At HZL we see the importance of education and the impact it can create on society
at large. We believe every child should have the opportunity to receive quality education and with this in mind, we have been implementing several educational initiatives that focus on government run institutions accessed by children from rural areas.
Several of our educational projects use advanced teaching methodologies and technology to take learning to the next level. Along with improving infrastructure, our efforts to impart good education rest on building capacities of teachers, so
that they are able to open a world of opportunities for their students.
Khushi Anganwadi Project
We believe that a healthy child is a happy child and a happy child in a favourable learning environment is more receptive and curious to learn. The Khushi Anganwadi Project thus focuses on good health and quality pre-school learning opportunities for the 3 to 6 year old children coming to an Anganwadi run under the Government of India's Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) scheme.
An EduTECH effort in this project is a Smart Digital System to track the performance of each Anganwadi Centre. Further, grading and assessment tools have been developed to monitor the performance of the centres and of the children as well.
Reporting Period Highlights
64,000
children (3-6 years) |
Comprehensive health check-ups
20,000+ children |
| Attendance at the centres 43% in 2016 to 59% in 2017 |
| Pre-school education & nutrition training 4,500 ICDS workers & NGO staff |
| 25,000 community meetings held |
Community contributions mobilised
INR 54.32 Lakh |
1,107
kitchen gardens developed at
Anganwadis and households to
supplement fresh vegetables in meals
cooked for the children at the centres |
Nandghar
'Nandghars' are new-age Anganwadis equipped with state-of-the-art infrastructure to enable access to e-learning, clean water, sanitation and solar power. We have integrated two of our flagship projects, Khushi and Sakhi, within the Nandghar and the outcome is a re-imagined Anganwadi which is a springboard into the future for both children and women.
This is one of Vedanta's flagship projects with a goal to construct 4,000 Nandghars across India. A detailed step-by-step user friendly manual on how to convert existing Anganwadis into Nandghars is also put in place.
Shiksha Sambal
The Shiksha Sambal project aims to help rural children from 59 government schools near our operational locations. We have found that for students in these schools, Science, English and Mathematics are often the most challenging subjects. The fact that many of these schools do not have sufficient teachers for these subjects is a big challenge; failing in these subjects increases the likelihood of a student dropping out of school.
Interventions like deployment of subject teachers trained in innovative teaching methodologies, and activities like baseline tests, learning camps, remedial classes, practical learning using science lab kits, science fairs etc., have transformed the learning experience of students under Shiksha Sambal.
Overall results of class 10th of Siksha Sambal Schools
Inspired Inventor
Rohit Sikhwal is a prime example of how quality education can ignite a young mind. Having come across the disastrous effects of oil spills on marine life while watching television, Rohit was determined to make a difference.
His keen interest in the subject matter and participation at Shiksha Sambal's May 2017 summer camp, allowed him to devise a concept and design a machine that can clean up oil spills in water bodies. Rohit has presented his ideas along with a model of his proposed machine at the State Institute of Education Research and Training, Udaipur and at a state level science fair. Along with support from the Shiksha Sambal team and positive feedback from his presentations, our young champ is refining the design of his machine and also working towards patenting it.
Unchi UdaanUsing the platform of Shiksha Sambal, our programme Unchi Udaan identifies bright students in government schools to coach and groom them for entry into IITs and other prestigious engineering institutes.
Selected from a base of almost 2,000 students, Unchi Udaan currently has 56 students, including 26 girls, who are receiving residential schooling along with intensive coaching support.
Company Run Schools
HZL runs 5 CBSE schools, some directly and others in partnership with DAV catering to both our employees' wards as well as the local population. Situated in remote areas, these schools offer access to quality education, to local children and children of HZL employees.
During the reporting period, the schools served 2,092 outside students.
Support for Higher Education
Yet another way in which the Company encourages higher technical education among Rajasthan's youth is through the provision of merit-cum-means scholarships to engineering students. In addition to the ongoing 50 students from last year, 37 new scholarships were awarded this year. All 87 children are studying engineering at government engineering colleges of Rajasthan, and belong to economically weak families.
HZL awards the toppers from each of the 8 engineering departments at the College of Technology and Engineering, Udaipur. The toppers receive a scholarship of INR 50,000 each, and the award was given this year as well.
We strongly believe that educating a woman changes a whole family and society. To that end, we support girls from our operational area to go for higher education at the Vedanta Post Graduate Girls College, Ringus. HZL takes full care of the tuition fees and living expenses for the selected girls. During the reporting period, 59 girls were sent to Ringus for college education.
Jeevan Tarang… Zinc Ke Sang
In January 2017, we launched a flagship project, Jeevan Tarang, to mainstream people with disabilities. At the end of this reporting period, more than 600 differently abled children are benefiting from this project, getting opportunities to learn new skills that help them lead a more dignified life. Technology has become a new leveler and we are introducing this in our work with the blind children.
Another challenge with Special Education is a dearth of qualified teachers, and in rural settings, this is even more so. To address this problem, one of our first efforts has been to introduce Indian Sign Language Training for teachers and hearing-impaired students.
Bringing the power of the Internet
to the visually challenged
On World Disability Day, we distributed Android smartphones to visually impaired students in two schools, with special features tailored to assist them in their learning. The special accessibility features on the devices help students to read and write. The devices also help children access 'Bookshare', the world's largest e-library for the visually disabled, which also includes text books from the Rajasthan Board of Education. It's not just all work and no play for the students! These Android devices also come with Internet features and special games that they can enjoy just like anyone else.
Everyone enjoys watching movies and that includes blind people. Often blind persons have to rely only on the spoken dialogues to make sense of the movie. Pauses and musical effects are lost as no word is spoken.
A new concept - audio description – where a narrator describes the silent segments of the movie, makes the entire movie accessible to the blind.
Hindustan Zinc under its Jeevan Tarang project organised a special format screening of Aamir Khan's blockbuster movie 'Dangal' for the visually impaired in Udaipur.
The movie was edited, with a narrator describing segments without dialogues. The screening was attended by 110 visually impaired children and adults accompanied by our employees and their families to experience the movie together. Many more such movies will be screened for a larger group of blind people.
Sachin Porwal, a visually impaired student of Pragya Chakshu school said,
“the audio description format was amazing. The support was superb, the experience was really great. Thank you Hindustan Zinc.”
Raju, a visually impaired student
of Udaipur said, “maine pehli baar movie suni hai, audio description
ki help se puri movie samajh mein aayi. Dangal dekhne se bahut prerna mili.” (First time I heard a movie too. The audio description helped me understand the entire movie. The movie has really inspired me).
We would like to tell Raju that because of the response received on this initiative, we are inspired too! And we will continue, in this and different ways.
