Microsoft's learning centres trigger empowerment
Civil Society News
New Delhi
PROJECT Jyoti was launched under Microsoft's
Unlimited Potential initiative in 2004 to promote
computer literacy. Under this project, a
Community Technology Learning Centre (CTLC)
is set up at any convenient location in a semiurban
or rural area. It could be inside a school, a
panchayat office or a community building.
You will see young boys and girls at these centres. They learn how to use computers and the Internet and explore career options. Many of them are dropouts. The CTLC helps them clamber back on board. It gives them skills, helps them learn English and generally positions them for entry level jobs.
CTLCs also have a much wider role. They speed up the availability of information, be it on crops, market prices or the weather. They empower communities by teaching them to use information technology to secure their rights. They also link people with government schemes.
By giving women access to computers, CTLCs bring about a change in their social status. They help them earn and run small enterprises with greater efficiency. In April, buoyed by the programme's success, Microsoft released additional funds to NGOs they work with.
Civil Society spoke to Vikas Goswami, head of CSR at Microsoft India.
It is five years since Project Jyoti began. What
have you achieved in terms of scale?
Recently we inaugurated the thousandth Community Technology Learning Centre (CTLC) in India. We are spread across 20 Union territories and states. We have trained more than 160,000 people out of which 35 to 40 per cent are from government.
At the inauguration, the CAP Foundation, which had set up this particular CTLC, said on a grant of Rs 1 crore from us, it had in two years educated and trained people who had earned and brought back home close to Rs 14 crores.
I am talking of one NGO, one grant. That's the return on investment. I don't think I need to do another dipstick to find out. The NGO trained 20,000 people out of whom 18,000 are employed. These are people who had no chance of formal employment. The money they bring back home not only impacts their lives economically, but encourages them to study further. They now want to go back into the same education system from which they dropped out. After finding employment, and seeing the opportunity a graduate gets in moving up the ladder, they want to go back to college and do more.
The return is also on their siblings who want to study further. Young people, after being trained by a CTLC, can support them. Then, terrorism and criminalisation is on the rise. So creating role models in slums, peri-urban and rural areas is very important. It also creates a ripple effect. When one youngster sees his neighbour being employed and earning respect, he wants to do the same. They become an asset to society and you can't measure that in mere economic terms.
What are the kind of jobs young people in rural and urban areas get after they acquire basic computer skills?
A variety of jobs. Computers, life skills and English are required as a combination for almost any job today – be it in a security agency, BPO, coffee shop, retail chain, hotel, restaurant or hospital. Because we are reaching out to the first generation of people in formal employment, they do not know how to dress for an interview, how to face an irate customer and so on. So learning life skills prepares them for these challenges.
We fund and support the computer part of it, but we encourage and support our NGO partners who can do the rest. These are all entry level jobs. I am not claiming these are high-end. CTLCs are like the primary school of computer education. I am not making them computer programmers. I have to see how to spend the money. Should I spend Rs 100 on 10 people or two? I'd rather impact 10 people and get them into formal employment.
Are the CTLCs helping communities to boost their
incomes, improve their livelihood prospects?
The programme is very generic in nature. You can
make it as specific as you want in a locality.
Fishermen in Tamil Nadu use CTLCs to find out
where the school of fish is camping and go fish in
that area and where the best markets for fish are.
Groups of women in SEWA use their computer skills to find out how to improve productivity. I have seen women sitting over an Excel sheet talking in Gujarati.
This particular group was manufacturing detergent. On the sheet they had input costs like marketing, raw materials and packaging. They were having a very vibrant conversation on what needed to be tweaked to bring down costs. Such use of technology has an economic return because of the ripple effect on other women in the area – women who would not be allowed to sit on the same charpoy as the men in a panchayat meeting. Earlier, it was never thought that women could use technology. Now they are winning respect in their families and communities. In the E-gram project, which the Gujarat government is running, the women E-sevaks are called for meetings, their opinion is sought.
If you look at NGO vocational programmes run earlier we had pickles, papads and petticoats. Nobody challenged it and said why can't women be technology oriented? Boys were given those trainings but women were not. This programme helps to challenge the idea that only men can do it and women cannot
Are the CTLCs helping communities to boost their incomes, improve their livelihood prospects?
The programme is very generic in nature. You can make it as specific as you want in a locality. Fishermen in Tamil Nadu use CTLCs to find out where the school of fish is camping and go fish in that area and where the best markets for fish are. Groups of women in SEWA use their computer skills to find out how to improve productivity. I have seen women sitting over an Excel sheet talking in Gujarati.
This particular group was manufacturing detergent. On the sheet they had input costs like marketing, raw materials and packaging. They were having a very vibrant conversation on what needed to be tweaked to bring down costs. Such use of technology has an economic return because of the ripple effect on other women in the area – women who would not be allowed to sit on the same charpoy as the men in a panchayat meeting. Earlier, it was never thought that women could use technology. Now they are winning respect in their families and communities. In the E-gram project, which the Gujarat government is running, the women E-sevaks are called for meetings, their opinion is sought.
If you look at NGO vocational programmes run earlier we had pickles, papads and petticoats. Nobody challenged it and said why can't women be technology oriented? Boys were given those trainings but women were not. This programme helps to challenge the idea that only men can do it and women cannot
How have rural communities reacted to the idea of having a CTLC around?
Each rural community has reacted in a different manner. Farmers have used CTLCs to find information on pests, good seeds and so on.
One example I like is from the Aga Khan RuralSupport Programme (AKRSP). They borrowed an entire presentation from a local agricultural college and showed it on a laptop to various villages. When the next animal fair happened and somebody was parading a cow as a Jersey cow, a village woman got up and said it was not a Jersey cow. A Jersey cow has two bumps, she said, because she had seen it in the presentation. So you cannot short-change the villager any more.
At a meeting of sarpanches who had CTLCs in their villages, a sarpanch said Internet was an issue in his village. Now you expect sarpanches to talk about primary education, health or livelihood. You don't expect Internet to be a priority.
The reason it has become a priority is that AKRSP has a rights based approach to computer education and technology. They use the CTLC as an RTI centre. How do we get you BPL (below the poverty line) benefits? Let's figure out the criteria. Your village should have had water and electricity by this year you have not got it, let's figure out why.
When you have RTI and you have the Internet you are suddenly very powerful. The government has to respond to you. The NGO plays a very crucial role here because they understand both spaces and help people walk the path.
How have local demands and needs changed the
character of the CTLC?
The CTLCs adjust to local conditions. Can I go to
Jharkhand and teach computers, English, life
skills and talk about employment? I can't. These
things work in urban and peri-urban areas.
So I have to look at the role CTLCs can play in their lives. Can they be used for disaster awareness, information on agriculture, RTI or getting you the news earlier? Can this be a centre where people can get their birth and death records?
From our perspective getting you a birth record online saves you not only Rs 10 and a day's wages but also thwarts corruption.
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