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creating circles of freedom
At school I play, building castles, I imagine, I pretend, I make believe. It’s my world…I choose what I want to do.”
 

Initiated in 2003 by Paragon Charitable Trust (PCT), Muktangan is a pioneering educational programme offering low-cost, high-quality English medium education to the economically disadvantaged sections of society. Muktangan is founded and spearheaded by our Trustee, visionary and educationist Ms. Elizabeth Mehta and based on her 40 years of educational experience in India with its inherent issues and challenges and with full awareness of the needs of child development and best international educational practices.

The Muktangan educational model has transformed the educational scenario of socio-economically challenged communities of Mumbai by creating a cadre of teachers through training women from this community who earlier had no career prospects, and who are now running Preschools and a Municipal English Medium Primary School having 480 children. All this has been accomplished within a short span of 4 years, starting from scratch in 2003 with the first batch of teacher trainees and preschool at first and now having reached up to Standard IV with one higher standard added each year.

Muktangan differs from other schools in its child-centered ideology, its innovative classroom layout and curriculum, its low student-teacher ratio and its integrated teacher training programme with its reflective practices. Coming from the same community of socio-economic background, there is great affinity and bonding between the teachers and the children. Teachers each having between 6 and 12 children sit in small circles, all sitting at the same level with frequent personal interactions. The teachers view themselves as facilitators and respect fully the child’s inherent desire to learn and innate capabilities of self-learning. All lessons are planned daily, reviewed and conducted to provide experiential learning to every child.

Muktangan has proven to be an effective and relevant educational model. It impacts holistically the community and the educational development in Mumbai.

The education and teacher training provided is completely free with some parents contributing of their own free will and according to their means. All resources needed for the teacher training, the school and the children are provided free.

Recognizing the relevance and effectiveness of the educational model, the BMC has this year entrusted to Muktangan 6 more preschools to be run with the Muktangan pedagogy, impacting additionally 480 children. This augurs well for the spread of the Muktangan model to other schools and also possibly for these 6 preprimary schools to expand vertically into primary standards from June ’08 on the lines of the first model school

The Muktangan model is also being adopted by other NGO’s who have had/are having women from the communities served by them, undergo Muktangan teacher training and then starting Muktangan model Preschools in their respective locations.

 
     
  The accomplishments of the organization, since its inception in 2003, speak for themselves.  
     
 
The children are joyous in their learning, motivated and confident in their thinking, questioning and in themselves.
   
Teachers have become empowered in their communities and families and are functioning as change agents.
   
Parents are Muktangan’s strongest advocates, with enthusiastic involvement in the school. Regular parent meetings address issues of what constitutes education, children’s rights, child development, parental responsibilities, health care, social issues and so on.
   
4 out of 6 exam toppers in the annual Ist standard BMC exams of April 2005, conducted in 54 English-medium primary schools, came from Muktangan.
   
In the subsequent years too the children of Muktangan have continued to perform very well with consistent scores of 95% in Maths and 80% in English in the BMC annual primary exams of 2006 and 2007.
   
Number of teachers trained and employed by us and for other organizations between 2003 and 2007 are over 100, with plans to train 70 more this year.
   
Number of schools have increased from 1 to 10.
   
Number of communities served have increased from 1 to 11, with 4 being through 3 other NGOs.
 
We have made a 10-minute Documentary Film on Muktangan. This Film has been put on the Youtube website and can be viewed through the following weblink: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9YOTdpDaEI

Muktangan schools are dream schools realizing the dreams of educationists, teachers, children and their families.

We invite you to enter into a partnership with us (through volunteering, dissemination or donating) to carry our dream forward and thereby help realize the dreams of many families and their children!

We look forward to hearing from you.

Please contact:
Mr. Sunil Mehta
Managing Trustee
PARAGON CHARITABLE TRUST
1 - 11/12 Paragon Condominium
P.B. Marg
Worli, Mumbai, 400 013.
T: +91 22 2493 8752 / 8599
M: +91 98204 17442
F: +91 22 2493 6627
E.mail: partnership@muktanganedu.org