School on Wheels
Overview
The School-on-Wheels is a bus which is furnished and equipped to be used as a class room. The School-on-Wheels project is the flagship of Doorstep's attempts to take education to out of school children who dwell on the very fringes of society. This project was initiated with the following major objectives in mind:
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Provide a means to impart basic literacy skills to the less settled groups of children viz. those who live on pavements, station platforms or street corners and are often seen begging. These groups are very mobile and usually there is no facility to run classes in the areas where they dwell. A bus provides the most suitable alternative for such a classroom.
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Provide a location when on some of the construction sites a proper place for classes is not available or is not ready yet. At times we don't get the permission to run our programs on these sites.
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Provide a School Bus Service for primary school children. Some parents are motivated enough to enroll their children in school but are unable to drop the young ones to school regularly resulting in high school drop-off rates.
Activities
- Basic literacy classes
- Educational sessions on social skills
- Recreational and educational field visits
- School Transport
On construction sites where we run 8 hour classes, the bus can accommodate about 20–25 children at any one time. These classes attempt to impart the three Rs (reading, writing and arithmetic skills) in a non-formal setting.
Sessions are held on the bus to instill social skills like basic hygiene, health and safety. Such meetings often turn into problem solving sessions that address some of the unique problems faced by the kids.
The bus is also utilized to take the kids on field visits to museums, the zoo, banks, hospitals and even police stations. (The last in an attempt to dispel fears children have about policemen and for them to learn their rights and duties).
The bus is also used as a pick up and drop off facility.
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