Going to School is a creative non-profit education trust based in New Delhi that makes beautiful stories for the poorest children to inspire them to use their education to transform their lives and create their own opportunities.
In India, by 2020, there will be over 190 million unemployed people below the age of 30. Today, 50% of children are dropping out of school (which means the next generation work force will be largely unskilled). And we're facing pressing resource problems of water, waste, energy, shelter, food—problems that are exacerbated by our ever-growing population. So what do we do, when we don't have the solutions we need for the time we find ourselves in? We go in search.
Be! is a new model, a new way to solve poverty on a massive scale.
Be! uses mass media to create value for entrepreneurs and make education relevant to employment so children not only stay in school, but also choose to pioneer businesses that solve problems once they leave school. At the same time, we provide young people, ages 18-29 who live in poverty, with a new source of finance (risk capital) to start businesses they propose, businesses that solve problems where they live. Be! consists of three interlinked components:
- Be! Books teach entrepreneurial and employability skills to children in government schools. Fifty engaging storybooks and graphic novels teach 50 skills—from identifying a problem, to making a plan and a budget to building a team to taking a risk. Children read one book once a week and conduct a skills activity that we monitor to chart their progress.
- Be! Movies tell stories of hero entrepreneurs and, when aired on national television, create massive public awareness and a supportive environment for young people who live in poverty to choose to become entrepreneurs and solve problems where they live. Be! Movies inspire young people to take a risk to become entrepreneurs, to recognize their entrepreneurial skills and elect to start businesses that 'do good.'
- Each movie drives young people who live in poverty to a new source of 'risk' finance: Be! Fund.
- Be! Fund provides new access to risk-capital and business skill support to young people with for-profit ideas to solve a local social problem. Young people define and propose business ideas that solve a problem where they live. When they make it through the selection process, young people get direct investment into their businesses, and the movie series starts again, this time with the real heroes.
