1.
FOR RELEASE ON 1 DECEMBER 2011
Education scholarships transform young lives
New Delhi, 1 December 2011
Governments, donors, parents, teachers and schools must invest more in the education of
children in India, say the Kusuma Trust UK (the Trust) and the London School of Economics
(LSE).
The Trust and LSE jointly hosted a seminar on 1 December 2001 at the India Habitat Centre in
New Delhi to discuss key developments and challenges in secondary education in India, with a
focus on the role and impact of scholarships on education outcomes.
At the seminar the findings of an evaluation of the impact of Kusuma scholarships over the last
three years and the experiences of three other major scholarship funders in India were
discussed.
“Education has the power to transform lives and every child should have the opportunity to
grow and develop as an active and productive citizen. Children have one chance of a decent
education. Scholarships facilitate and increase access to education and employment
opportunities for young people from the most economically disadvantaged backgrounds,
enabling them to realise their potential and break the inter-generational cycle of poverty” said
Dr Balwant Singh, CEO of Kusuma Trust UK.
The findings of the evaluation show that scholarship recipients perform better in examinations,
have a better understanding about job prospects and are more likely to progress to higher
education.
Dr Sandra Sequeira from the London School of Economics who led the research stated that
“scholarship recipients exert more effort on learning, have a more accurate perceived return of
their higher education in terms of expected salaries being higher than non-recipients of
scholarships, and are better networked with their peers and other scholarship recipients”. She
also added that those who belong to social networks of scholarship recipients perform better
than others who are not part of their networks.
Since 2008, the Trust has funded 1910 scholarships through local partners in Andhra Pradesh,
Orissa and Uttarakhand.
For further information, please contact:
UK – Julian Beckedahl at T: +44 (0)20 7569 1920 or Email: julian.beckedahl@kusumatrust.org
India - Udita Das at T: +91-(0)11 4107 7026 or Email: udita.das@kusumafoundation.co.in
Kusuma Trust UK is a UK-based philanthropic trust founded by Anurag Dikshit and Dr Soma Pujari,
and it supports interventions, innovations, research, training and advocacy to improve education and
employment outcomes for young people in secondary and tertiary education. For more information,
visit www.kusumatrust.org