Pratham Education Foundation and Community Jameel come together to launch the Pratham-Jameel Second Chance programme in India to help 10,000 girls and women each year finish formal education  

• 10,000 girls and women will be supported each year under the Pratham-Jameel Second Chance programme, helping them get back into school, finish formal education and realise their dreams.
• With their grade 10 certificates, girls and women are better able to access new opportunities in higher education, skills training and jobs.
• The programme is a collaboration between Pratham Education Foundation and Community Jameel and builds on the longstanding partnership between Pratham and the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL).

Pratham Education Foundation a leading non-profit in India, has partnered with Community Jameel, an independent, global organisation advancing science and learning, to launch the Pratham-Jameel Second Chance programme, which aims annually to support 10,000 girls and women in India who have dropped out of school to restart their formal education, complete the grade 10 year and obtain the secondary school certifications that are critical to opening opportunities for higher education, skills training and jobs.

In spite of successful efforts to ensure universal elementary education in India, as children grow older, girls in particular are less likely to remain enrolled in schools, with almost one third of girls dropping out before or during grade 10. After dropping out, girls often face steep challenges in reconnecting with the education system and completing their schooling. Without a grade 10 certificate, which is necessary for pursuing higher education as well as an array of employment opportunities, many girls are therefore left without the ability to realise their potential. Through a range of support mechanisms, the Pratham Second Chance programme, which was launched in 2011, currently supports 4,000 girls annually in reconnecting with the education system and helping them to complete their secondary schooling.

The new Pratham-Jameel Second Chance programme will enable the expansion of the Second Chance Programme, providing support to more than 10,000 girls and women across 12 states in completing education at the grade 10 level annually. Additionally, under the programme, a cohort of 5,000 girls and women, known as the Pratham-Jameel Second Chance Fellows, will receive additional support upon completing grade 10 to pursue higher educational opportunities and vocational training.

Dr Rukmini Banerji, chief executive officer at Pratham, said: “The new partnership with Community Jameel will expand and strengthen Pratham’s decade-long effort to help dropout girls and women complete secondary school. Through the Pratham-Jameel Second Chance programme, we are aiming not only to double our current reach but also introduce opportunities for them once they finish their tenth grade examination. This partnership has happened at an opportune time, where as part of our strategy for 2022-2027 we were eagerly looking for opportunities to take our Girls and Women Programmes forward.”        

George Richards, director of Community Jameel, said: “Women and girls in India are disproportionately affected by obstacles that hinder their ability to finish school and fulfil their potential in education, training and the workplace. We are proud to be partnering with Pratham in launching the Pratham-Jameel Second Chance programme to support thousands of women and girls across India get back into school and finish their formal education.”

Pratham is a longstanding partner of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), the research centre at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that Community Jameel has supported and partnered with since 2005. Among many areas of collaboration, J-PAL has conducted rigorous evaluations of Pratham’s ‘teaching at the right level’ (TaRL) approach to remedial classes at schools in India, demonstrating its effectiveness in helping fallen-behind pupils catch up with their peers. Taking the evidence of its effectiveness, Pratham and J-PAL have scaled up TaRL - which can teach a child to read in just 50 days, reaching millions of children across India and now in 12 countries in Africa. Pratham has independently taken this forward by taking TaRL to more than 5 other countries beyond sub-Saharan Africa.  

Launched in 2011, the Pratham Second Chance programme is a year-long intervention that supports young girls and women in reconnecting with education and completing their secondary schooling. The programme offers flexible learning opportunities and equips participants with the necessary knowledge and skills to obtain their grade 10 certification, thereby allowing them to pursue higher education and employment opportunities.