17000 ft Foundation

TeacherTraining@17000ft is a programme that brings new and relevant pedagogy to the school system through a system of continuous teacher training and capacity-building workshops, conducted centrally and at times directly at the remote school.

The training is conducted in collaboration with the local administration and DIET (District Institute of Education and Training). Generally, the training is conducted in winters when all schools are shut due to the severe cold.

With distances and inaccessible terrains leading to problems of access, what the system needs, are interventions that will help bridge the gap between these remote, isolated schools and the rest of the world. Technology, therefore becomes an important enabler and leveler, which can help bring much needed developmental efforts to the children of this region.

The 17000ft DigiLab is a unique solution pioneered by 17000ft to reach the power of Digital Learning to areas with neither electricity nor mobile connectivity. It provides all the necessary solar and digital hardware, along with the learning and support required to ensure that children get the benefit of digital learning opportunities.

The digital content is mapped to the academic syllabus with every student having a unique ID. Thus enabling the student to learn at his/her own pace.

This program focuses on implementing key infrastructure improvement projects at very remote schools across the Indian Himalayan Region.

The Foundation has setup playgrounds, painted and carpeted the schools, setup classroom furniture, built toilets, furnished dormitories and created happy learning spaces for children. This helps the Government schools to come up to the level of private counterparts. As a result, parents who are more interested in sending their children to private schools that are far away, due to better facilities, have started considering enrollment in Govt. schools in the village.

This program connects committed travelers to remote villages where they can volunteer at schools while on vacation. It is a structured 10-day program for Individual voluntourists. It involves training and orientation to conduct reading programs helping children read, conducting art and science workshops, video modules and infrastructure projects.

400+ voluntourists have visited till now and have returned enriched with life lessons and memories for a lifetime.

17000 ft Foundation has been tirelessly working to create a culture of reading in Ladakh, by setting up libraries across hundreds of schools in remote areas. In a region where the only books available to read were either religious texts or travel books, the presence of hundreds of books in each school opened up a world of imagination and discovery for these children.

17000 ft has partnered with Pratham Books and Scholastic Publishers to translate few of their titles each into the local language, Bhoti, to be made available to children across 300 schools of Ladakh.

At 17000 ft, we believe that a school Library is not a collection of books, but a means of helping young students to improve their reading and consequently their academic performance. A Library in a remote region like rural Ladakh becomes all the more important to these 1st generation learners due to lack of availability of any other source of information like TV, Internet or even the mobile. Given the remoteness of the villages of Ladakh, any interventions aimed at improving existing systems must be supplemented and supported by a robust and well planned monitoring and assessment system.

17000 ft sets up libraries with colourful, engaging, age appropriate books, in English and Hindi, as well as the local languages, Urdu and Ladakhi, largely from domestic publishers. Books are chosen keeping in mind the reading abilities of the children, and emphasis is laid on picture books, locally relevant content and also books which provide exposure to the outside world. 17000 ft libraries consist not only of easy reading and fiction books, but also have reference books, subject exposure books, encyclopedias, dictionaries, atlases etc., to aid the child in his academic curriculum.

17000 ft foundation is working in Ladakh for the past decade, facilitating quality education to the children of Ladakh near their homes. Our programs focus on upgrading school infrastructure, implementing digital learning solutions for off-grid and off-network areas, enhancing teacher capacity, engaging the community and further supporting the Govt. to bring in systemic reform in education. (https://www.17000ft.org).

Covid-19 has increased the learning gap to a worrisome level as most of the villages are off-grid and off-network. The National Education Survey has highlighted the learning gaps in Numeracy and Literacy and 17000ft has taken up the task to bridge this learning gap in 150 Govt schools, by providing children with grade-appropriate learning resources and story books, Conducting reading workshop with children to increase their exposure and reading skills, Building capacity of Head Masters and teachers on implementing Blended Learning so that children can learn at their own pace from the Tablets provided in the specialized Digital Learning Labs (DigiLabs) setup in the schools by 17000ft, Sensitizing and mobilizing parents to oversee learning, Supporting the schools and teachers through visits and calls to ensure children are able to achieve at least their grade-level learning