The document discusses the challenges faced in educating migrant children living in urban slums in India, using Surat as a case study. It notes that migrant populations are often illiterate and their children frequently do not have access to consistent age-appropriate education due to seasonal migration. Barriers to education for migrant children include lack of accessible schools, inability to keep pace due to joining mid-year, and affordability issues. The COVID-19 pandemic has further disrupted learning. Potential solutions proposed include customized curriculum, informal learning centers, and increased accessibility to reading materials and activities.

1. Community
challenges

2. Background
• As per census 2011, there are 13.7 million slum household across 63% of
Indian town
• Mostly these are migrant, and they are among poorest of the poor
community
• More than 8 million children under 6 years live in approx. 49000 slums
• There are 22.72 million children (age group 5-18 years) living in urban
slums who are out of school
• Migrants' population in India is mostly illiterate and always be on move
in search of new livelihood opportunity
• Migrant children move with their parents and often loose out of age-
appropriate education opportunities

3. • Right to education act 2009 expect to increase enrollment in urban and
rural school
• However still there are million of children who are out schools mostly
they live in urban slums and remote rural area
• Girls in urban slums works as a domestic workers and take care of their
younger siblings
• Boys drop out from schools to supplement their household income

4. City of
Migrants Surat
• Surat is one of the prime destination of lacs
of Migrants from across the state of India
like Orrisa, UP, Jharkhand, Rajasthan,
Telangana west Bengal etc.
• Majority of this type of migrants of
semiskilled and unskilled illiterate people
• Mostly these workers employed in textile
industry, construction, Dimond etc.

5. Cont…..
• Generally, the migration happen with family as unit who don’t want to
leave their family behind in villages due to their individual challenges
• In Surat 70% workforce are comprises of migrants
• Such migrants resides in slums area with their family

7. Challenges in
education of
Migrants 'kid
• Due the nature of seasonal of migration the well
being of kids highly affected as per GMR 80% of
children of seasonal workers were not able to
access education at all
• Limitation of education opportunities at work site
• At destination educational facilities are usually
not accessible to such children due availability
• As children arrive at middle of academic year so
hard for them to make pace with other students
(in case get access to education)

8. Cont…
• Lack of availability of bridge course or other training to overcome the losses
of education
• Affordability is one of the challenge for poor, migrant community is unable
to provide good education to their children.
• According of one of the stakeholder, he stopped his son’s school because the
quality of online classes were not good, but the fee was same.

9. https://asha-india.org

10. Post covid
challenges
• Covid pandemic over 2 years has disrupted the
learning the learning process of students.
• Though the government has introduced the virtual
medium still ignore the multiple challenges faced
by these community like access to internet,
availability of appropriate gadgets, know how,
which already deep rooted with such migrant
community.
• There is also a digital divide in urban and rural
India as per the NSSO 2017 -18 23.8% household
in urban area had internet access whereas only
14.9% has internet connectivity in rural India

11. Impact (Based
on discussion)
• Thus, the children don’t get the skill and
learning at the right time which result into poor
development of personality and intellectuality
due to this they remain trapped in poverty
cycle
• Other than, they are not able to develop social
and emotional abilities
• Unable to understand their rights and
entitlement
• Children got involved in some income
activities.

12. Cont…..
• One of the stakeholder stated “He made his daughter marry during lockdown because the
expenses were supposed to be less due to government guideline.
• Most of the children are getting addicted towards mobile in the name of online education.
• The work that is being given by the teacher during the class is not even completed.
• The monitoring system of school is not operating.
• According to parents- Techers never reviewed the students (Educational growth).
• Children don’t want to give off-line exam (loosing confidence) because they are getting
great marks without early preparation.

13. https://asha-india.org

15. Way forward
• As solution to the ongoing challenges there must be availability of
customized and out of the box curriculum for the migrants' kids.
• Such customization should consider the cognitive ability of students and
heterogeneity of students (as there is possibilities of group of kids who
belong to different age group, learning ability, social and cultural variation
• Instead of formal school education these children should be provided with
informal set of education where they can engage themselves in various
activities and learn from those

16. Solutions (According to Community)
• 13 community member said “Schools should completely restrict the online
classes.
• Teachers should arrange extra classes for the courses they have already
completed.
• The earlier exams must be cancelled and again the exams should be
conducted.
• Teachers should review the growth of every students and based on that students
should be focused.

17. Accessibility reading centers
• As there is hardly availability of such place where migrants' kids come
together to learn, therefor providing them such platform help them to gain
some reading opportunity
• A library with mix of books and cartoon based mythological inspirational
story can increase their learning ability
• Availability of various learning material
• Use of audio visual will help them learn quickly

18. Approach
• To initiate the reading centers, youth who is qualified enough can be promoted as entrepreneur who
will charge a minimum fee that will be much lower than the average fee charges by private centers
• Initial training will be provided to the youth to carry out engagement process with the slum
community
• Conduct Mobilization and awareness drive for the community to orient them about the approaches
and its impact on the children’s future
• Time schedule should be adjusted with the availability of kids as they mostly support their family at
work and household chores

19. • https://theprint.in/opinion/media-overplayed-surat-migrant-protests-didnt-see-
the-city-taking-care-of-the-outsiders/405656/
• https://www.thebetterindia.com/164518/surat-migrants-schools-education-
policy-news/
• https://www.indiatoday.in/education-today/featurephilia/story/how-seasonal-
migration-of-indians-is-destroying-educational-opportunities-for-children-
1406369-2018-12-11
• https://sprf.in/seasonal-migration-and-childrens-education-in-india/
• https://www.smilefoundationindia.org/blog/improving-education-of-slum-
children/
• https://egyankosh.ac.in/bitstream/123456789/39175/1/Unit-2.pdf
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9mDw2-l3dU
• Everyday Life of Slum Children: A Case Study from Education Perspective - Aditi
Deshpande
• https://asha-india.org/how-we-
help/education/#:~:text=Poverty%20of%20Education,-
Although%20Indian%20law&text=Slum%20children%20have%20little%20chance,
enrol%20in%20state%20primary%20schools.