Pratham featured in Forbes

We were delighted that our work throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic has been highlighted by Forbes as an organisation that has shown it is possible to counter the shock, and to turn crisis into opportunity. They describe how we have been “working nimbly and with tenacity to address the unprecedented challenges of this moment”

They quote our CEO  Dr. Rukmini Banerji who explained in a World Bank panel discussion, how many of our colleagues on the ground  made about a hundred calls a day. They first contacted an “anchor” in each village and from there reached out to one person in each hamlet, then all the houses in a hamlet, asking people to deliver messages or share phones until, finally, they reached “the last child.”

“Once contact with each individual learner was established, team members sent content and activities through WhatsApp and asked children to reply. “WhatsApp is very effective,” said Dr. Banerji, with the caveat that not all kids have access to smart phones, but do have access to basic phones. “So we had to quickly turn everything into 167 characters of SMS in 20 different languages…sending little ideas and hoping for getting some feedback.” As the lockdown wore on, the number of responses, assignments, and videos submitted increased.”

You can read the full article here