Nyasa, an informal school run by students and community volunteers of the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar (IITGN), successfully concluded a 10-day summer camp for about 90 children from neighbouring villages and construction workers’ colonies of IITGN.
The Summer Camp, which was held from May 30 to June 08, 2022, was aimed at helping these kids explore their hobbies and hidden talents.
The camp featured a plethora of exciting activities and learning modules to inspire and motivate kids while having fun. The activities included sessions on arts and crafts, origami, dream catcher making, preliminary English, basics of computer skills, introduction to archaeology, science experiments, pottery, music and dance, yoga, fun games, and sports.
About 40 mentors, including students, faculty, and community members of IITGN, conducted various sessions with the help of about 50 student volunteers from the Institute. Team Nyasa concluded the summer camp today by putting together a gallery/exhibition of memories from the camp in the form of photographs and children’s artwork.
Sharing the idea behind organising this activity, Anukesh K A, a PhD scholar at IITGN and one of the student volunteers from Nyasa Team, said, “The idea of the Nyasa summer camp is to introduce these kids to different new avenues of opportunities mixed with fun and learning sessions using IIT Gandhinagar’s facilities. The camp aims to impart the seeds of motivation among kids to equip them with various skills.”
Sharing her experience, Kinjal, a seven-year girl from IITGN construction workers’ colonies, said, “I enjoyed these ten days a lot. We studied English and computer skills as well as played a lot of games, learnt to make different things like paper rabbit, whistle, and so on. I enjoyed the dance sessions the most.”
Expressing his joy and excitement from participating in the camp, Yashpal Vaghela, a 10-year boy from Basan village near IITGN, said, “I had a lot of fun at IITGN summer camp. I learnt to make a water sprinkler, whistle, did digging and made vessels from olden times, painted earthen pots, made paper flowers, met a faculty and talked about the environment. I also enjoyed the library visit and read books on plants. Today I went with my father to a plant nursery and brought many flower and tree saplings to plant at my home.”
Nyasa, an informal school started by faculty and student volunteers of IITGN in 2011, primarily aims to support and provide educational opportunities to the children of migrant construction workers in and around the campus.
Nyasa volunteers, i.e. students and community members of IITGN, teach these children basic alphabets, script, rhymes, songs and arithmetic. They also engage them with music, origami sessions, computer sessions, regular sports sessions, cultural and fun events, periodic health camps, etc.
There are also two full-time teachers for these children. Construction workers’ children are also aided with enrolment in regular government schools. The IITGN community offers financial help to students interested in pursuing formal education.
The Institute community’s collective strength in ‘education’ is used as a platform to bring the children from dusty environs to an informal school, provide them mid-day meals, fruits for good health, and basic education on our campus. Various things like clothes, uniforms, books, stationery, bags, footwear, etc., are distributed from time to time.
The focus is on the overall development of the children to make them confident human beings so that they can live up to their potential.