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All our girls come from families whose family income is less than 2,00,000 per annum. They come from families where violence and abandonment is very common. The family can barely make their ends meet and education takes a backseat especially for the girls. Besides this, many of the girls have single parents or are living with guardians because the parents have abandoned them. Their parents are typically daily wage earners or are working in the unorganised sector on a weekly or daily wage. Auto drivers, domestic help, painters on contractual basis, carpenters, mechanics, car drivers, BBMP pourakarmikas and persons from similar livelihoods make up the population of the families who bring their daughters to us for help. The parents have barely made it to a school and the maximum some of them managed to reach was up to the 5th standard. Given their economic conditions, they have very limited access to nutritious food, healthcare, sanitation and education.

Catherine, our scholarship student, lost her physically challenged father last year and her mother was barely able to make ends meet when she met us for her scholarship. She aspires to become a Chartered Accountant. Given that her mother was a caretaker in a school, the family could barely manage to put food on the table let alone providing Catherine and her siblings an education. Today Catherine is pursuing her degree in commerce from a reputed college and is also working as an accounts assistant in a reputed eye hospital. She is studying very hard and she hopes that with our support she will one day be able to live her dream! Along with financial support to our students for their education, we have also supported their families with groceries and ration kits during their difficult times.

Stories of grit and resilience is what you will find among our students. Priya joined our program two years ago. Her father passed away very suddenly and overnight the girls and their mother were left to fend for themselves without a roof over their heads. Through family and friends, they managed to find shelter and the mother started to string flowers and sell them to make a living. Priya joined us when she met us at the school she was studying in. With no hope for a future and no idea how and where their next meal would come from, she approached us and asked if we could help her to pursue her education. We did and today, Priya is the recipient of multiple awards and recognitions in her college and she hopes to one day join Infosys! Her single minded determination to complete her formal education so that she can support her family has driven her to ace her subjects and also stand for student council elections.

Bhavani’s story has courage, grit and determination to overcome all odds in her pursuit of an education. Her mother is a pourakarmika with the BBMP in Bangalore. With an alcoholic father and 5 sisters to feed, Bhavani’s life could have been that of despair and hopelessness. Worse still was that when Bhavani was in her 10th std, her mother pulled her out of school and sent her and her siblings away to their village to get the girls married off. Bhavani was forced to agree to marry a man her family had found for her on the promise that the groom would pay her family some money. But she resisted and fought off her family and ran away from her village. She came back to her home in Bangalore and swore that she would get an education and change her family’s circumstances. Along side her education, she took up a part time job with a large hotel and today is hoping to write the Civil Services exam. HopeWorks helps girls from economically underserved families find part time jobs in the formal sector so that the girls get a first hand exposure to what corporate life is and also be able to supplement their family income while pursuing their graduation.

Most of our students are also first time scholars in their families and in some cases, in their communities. Syeda comes from a very conservative family and her father is a car driver. Given her family background, there was absolutely no opportunity for her to be able to finish school and enroll in college. Her dream to become an accountant drove her to negotiate with her family and apply for the scholarship with us. Today, she is the only girl in the family to have reached up to a college degree and to top this, she has started working with a large multinational on a part time basis. With the support of her father and her own courage to stand for her aspirations, she walks tall among her family and community.

These are stories of courage of the girls who beat all odds to gain an education and all that HopeWorks aims to do is facilitate this dream for the girls through financial assistance, skill training, employment opportunities and mentoring.

“You educate a man; you educate a man. You educate a woman; you educate a generation” - Brigham Young

Today, our girls are able to negotiate for their families better nutrition, better quality of life, thus bringing them on par with any other girl in society. The girls are able to dream of a future that provides them with the security of being able to access career opportunities in the formal sector and also gives them the agency to choose what kinds of industry they can aspire to be in. These eventually lead the girl to be able to make informed choices on her career path, improves the quality of the lives of the families and communities, increases her social mobility and greatly contributes to the economic situation in their homes and to the larger economic growth of the nation when 50% of the population is actively contributing towards this end.

How has HopeWorks benefitted them and what does it mean for them?

HopeWorks Foundation provides them with scholarship support by paying for their tuition fees. Along with financial assistance, we provide them each with a mentor who guides the girl through her career goals and her education goals. We also actively look out for part time job opportunities and internships for our girls to be able to get real time experience of working in the formal sector as well as learn for themselves how to manage their finances and their careers.

Without access to education, these girls will end up being forced to work in the unorganised sector, thereby increasing their vulnerability to exploitation of all kinds. The girls will be denied access to basic healthcare, hygiene, nutrition and sanitation. Worse still is that many of them will be forced to marry early and that in turn will lead to health issues for them as well as their children. Their vulnerability will only increase with the addition burden of fending for themselves and their children. Many men and boys turn to alcoholism and substance abuse in order to cope with their circumstances putting an additional threat to the lives and livelihoods of their wives and children.

Can we teach our girls Hope? That’s the question we set out to answer, right in the middle of a global pandemic just about two years ago. From personal freedom to professional opportunities girls are constantly at the receiving end of gender disparity and prejudices, resulting from centuries of regressive socio-cultural practices. Having over 20 years of experience of working on gender and gender based inequities lead the Founder to dive deeper into the problem and looking for possible solutions to change the equation in favour of girls.

When the Founder, Jacintha Jayachandran,  met with the Principal of her alma mater and asked her how she could give back to the institution, her Principal asked her to teach “Hope” to the girls in the school. This simple suggestion planted the seeds of what we now know as HopeWorks Foundation. HopeWorks Foundation endeavors entirely on being able to empower girls through education and employment opportunities. With Jacintha’s experience of working with young girls and women over her entire career span gave her a close-up view of the vulnerabilities that women and girls face on a day to day basis. Many factors lead to aggravating their vulnerabilities and one of the key elements that HopeWorks aims to address is education. Providing education to a girl in many ways gives her the impetus needed to earn a decent living for herself and her family

 "The girls who approach us for scholarships come from families and social backgrounds where they are economically underserved, socially impoverished and extremely vulnerable. But there is a fire in their spirit to dream of a life that is very different from their existing circumstances. There is a strong determination to create and rewrite their life experiences. This fire is what we want to nurture. Because this burning ambition to look beyond their current circumstances and carve a new life for themselves and their families will push them to score better than their peers in their academics, help them to pursue their careers and become financially independent. If we don’t support these girls, many of them will go back to their current situation of being exploited by their families into working in unsafe and unorganised occupations. Many will be forced into marriages which may again be unsafe for them, both physically and emotionally. They may end up getting pregnant very early leading to a whole host of health as well as psychological issues. Depriving the girl of an education also deprives the community of any chance of betterment and access. Denying education to girls also impacts the next generation of children who will go through similar experiences as their parents and further draw them away from better economic and social growth."

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. ” – Nelson Mandela

And this is the weapon we are hoping to place in each girl's hands. A million girls to be precise!

HopeWorks Foundation is a social impact organisation working on empowering girls through education and employment in the formal sector. We do this through scholarships, mentorships, soft skills training and life skills training. 

At HopeWorks we believe that just financial support will not help a girl gain the skills and talents she will need to conquer the world. And that's why we equip her with all the toolsets and skill sets that she will need to help build her mindset towards formal education and gainful employment.

This year we have set out to bring 250 girls from underserved communities under our wing and we are looking for support from you to help us bring about a life change in these 250 girls' lives.

So far we have provided scholarships to 64 girls and this year we intend to grow that number to 250 girls. We are expanding our reach to Madurai, Palakkad and Dindigal too. And in 5 years intend to take a Million girls to college!

We need a total of about 87,50,000/- for this year, where all of this amount will be utilised towards the students tuition fees alone.

At the moment we are supported entirely by a large pool of individuals who share our vision and volunteer with us. They have been providing us with monetary support, their time and their skills in our programs. They have helped us draft the curriculum, train the students and also sign up as mentors for this program. With your contributions, we will be able to take our girls forward towards their goals.

For every contribution you make, please write back to us with the details of the transactions to donations@hopeskipjump.org