Dakshana Entrance Test

Basic question to be solved:

To provide bright students of government schools from weak financial background a
platform to succeed in competitive exams such as IIT-JEE, NEET, AIEEE etc.

Perspective
There are many bright students in the district who cannot perform well in competitive exams
due to lack of proper guidance, counselling and coaching. To help bright and impoverished
students predominantly from rural India to prepare for IIT and medical entrance exams,
Dakshana Foundation, an Irvine, California and Pune based organisation, conducts a
selection test and provides free residential coaching to eligible students.
The students go through rigorous coaching from some of the best teachers, hence providing
them an opportunity to raise their level similar to a student from a well off background and
appear in the exam of their choice.

Stakeholders
Education Department – Kanker, Dakshana Foundation, District Collector

Criteria for Success

Maximum number of participation of 12th class students from government schools all across
the district. The criteria was kept such because this was the first time the test was conducted
in the Bastar Region, and will lay the ground work for upcoming years.
Additionally, the evaluation of students will help us in identifying the problem areas that
students may have, and special focus can be provided to those.
More than 271 students appeared for the test out of 318 enrollments, on a very short notice.
This also shows the interest of students and the education department in the initiative.

Constraints within the initiative

The level of the test may be slightly high for students, and hence they have to be identified in
advance and provided special attention, so that they may perform well in the test.

Key Sources of Insight

This initiative was informed to the fellows by the state team and fellows followed through
with the Dakshana Foundation officials.
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 XPLORE-Idea Presentation Competition

Create awareness among students regarding burning social issues and their solutions:
To create realisation among students of class 9th and above regarding pressing social issues
and urge them to think towards solution while appreciating the efforts taken by the
Government to counter them.
To create confidence in students to be able to present and defend their ideas in front of
subject matter experts.

Perspective:
Kanker district has about 80% tribal population and most of the tribal children are enrolled
in Government schools. Although the theoretical part is well taken care of in Government
schools there is a need for extracurricular activities to provide the students a better chance
to be successful in the outside world.
The promotion of critical thinking among students is a core purpose of education. Keeping
the above in mind it was decided to single out the most pertinent issues affecting the district
namely Education, Sanitation & Hygiene, Drinking Water and Conservation and Malnutrition.
A small paragraph describing the problem statement in brief was issued on each of the topics
to all the schools in Chhattisgarh with instructions to visit on ground conditions on each topic
and then submit a written report.
110 teams from 10 districts of Chhattisgarh participated in the competition and 20 teams
from 6 different district were shortlisted based on the screening cores.

Stakeholders
A tremendous support from the District Collector and the Education department along with
meticulous planning from the fellows.

Criteria for Success

Encourage children to understand and report ground reality with respect to the topics in
their village and push them to articulate their ideas in a confident manner.

Key Sources of Insight

The initiative was designed after observing on ground that the students have theoretical
skills but when it comes to critical thinking they were not taught to think this way. Also they
lacked confidence to convey their ideas confidently.

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