Madhi Foundation

We work to eliminate the foundational learning crisis in India by partnering with governments and parent communities.

  • Bronze Certified 2023
  • 80G
  • 12A
  • CSR-1
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Bronze Certified Bronze Certified

About

  • Headquarters

    Chennai, Tamil Nadu

  • Since

    2016

Madhi Foundation is a non-profit organisation based in Chennai, working in the education sector to reimagine public school systems and address educati Read moreonal inequity in India. Established in 2016, Madhi has grown from a reach of 3 schools in 2016 to a reach of 37,000 schools across the state of Tamil Nadu by 2021. Madhi’s approach to education reform stands out from other siloed, piecemeal solutions that address only one of the many components of education like teacher training or curriculum revision. It is holistic, comprehensive and unfailingly places the last mile child at the centre of all programme design decisions. Over the past 5 years, Madhi’s work has largely focused on improving Foundational Learning in the state which has translated to Madhi being appointed as the Chief Management Partner for Tamil Nadu’s official Foundational Learning Mission - a Rs. 500 Cr Mission of national and regional importance. Over the next 5 years, Madhi plans to leverage its learnings from having worked closely with the education system in Tamil Nadu to diversify into other critical domains within education and lay the ground for taking some of our programmes to a nationwide scale while remaining true to our core belief that all our decisions must be rooted in lifting the last mile child out of learning poverty.


Issue

Attainment of foundational literacy and numeracy is the ability of a Std 3 child to read and comprehend fluently and to carry out critical arithmetic operations. According to ASER 2022, 80% of students in Std 3 cannot read a Std 2 level text while 82% cannot solve questions on subtraction in India. A child that falls behind by Std. 3, stays behind. Children from lower income demographics, who predominantly attend government schools, perform significantly poorer on grade-level attainment of critical learning outcomes. The reasons for this are multi-pronged, including lack of parental awareness/support, lack of teacher capacity to transact in a multi-grade, multi-level context, poor academic support to help teachers, and lack of administrative efficiency to target interventions to improve learning outcomes. Parent participation has a great influence on a child, and is widely recognised as an important determinant in a child’s educational achievement. Parents want good quality education but are unaware how to define the quality or how to measure it. So far, metrics of measurement of quality education have been expensive uniforms, well constructed schools, freshly painted walls, and computer labs.


Action

Madhi recognises that the foundational learning crisis is a complex problem and strives to adopt a systemic approach for effecting transformational change. Our solutions are rooted in the context and tackle the power centers using both a top-down and bottom-up approach. We believe that for real transformation to take place both Supply (of) and Demand (for) quality education need to converge. On the supply side, Madhi aims to improve student learning outcomes by working with the government mechanisms across multiple departments within the state to collaboratively create holistic solutions. Madhi addresses all aspects of education impacting the quality of foundational learning that a child receives. We create personalised training programs using a blended learning model, improve and contextualise teaching learning materials and build sophisticated monitoring systems to track real time data. On the demand side, Madhi aims to galvanise parents and caregivers with its 3A approach: build AWARENESS among parents around the criticality of foundational learning, strengthen parents' and caregivers' AGENCY by equipping them with knowledge, skills, and mindsets, and set them up as ADVOCATES for their children’s right to quality education. This happens through education fairs, workshops, home visits by community workers, etc., The project envisions empowering parents and teachers to become allies in the quest for quality education.

Demographies Served

Impact

On the supply side, the learning outcomes in intervention cohorts on an average are 4X in literacy and 2X in numeracy of the control cohort across Std 1, 2 and 3. Then, through our pilot in 2,500 schools, we have measured 12.5% improvement in literacy skills in 3 months. Additionally, we trained the Government officials on effective data collection practices which led to 13.5% improvement in accuracy of data collection in 3 months. Based on the success of these interventions, we have scaled to 36,700 schools working with 80,000 teachers and impacting over 1.3 million children. The intervention launched in June 2022, has shown tremendous improvement in implementation fidelity as training effectiveness has improved by 36% and classroom practice adherence (usage of curricular materials, conducting assessments, etc.,) has improved by 18% in the last 9 months. On the demand side, we aim to impact 50,000 parents and children across 600 habitations in Tamil Nadu by 2024 through our Communities Enabling Foundational Learning (CEFL) project. We are currently running a pilot for CEFL with 250 parents across 8 hamlets in Tamil Nadu, India.

Programs

Leadership Team

  • Merlia Shaukath

    Founder and CEO

  • Srivathsan Ramaswamy

    Co-founder

  • Vijayalakshmi Mohan

    Co-founder

Demographics & Structure

  • No. of Employees

    100+

M&E

  • Internal, External Assessors

    No

Policies

  • Ethics and Transparency Policies

    No

  • Formal CEO Oversight & Compensation Policy

    No

Political & Religious Declarations

  • On Affiliation if any

    No

  • On Deployment Bias if any

    No

Registration Details

  • PAN Card

    AAETM4607R

  • Registration ID

    44/2016/BK IV

  • VO ID / Darpan ID

    TN/2018/0195113

  • 12A

    AAETM4607R/05/16-17/T-1307

  • 80G

    AAETM4607R/05/16-17/T-1307/80G

  • FCRA

    Not Available

  • CSR Registration Number

    CSR00000363

Location

  • Headquarters

    14/A, 1st Street, Thiruvalluvar Nagar, Varadapuram, Kotturpuram, Chennai, 600085

    Directions
  • Offices in Cities

Other Details

  • Type & Sub Type

    Non-profit
    Trust

Financial Details

 Income / Expenses
  • 2020-21

    Income
    Rs.7,601,080
    Expenses
    Rs.12,800,998
    Admin Expenses
    Rs.2,477,334
    Program Expenses
    Rs.10,323,664
    Tip: Click on any value above to exclude it.
  • 2021-22

    Income
    Rs.22,440,295
    Expenses
    Rs.19,918,887
    Admin Expenses
    Rs.3,896,932
    Program Expenses
    Rs.16,021,955
    Tip: Click on any value above to exclude it.
  • 2022-23

    Income
    Rs.120,000,000
    Expenses
    Rs.92,000,000
    Admin Expenses
    Rs.2,000,000
    Program Expenses
    Rs.90,000,000
    Tip: Click on any value above to exclude it.