Free-of-cost School for Underprivileged Children

JAAGO Starts 2018 with New Promises

This year 2018, JAAGO Foundation starts its journey with same promises of eradicating poverty through providing quality education to those who cannot afford.  The journey hasn’t been easy when it started in slum of Rayerbazar with only 17 children, a white board and a mat. Since then, JAAGO is shaping and constructing dreams of deprived children’s and injecting new hope for a better life to them & families. Starting from a very few students, currently we have 3000 students in all 13 Schools across Bangladesh.

Dream is the word which has different meanings to different people. To our young stars of JAAGO, dream is something which pushes them to chase, work hard and engage into things what they want to achieve in life.

Each year new enrolled students of JAAGO fears to have dreams because of their extreme background of poverty. However, once they are settled after few days, JAAGO nurture these young stars in a way which shapes them into confident human beings who are confident, believes they can change their lives as well their families. Now, at the starting year 2018 journey our student can proudly say JAAGO has given them hope of a better future while they excel at public examination and extra-curricular activities. 

Merging Towards Excellence

Attending JSC and PEC Examination

The Junior School Certificate, also known as JSC, a public examination taken by students in Bangladesh after successful completion of eight years of schooling where our students of 8^th Grade participate and achieved great results.  

Starting from 2007, these are JAAGO’s 3^rd batch students from Rayerbazar School, who have participated in JSC examination 2017. 90% students have passed the exam successfully, 58% students got A, 16% students got A-, and 16% students got B.

The Primary Education Certificate (PEC) Examination is a national examination administered by the Ministry of Primary and Mass Education Bangladesh for students at the end of their fifth year in primary school. This year’s PEC Examination was important for JAAGO not because only for the first board exam for students but also it has become a landmark for us. To remove the obstacle of distance barrier from delivering quality education, we had introduced Online Schooling Program in 2011. This year, student of 1^st batch from our first ever Online School, JAAGO’s Gazipur Branch has participated in the PEC Exam. Also, it is the first time our Banani School has participated in PEC Exam as well.    

Students of three schools of JAAGO Foundation have participated in PEC examination 2017. From Rayerbazar School 3.45% students got A+, 41.3% students got A, 27.6% students got A-, 16% students got B and 10% students got C. From Banani School, 93.75% students got A. From Gazipur School 6% students got A+, 37.5% students got A, 19% students got A-, 25% students got B and 12.5% students got C.

Getting Prepared for SSC

The Secondary School Certificate (SSC) Examination is a public examination in Bangladesh conducted as completion exam of Secondary Education. Students of 10th grade/class ten appear in these examinations. All the students who enrolled on our 1^st batch couldn’t made this far, because they belong from the underprivileged background. They had to struggle with their livelihood as well. There were dropouts and enrollment on 1^st batch and finally, we have 19 students participating in SSC examination in 2018.

The change is significant in the local communities where JAAGO schools operate. When JAAGO started its journey, the communities were reluctant to open up to yet another organization which wanted to change their lives. But watching the people of JAAGO’s unwavering commitment and dedication to improve lives of not only its students but also the families, these communities have slowly realized the impact JAAGO’s school program. After this 10 year journey, JAAGO first batch students are looking to participate on SSC Examination this year which is one of the very important exam for any students in Bangladesh.

Photo Voice Exhibition

JAAGO believes in injecting creative and logical thinking among the children of JAAGO to help them flourish with knowledge. Each child has the potential to become everything they have dreamt of, only if they are given the right platform. At JAAGO, we ensure our children get the right education and experience to achieve their dream.

From this belief, JAAGO collaborated with Volunteer for Bangladesh (VBD), largest youth organization in the country, to instill creative skill among its students. They were trained of how this exhibition will work, trained on taking picture etc. Together, they have organized an exhibition of photos where one photo says thousand words. Children picked random photos of their choices, which expressed many untold issues of the community. Finally these photos were exhibit on public.  

Public Speaking Competition

JAAGO delivering education in a way which shapes the students for future endeavors by preparing them in a way so they could develop themselves. Public Speaking Competition is an internal competition in JAAGO Schools where student participates and deliver speeches on random topic selected by teachers.

This is an initiative designed to develop skills of the students and build capacities among them for future challenges. Teachers allocate different topics to students on saving environment, pollution, necessity of nutrition etc. They deliver speech in front of students which boost their confidence as well. Finally, winners are nominated by teacher’s preference. However, this competition has great benefits such as building self-esteem, honing critical thinking and presenting network opportunities.

How JAAGO Changing Lives!

Statement of Fatema
Class: 10^th Grade
JAAGO Foundation, Rayerbazar School 

I am Fatema and I belong to a very poor family. My father was a rickshaw-puller and mother works as a house-maid. There was a time when I could not think of studying as my family was unable to provide education to me with their low financial condition. No one in my family understood the importance of education where as I wanted to be highly educated. My fate surprised me with an amazing blessing; JAAGO came into my life as a dream. Unfortunately, I lost my father at a young age when I was studying at standard 5 in JAAGO. I felt that all of my dreams are about to end. My mother and I were living together and we could not manage food for 3 times a day. That’s when JAAGO stood by me and rescued from the horrible trauma. There’s a saying when God take something from you, He gives you something too. JAAGO provided the house rent for me and I started working as a part time assistant teacher in my school. When my brothers wanted me to get married at a certain age, I stopped going to their house because my motive was something very different. I wanted to study and have a very bright future for myself.

Now, I take tuitions and try to help my mother as much as possible. We all know that when a child is born, he/she rear-up in his/her mother lap, just like that I have grown up in JAAGO’s lap. JAAGO taught me to fight against all the odds and taught me to dream. Now, I dream of being a civil engineer with the wonderful education they are providing me. I found my fairyland on earth which is JAAGO Foundation.  

Thank You Note

This long journey of success on shaping lives of children as well their families wouldn’t be possible without our companions. We would like to thank GlobalGiving, our sponsors and all our supporters for sharing the journey with us and underprivileged children of JAAGO. Thank you so much for your support, hope together we will build a better future for tomorrow.

‘This project report is a submission to GlobalGiving’s 2017 Fail Forward Contest, where organizations are asked to share a story of when they tried something new that didn’t go as planned and how they learned from it. Enjoy!’

JAAGO Foundation idealizes its employees and the children and youth, who it works for, as family. The small family of 17 underprivileged children back in 2007 has now become extended in 2017 with 11500 children and 25000 young volunteers. This growth has introduced JAAGO as one of the fastest growing organizations in Bangladesh. JAAGO’s success in improving the living standard of the impoverished children and engaging the youth from different backgrounds in the process of national development has been achieved not just because of the devotion and efficiency of its workforce but also for its failed attempts and learnings from them to go forward.  

JAAGO began its journey taking the holistic approach to cater the educational needs of the impoverished children, which included cost free quality schooling, healthcare, supply of nutritious food and fruits, uniform, soap and other necessary stuffs for healthy and hygienic living, and so on. Despite these cares and services, the school management found the students inattentive in classroom and absent from school. The administration deemed it alarming because the irregular students would get dropped out at one point of time. This irregularity posed threats to JAAGO’s mission, breaking the cycle of poverty through spreading the light of quality education among the children from poverty stricken families. At that time, students at JAAGO schools were receiving English Medium schooling under conventional teaching system. Teachers started becoming strict towards the students about their attendance and completion of homework to make sure they wouldn’t miss the class fearing the punishment. Practice of this kind is prevalent in Bangladesh. The enactment of hard rules worked counterproductively, as the number of irregular students grew bigger. The students of upper classes (Iv-VIII) were trying not to come to school finding the lessons too hard for them. As Afroza, a student of Class VI said, "I don't want to go to JAAGO School because the lessons are hard and I don't understand them".  Since the parents were illiterate and more willing to send their children to workplace instead of school owing to extreme poverty, they found this reluctance grown among their children as a pretext. This was reflected in Afroza’s mother’s words. She said, “My daughter does not want to go to school. I would rather send her for work". Moreover, these parents didn’t have any idea about English Medium international curriculum; hence, they were doubtful about their children’s future prospect with such education.   

Having failed to keep the students attentive in classroom, the school administration realized the process was not appropriate for the students, especially of this underprivileged background. The students from well-to-do and educated families can resort to taking help from house tutors or other family members if they find any lesson complicated or illusive. JAAGO’s students, in contrary, do not have such privilege. From this observation, the management came to understand the necessity of innovative interventions to change the situation. Consequently, the started working on failing forward by using the learned lessons from failures.      

JAAGO shifted the curriculum from English Medium to NCTB (National Curriculum and Textbook Board) English Version so that the students of such communities can cope with the lessons and have English language proficiency to compete globally, as well. Its efforts to change the earlier failure into success was not limited to shifting the curriculum. The school management initiated pedagogical interventions by developing audio-visual contents for lesson delivery to attract the students to the classroom. Teachers were also trained to conduct the classes in the friendliest and most suitable ways for these children. Students of the Reception and Nursery Classes, who would flee from school if the conventional lesson memorizing and cramming were continued, find the classroom much entertaining these days because they learn from cartoons and in singing-dancing approach. JAAGO believes, if schooling does not help the students acquire skills it can never be thought standard.  Considering its findings on conventional schooling, JAAGO has made the lesson delivery system interactive. Students of upper classes at JAAGO Schools learn through the demonstrative presentation on the class contents, i.e., they are taken to muddy lands when lessons on soil are taught, and given different science projects, etc. These interactive and demonstration based class sessions, intensive care from the teachers, and other necessary nourishments have made the students feel and strengthen their attachments with the school. Class lessons are no longer difficult to them and, as a result, school is no more a scary place to go. 

The success in making the students attentive in classroom did not suffice to prevent their absence from schools, as the parents kept trying to send the male children to work and marry their girls off. This failure within the success made the administration take one further step to buttress the already achieved outcomes and ensure comprehensive triumph over remaining challenges. They launched parents counselling to help them understand the importance of their children’s education. JAAGO recruited community officers from the locals of school areas and trained them to be motivational counsellor for the parents. They sit with the parents, who are day laborers, rickshaw pullers, and some of them are even drug addicts. The community officers motivate the parents in various ways and guide them on how to grow their children as enlightened, respectful, educated, and financially empowered individuals what they are not. As Ms. Sharmin, one of the community officers at JAAGO Foundation School Rayer Bazar Branch, says, “Once a teacher told me about a child whose father beats him and his mother every night. The father is an alcoholic and doesn’t earn for the family but drinks whole night long spending the penny his wife earns working as housemaid. I requested the father to talk to me and he talked, even though he was showing his heavy unwillingness at the beginning.  Talking to him for more than an hour, I asked to imagine a night his son beating him after getting drunk. I also asked him, do you want see your son alcoholic, drug addict, frustrated, and workless like you? No, he replied and expressed how wildest the imagination was. He later took an oath to try quitting alcohol and go for work by himself. Since then, he has never missed any counselling sessions and been encouraging other parents to send their kids to JAAGO school.” The parent counselling initiative paid off this way encouraging 23000 parents across the country about their children’s education.                                           

JAAGO family is now well-grown and getting expanded every year with the enrollment of new children. It is also planning to penetrate the government primary schools with its pedagogical interventions in partnership with the Education Ministry and ICT Division. Parents now want their children to receive education at JAAGO schools. Children, even of the marginalized hill tracts areas under Chittagong Division, ask their parents to prepare them early in the morning, although they have to climb hill to reach the school. For instance, JAAGO Foundation School Bandarban Branch has currently 96 students (Reception to Class III), where a government primary school of adjacent area has only 19 students (Class I-V). Parents love JAAGO schools as do their children. Afroza, who didn’t want to come to school, now says to her teacher, "Miss, I like coming to school, It's fun. We do so many things together in school." Her mother’s words have also changed, who says, I now give the full responsibility of my daughter's education to JAAGO." JAAGO Foundation would have never seen this enormous success had it not had those failures. Therefore, JAAGO administration believes in the words of Henry Ford, “Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.”