COMMUNITY CENTRE
Part of Reality Gives’ original vision was to assist teenagers and young adults who have been sidelined or ignored by the mainstream education system, or who are struggling tonfind employment. So, after research and consultation with the local public, we opened a Community Centre to operate as a hub for training and workshops for youth and young adults.
The Community Centre is in the heart of Dharavi and its main goal is to provide local 16-30 year olds with the tools to improve their quality of life by continuing their education or by getting better jobs. So, maintaining our passion for quality education, we started a project to design tailored materials for this exact purpose and the Youth Empowerment Program was born.
The Youth Empowerment Program (YEP)
The Youth Empowerment Program is a 3 and a half month course run at the Community Centre and is free of cost to students (they have to pay a small deposit which is refundable upon completion of the course). The course has proved very popular and we currently have 2 batches of students at a time- 10am-1pm and 2:30-5:30pm, 6 days a week. We employ skilled, dedicated teachers who are passionate about the students’ development and we often have volunteers to assist.
The three areas that the Youth Empowerment Program focuses on are English, Computers, and Softskills. These 3 areas were identified after extensive research and consultation as skills that the students can utilise in their everyday life and as tools that will help them to improve their quality of life.
It quickly became apparent that the materials being developed for the Youth Empowerment Program in Dharavi are needed in, and appropriate for, many other similar situations in Mumbai, across Maharshtra, and throughout India. With this in mind, the decision to develop the materials for a wider audience was taken. See Curriculum Development to find out more
Post Course Support
Former YEP students are encouraged to return to the Community Centre for post course support sessions with our teachers. There is also a computer work station reserved specifically for former students to practice skills such as typing, to update their CVs, use the internet, and more.
Evening computer classes
In the evenings, from 6 to 9pm, we have three 1hour computer classes where young children from the community come to learn basic computer skills such as Microsoft Windows and Office. Many of the computers, very kindly donated to us by Vodafone, have an internet connection.
Library
The Community Centre is home to an extensive library, kindly donated by Joyce Zickler, that can be used by anybody from Dharavi
|
