We are in South Asia’s largest and most notorious slum seeing how children’s lives are being transformed by Developments in Literacy.
“Education is the Key to Success”
It’s the ’slum of all slums’ surpassing even the size of Dharavi in Mumbai, the area made famous by the film Slumdog Millionaire.
Orangi is home to more than a million people living in poverty amidst 22 square miles of huts and limited hygiene. Its people are denied government social services because Orangi has no official status. It is notorious as an illegal settlement where rival ethnic gangs clash. Violence can erupt without warning.
But that doesn’t stop Developments in Literacy (DIL) from reaching out to the children of Orangi. Despite the chaos that can force schools to close until disruptions subside, DIL continues to bring education and life chances to children who might otherwise remain illiterate.
Sixteen DIL schools stand out as oases in this urban slum straddling the outskirts of Karachi.
Families in Orangi can be very conservative and not want their daughters to study, says Rahedeen Ali, a DIL Programme Officer who is taking is to visit her schools. Parents here depend on children to contribute to meager family earnings. “Many of DIL’s students work after school in making shawls and embroidering cloth,” Rahedeen explains.
“We have to mobilise the community and teach the parents that importance of education,” she says.
It’s Rahmadeen’s job to mobilise the teachers too by helping them to engage and inspire their students. She conducts teacher training that encourages independent thinking. She wants teachers to encourage children to discover the answers for themselves, she explains as we make our way through the teeming slum to DIL’s Orangi Junior School.
The gates open at the school and there to welcome us is Shahnaz, Principal. She is standing against a wall emblazoned with ‘Education is the key to success.’ She proudly leads us around her school introducing us to teachers who have benefitted from training offered by DIL and funded by The British Asian Trust.
Zeenat teaches classes 2 and 3 (ages 8-10) at Orangi Junior School. DIL training has helped her to understand her responsibilities as a teacher and how to inspire the children, she says from her classroom decorated with her student’s colourful schoolwork. “Knowledge is power,” she says.
At DIL’s Mehran School, about 15 minutes away, the biggest challenge is convincing parents to send their children to school,” says Principal Shagutta Anjum. Once they are there, Shagutta and her nine teachers engage them in learning so successfully that Mehran has become a ‘model school’ that other DIL schools can turn to for guidance. Right in the middle of South Asia’s largest slum.
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