Indore (Madhya Pradesh): The first start-up of the Indore Smart City’s Smart Seed running under CIIE.CO, the Technology Business Incubator of IIM Ahmedabad, which is incubating the start-ups has come up with a dream to make kids in slums literate.
The start-up of Literacy Lab started by Inspire India, founded by Rohit Pandey to educate the slum area kids and students of Government Schools.
Pandey said, “I have researched that in the schools and kids living in the slum areas do not get that education which they deserve”.
“Enrolment rates are now at around 95% across India, and still rising. However, schools are often failing to make their students literate. The Annual Status of Education Report (2018) indicates that 56% of Grade 5 students can’t read a Grade 2 Hindi text. The fact is that so many students are failing to learn the basics in school shows that there are deep issues in our education system,” said Pandey.
Goal of Startup
“In my start-up, I have designed a tool kit for these kids to educate them using several education techniques,” Pandey added.
“Till yet I and my team have educated over 1000 children with my learning programme which has great outcomes and on the basis of that I decided to take it ahead to make the nation 100 percent functional literate. I am doing this considering it ISR (Individual Social Responsibility)”.
What is the idea?
There is a 6-7 months long course for children under 12 to 14 years of age. The company runs the course in government schools and slum areas. A 30-minutes session per day is organised. There are 60 sessions in the course which works in a reverse learning programme. After and before completion of the programme assessments of children is also done. The program emphasises moving from the known to the unknown. We start with the picture, and ask what its first sound is, before going on to the unknown – the shape of the letter. This enables learners to incorporate this new knowledge effectively.
Categories of children
Students for the programme are categorised in three categories; Shishu – for children who don’t know basics; Kishore – for children above basic knowledge and Umang – for children above 15 to teach advanced courses including computer programming, stem learning, providing scholarship for future education and preparing children for competitive exams.
Another Startup by IITian
The IIT Mumbai alumni Anand Sharma, who has started K2 Technology company which manufactures products for farmers. With a dream to help farmers in wastage of the vegetables and in protecting their crops from animals and other unwanted things Anand has developed a few devices.
What is the idea?
He has invented the low-cost cooling chamber which uses water to store the perishable vegetables and keep them fresh for up to a week and more. The setup can protect upto 100 kg of vegetables in one plant.
Another device consists of a three-layer protection system by which the animals cannot enter the field. The device has a flashlight which will flash on detecting the animals which will scare the animal as well as it also has sounds of animals which will also keep the animals away from the field.
Goal of Startup
“This will help farmers in earning and help in prevention of wastage of vegetables. We are developing more such devices to motivate people to come into the agriculture sector”, said Anand.
Help needed for Startup?
We are looking for the support from the horticulture department for the successful implementation of the technology across the state. And in future we would be working on technologies for the development of small and marginal farmers and bringing pride for the small-scale farmers.
Aditya Vyas |
Smart Seed officials say
22 startups yet to come
“We expect 4 start-up teams to join us at Indore Smart Seed by the first week of September and 22 start-ups have approached us so far”
Aditya Vyas, Team member, CIIE.CO, the Technology Business Incubator of IIM Ahmedabad.
Rishav Gupta |
Positive response indeed
"Smart Seed incubator is indeed getting a very positive response, especially from our city's young entrepreneurs. The target is to attract and nurture innovative ideas and a fresh outlook towards problem-solving, with an aim to help them grow into industry leaders. With state-of-the-art infrastructure, mentoring by subject matter experts and a symbiotic work environment, we are hopeful of flourishing a dynamic start-up culture in Indore" Rishav Gupta, Chief Executive Officer, Indore Smart City Development Limited.
