Concern for Humanity

New Delhi, Delhi, 110049 India

Mission Statement

To educate the underprivileged children of our society. To give them room and time to study in a satisfying and sustainable way. Over the years, we have faced a multitude of issues but undeterred, we have devised several solutions that help us to continue to engage more and more underprivileged girls into quality education.

About This Cause

About Concern for Humanity Concern for Humanity (CFH) came into being as a registered Non Government Organization (NGO) in January 2000-2001. Based at New Delhi, CFH has been formed by a group of professionals who came from different fields of specialization and are committed to the welfare of the disadvantaged people. CFH dedicated itself to help and enable the poorest of the poor build better lives for themselves and for their children. CFH’s vision is to help build a just society by involving the communities. The primary focus of the organization is to work for vulnerable girls. Work done so far by Concern for Humanity … Since its inception, Concern for Humanity has been impacting the lives of vulnerable children who did not have access to schools or were school dropouts by providing them the opportunity of a bright future through education. In two decades of its efforts, CFH has established a small but firm footing. It has implemented education programs for poor deprived children and has reached out to nearly 10,000 vulnerable children of the slums. CFH is primarily working in the education space by way of running Remedial Education Learning Centres for the in-school girls (grade 3 -12), in the slums of south Delhi. At present there are 16 Learning Centres, catering to nearly 500 slum children, majority of them being girls. At these centres children receive free education (remediation support), study material, stationary, and material for activities. We follow a mix of conventional and new methods of teaching children. The centres have a mix of children from grade 3rd-12th, hence the teacher at times uses conventional methods for teaching concepts, and later enganges children in activities to help them grasp the concept and practice it. Children are grouped as per their grades and group activities are done with the children. Our centres are a supplement to the regular school. Our approach is progress driven. Each child is helped to learn at his/her own pace. The teachers at the centre provide support to children in completing their school homeworks. A lot of stress is given on reading in the class. Children are encouraged to read the story books provided in the library corner in the learning centres. In order to make the whole experience of coming to the centre an enjoyable experience, children are engaged in creative activities, such as, making things out of waste material, doing drawing and coloring, celebrating festivals by preparing cultural activities for the celebration, intra-centre competitions, etc. From time to time, we have volunteers' visit our centres. The volunteers teach English, and do other activities with children for their holistic development. They prepare and bring card games, puppets, worksheets, and also do story telling, book reading, crafts activities, poem recitation, etc. to help children to learn joyfully. Why remediation centres – The school dropout rate is extremely high in children coming from poor families. The most common reasons for the drop out of mainstreamed children are many: • In ability to cope with studies; • Lack of interest in studies; • Punishment in school; • Work at home; • Care of sibling; • Shifting of residence/ demolition of slum, etc; • Seasonal migration; and • Frequent illness due to poor hygienic conditions in which they live What we do at centres – Academic • Centre teachers help these children to complete their homework, • Help to build their foundation in terms of reading, writing, comprehension and math skills. • Children learn letter recognition, phonics, pronunciation, and comprehension • A lot of activities are done towards holistic development of children besides providing them a playful environment. • There is a separate library corner in every centre where story books are provided from time to time. Children are encouraged to do reading practice. Personality development • Organize activities such as clay modeling, drawing, crafts, handicrafts, etc. • Hold cultural programs of dance, recitation, singing, etc. • Celebrate regional and national festivals such as independence day, republic day, Diwali, Christmas, Holi, Children’s Day, etc. • Invite volunteers to our centres for interaction with children. Timings – The centres run for three hours. Some children come to the centre in the morning shift, while most of the children attend the centres in the afternoon shift which runs from 2 – 5 pm after the school timings. Age group - Children between the age group of 8 – 16 years attend these centres. Although there are a few exceptions as we have over-aged school dropout girls who also attend our centres. Where – our centres run in Shanti Colony, Sambhav Colony, Bapu Colony, Bheem Basti and Veeru Camp slums on the Sultanpur – Jonapur – Mandi road, New Delhi and in Sanjay Colony (ahead of Chhattarpur Mandir). What makes our centres special… We, at CFH, completely understand that the basic essence of the success of running remediation centres is that children should enjoy coming to our centres and should continue to get the benefit of the remediation centres year after year. We prefer that children should study with us for as long as possible so that the chances of dropping from school are minimized. We use smart classroom concept using audio-visual aids to teach children and STEM education is an integral part of our approach. At our centres, once the children are enrolled, our teachers ensure that children do not drop out of our centres, unless they leave the slum. This strategy works wonders as the same set of children remain enrolled at our centres and we take fresh admissions only for replacing those children who leave the slum for any reasons. This strategy is helpful for children as well as for the teachers. Children move upwards in their learning graph and for teachers, it’s easy to give individual attention to children. We usually take children when they are in grade 2 and try to retain them with us till they complete their schooling (grade 12). We feel proud to share good news that some of our children have grown with us, they have been with us from past 8 – 9 years, and have completed their twelfth grade with us and are pursuing higher studies. Our centres provide an environment where girls feel comfortable and are encouraged to pursue their hobbies. They have the freedom to sing and dance and yell and be happy. The parents and the community also support our efforts and they feel comfortable in sending their daughters to our centres. We are proud to share that over the years our children have become more empowered, more confident, more aware and more smart than many of their friends in the slum. This feedback has been shared with us with the visitors, who have re-visited our centres over the years. International volunteers – We have had volunteers come over from Canada, Netherlands, Australia, Germany and London. They spent time with children, taught children photography, art, mask making, English communication, English songs and game playing, storytelling, etc. Computer Education Centre – This centre is open for senior students where they learn MS office and English communication so as to make them job ready as soon as they complete their twelfth grade. The Computer teacher is supported by IT volunteers through online support. Training cum production Centre for adolescent girls and young women – At present Concern for Humanity is running training cum production centre for the adolescent girls and for young women in the Sanjay Colony slum, Near Asola Bhati Wild Sanctuary road, Delhi. At this centre there are around 20 trainees who are receiving training in drafting, cutting, stitching of garments. A similar project was implemented in the past and around 35 trainees benefited from the training. The first batch was trained with an objective to secure the trainees business orders from garment export houses, however due to poor soil quality (red soil which leaves a permanent stain on clothes) the export houses could not give orders to the trained group. Some of the trainees in fact started to stitch garments on a professional basis. Adolescent Girls’ Menstrual Health – All our eligible girls are provided a free packet of sanitary napkins every month. The health counselor visits the girls at each centre, talks to girls on their issues problems and anxieties related to menstrual health and other UTI related issues. Nutritious snacks for children – All our centre children receive and savory or sweet nutritious snack every day. We have tied up with reputed brands for the regular supplies on a institutional discount rates. Some of the successful campaigns with corporates LensKart Foundation - Eye Testing Centre – Children’s eye testing had been on our agenda since past many years. This year, we succeeded in a major breakthrough. We managed to sign an agreement with LensKart Foundation. It is the philanthropic arm of the fast growing chain of LensKart stores – Lenskart is an Indian multinational optical prescription eyewear retail chain, based in New Delhi, India. The LensKart Centre team screened a little over 10,000 children and adults for vision related issues and provided free spectacles to those needing it for corrective vision. The team held follow-ups at regular intervals with all those who got spectacles to help overcome any issues later on. Gift a Smile campaigh with Radio Mirchi, 98.3 FM – The gift-a-smile activity was a campaign around Christmas time to collect donation of woolens and toys for our centre children. Radio Mirchi placed the donation boxes at strategic locations, including in their own office. It was a COVID restriction time, we knew the response would be limited. But the advertising on air was immense. We were happy with the publicity that the campaign generated. And more importantly, a big established brand like Radio Mirchi endorsed CFH as a credible organization.

Concern for Humanity
Building No. 253, 4Th Floor Shahpur Jat,
New Delhi, Delhi 110049
India
Phone 09810345783
Unique Identifier 5682440580725_a30b