in the village Umarkhed, Yavatmal district, Maharashtra, India. This is a place which has been infamous for farmer suicides. Locals feel this school propagates the hope that their kids will be able to make a better life than their parents have.

The school ensures that the kids and their families have to incur no expenditure at all. Therefore, all the stationary, books, notebooks and other supplies are provided to all its students by the Trust. The cost per student is estimated to be around Rs. 4,500 per year which is approximately equal to $65 per student per year.

Picture: Independence Day Celebrations, 2016

How will the funds be used:

The funds raised through this campaign will be used for the following -

1. Provide books, stationary, water-bottles, lunch boxes, uniforms, socks and shoes for every student.
2. Salaries for teaching and non-teaching staff.
3. Maintenance of the school building
4. Celebration of Independence Day, Teacher's Day, Children’s Day, Sport's Day, Republic Day and Annual Day

Picture: Independence Day Celebrations, 2016

About Shloka Missionaries:
Shloka Missionaries is a non-profit organisation with a Board of Trustees comprising of distinguished academicians and professionals. It was started in 2000 by Prof. Sandeep Manohar Desai along with two other Trustees, Late Smt. Sudha Manohar Desai and Noorul Islam. The Board of the organization has been committed to the goodness of unconditional sharing ... of knowledge, service, beliefs and values.

Shloka Missionaries has been committed to reforms in education from its very inception. The Trustees believe that Vidya (knowledge) is the true wealth of a nation and its people. It is in the bid to follow this mission that the Trust has been involved in creating new pools of learning where none existed and bettering the existing pools of knowledge.

After creating a new discipline in the field of creativity and communication studies, we now intend to make this a mass movement – Vidya Daan. This phrase literally translates to donation of knowledge. We intend to take the message and vision of Vidya Daan to villages and small towns in India.

Professor Sandeep Desai's noble journey:

Professor Sandeep Desai taught at a reputed MBA college in India in the late 90's. Being a teacher, he thought of using education to change the status quo of education in rural India. Having grasped the glaring disparity of privilege, he started teaching kids in government schools during his time off from college. In 1997, he quit his job to start a free English medium school in the slums of Goregaon funded by himself and some of his colleagues. The school was inaugurated in 2005.

His next project was to construct a similar school in Ratnagiri. But, the idea never got funded from the sources he expected. However, that did not stop Professor Sandeep Desai. He spread the word of his endeavor through people on local trains in India almost spending 8 hours each day for a year and met the gargantuan goal of raising necessary funds for the development of a school in the district of Ratnagiri for underprivileged children.

Through the money collected on these train rides, Shloka Missionaries built 5 English Medium schools in rural India which provide primary education to over 700 students. Four of the schools of the Shloka Missionaries are located in Maharashtra - In Yavatmal district, in the Vidarbha region, in Ratnagiri and in the slums of Goregaon in Mumbai. There's a new school under development in the state of Rajasthan.

Media Coverage:

• NDTV Coverage
• DNA Coverage
• Humans of Bombay post
• TedX Talk by Prof. Sandeep Desai
• India News video coverage
• Huffington Post
• Mashable Post
• Salman Khan helping Shloka Missionaries