RTE Advocates Methodology

If we had to sum up the approach to our Right to Education work in Chennai, it would be quality engagement. Unlike some RTE groups that focus on just parents and outreach (which is still great!), we employ a hands-on methodology with both families and schools. Our engagement also doesn't end after the admissions cutoff, either, as we offer support throughout the school year.

When we first heard about the RTE from local activists, they tended to give the same message: "Every school should follow it, but no one does. They turn away parents, give false information, and turn a blind eye." Given this, we didn't want to arm parents with information and let them go to the schools on their own accord.

After many school visits where we had met with administrators personally, me and my co-founder turned to each other and said, "I can't imagine how a parent could do this on their own." There were indeed some accommodating schools, but they were the exception and hardly the rule. Knowing the difficulty parents would face at an institution was a huge reason for our intimate involvement. Wherever our parents submitted an application, we had visited in advance.

Quality engagement doesn't stop with the parents. We also value and respect the schools, and we wish to view them as a partner rather than an adversary. Regrettably, this relationship was not always possible to forge when schools opted for noncompliance. For the institutions that did work with us, however, we made it very clear that we want to keep in close contact regarding our RTE-admitted students: we want to offer extra tutoring, mentorship, and intervention in the event of poor academic performance. For prestigious, expensive institutions, we wish to offer greater financial support to admitted children. Additionally, RTE Advocates wishes to meet with the teachers periodically for a status update on the child's welfare: this is still a "wishes" component because we must respect a school's autonomy, and we only go where we are welcome.

RTE Advocates is exceptionally proud of our inaugural year of work, which includes:

• Discussing the Right to Education Act and compliance with every institution under our purview
• Facilitating 70 applications
• Working with 19 families
• Engaging with 8 schools
• Meeting parents on at least 3 occasions to offer updates
• Personally transporting parents to/from schools
• Personally transporting parents to/from government offices
• Personally submitting 95% of all RTE applications to schools on behalf of parents
• Collecting and documenting paperwork, from documents, to receipts, to admissions slips
• Relaying information from school officials, thereby making their jobs easier (we hope!)
• Calling parents individually to inform them of admissions decisions, rejections, and appeals
• Issuing full scholarships for books and uniforms for this year to every child admitted under the RTE 
• Issuing reimbursement for general admissions fees if the parent had already paid for a seat elsewhere (on account of the extended, late June 30th deadline) but had later procured an RTE seat
• Working with the institutions and paying for supplemental programs that may assist the RTE-admitted students (in progress, as the dust needs to settle first).
• Following up on the well-being of students
• Measuring and assessing outcomes of every RTE-admitted child compared with non-RTE students, and working to fill any gaps
• Achieving a 65-85% admissions acceptance rate (the percent depends on whether you remove families who had gained admissions elsewhere, did not submit a complete application, and the families who had dropped out of the process). There were but two families who were unsuccessful. 

Naturally, scaleability is an issue: Perhaps we could expand our outreach, and maybe we could submit 200 applications and work with 20 schools. But at this stage, we are unsure if the quality of our involvement would suffer: As is, we place great emphasis on follow-up, financial support, and ongoing support/oversight to families and schools alike. Our expansion will only happen if we are certain that these crucial components will not suffer. Moreover, we look forward to using this inaugural year to assess how much support is necessary for parents and schools to achieve maximum benefits. This too will help us gauge or outreach efforts the following year. Perhaps we are being too hands-on, and maybe children will naturally flourish independent of our involvement. Or, maybe we will discover that underprivileged children need great external support and resources to achieve success. It is with great excitement that we shall find out.