Project PUTHRI

Project PUTHRI is India’s first-ever developmental project that seeks to promote career intentionality among underprivileged girl students. Our Vision is an India where young girls at the bottom of the socioeconomic pyramid are able to rise to their fullest potential and contribute directly to the GDP of the country by breaking out of the domestic labour economy into the knowledge economy.

The dropout rate at government and Government aided school is alarmingly high. Just one per cent of the girls complete their higher secondary school education, which is the national average. The girls either get into an underpaid job or follow their parents into manual labour. They may also get subjected to child marriage.

At project PUTHRI, we follow a holistic approach of providing complete and wholesome education to every PUTHRI scholar. Our various intervention programs in collaboration with partners, help us and enable every PUTHRI to equip herself for a career intentional goal in life.

What we provide through Project PUTHRI is as follows:

• Provide attitudinal training to underprivileged girls studying in government-aided/government-run/corporation/non-aided schools which cater to the disadvantaged sections of the society

• These pieces of training are provided by mentors, role models, and career coaches for over a period of 5 years, beginning from class 8th till class 12th

The end-goal of this project is three-fold: - 1) To make 10,000 corporation school girls across Tamilnadu & Pondicherry every year, career intentional, 2) Facilitate that they get into tertiary education, 3) Make certain they pursue white-collar jobs upon graduation.

Implementation:

Hundred girl students from each school are selected to be part of Project PUTHRI. They are called PUTHRI Scholars. These PUTHRI Scholars are exposed to 40 life skills training to build their personality, they are taught to work into different teams to build their interpersonal skills, they are taught to find solutions for practical situations there-by improving their problem solving and decision-making skills. thus they are handheld, inspired and motivated for the period of their critical phase at school. They are taught to be individualistic so that they grow into a career intentional professional.

• The training (delivered through a combination of classroom sessions, games and corporate exposure) will help them understand their capabilities better, prevent drop-outs, build meaningful relationships and develop the necessary skills to be successful in their career.

• This will, in turn, give them an opportunity to reach tertiary education (Graduation) and get into white-collar jobs.

• This will enable them to rise out of poverty and also help their families and future generations.

• We will continue to provide CAREER INTENTIONALITY training till the age of 18 years and later till they complete their graduation. This mentoring will ensure that the girls choose to marry late, getting married to the right person, give birth at a healthy age to healthy children, therefore bringing down infant mortality rates, domestic violence, and sexual abuse.

• Malnutrition is a growing concern in our society. With education and good exposure, these girls will, at a later stage, be able to provide healthy eating habits and consequently contribute significantly, to healthier children.

• Entry into the knowledge economy and white colour jobs will mean that these girls will directly contribute to the increase in GDP of our country, which is expected to grow by an additional 2.9 trillion USD, by 2025, if we achieve Gender Parity.