Rural Educational & Economic Development: Update

Introduction
Appalled by the acute poverty, illiteracy and inequality in the coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh, IMRC took the initiative in setting up a platform – REED (Rural Educational and Economic Development) – to fight these evils. The twin focus of REED is Educational and Economic development. For educational development, REED is concentrating on setting up basic multipurpose ‘one teacher schools’ in remote villages. To promote economic development, REED is planning to start a micro finance project.

Education
‘One teacher schools’ in underdeveloped villages of coastal Andhra. These schools would serve a multipurpose role as centres for secular and spiritual education as well as social activity. Four school buildings are almost completed, while three more are expected to be ready soon. We have earmarked two more sites and expect to begin construction there soon.

In addition to the school building and appointed teacher, villagers could also benefit from access to a basic library. We are setting up libraries in the one teacher schools, and as of now have established them in 5 villages.

We have also appointed 18 teachers in these and other villages where schools were built but were defunct due to lack of a teacher. We provide training to these teachers before they take charge of the village schools. All teachers attend the monthly training camp where they undergo refresher courses, and also provide a monthly report of their activities, so that we can monitor the progress. Working very hard to educate the villagers about the importance of education and the need for teachers. As a result, many villagers are now convinced about the need for them to participate in contributing to teacher salaries. We expect the locals in some villages to contribute one-third of teacher salaries. More important than their monetary contribution will be the resulting sense of involvement of the local villagers in these projects.

Micro-Finance
We are in the process of conducting detailed surveys to identify the demographics, occupations, unemployment, incomes, savings, educational levels, availability of credit, market forces, etc. Once the survey is completed, we will study and analyze this data to plan effective projects that can provide economic development of the region and its people. At the same time, we are looking at government schemes and the experiences of other NGOs and micro finance institutions, in order to formulate effective and efficient schemes for micro finance and economic development.