“Take a child to school”
This is the key motive behind ILMpossible, an initiative of The British Council partnered with ‘Educate a child’.
In a country where a basic necessity like education is out of reach for more than half of the population, ILMpossible makes it possible for them to be able to fulfill the dreams they have by bridging the gap between them and the right resources to achieve proper education.
Let’s walk you through what ILMpossible really is.
What is ILMpossible?
ILMpossible is an initiative of The British Council partnered with ‘Educate a child’ in association with Children’s Global Network (CGN), School of Leadership Foundation (SoLF), Free and Fair Elections Network (FAFEN) and other various partners that help with the local level implementations.
What they do?
Their initiative focuses on enrolling out-of-school children into primary schools throughout Pakistan, they reach out to the children that are not going to schools due to various reasons and also give them proper attention to them for minimum an year, specifically in districts where enrollment and completion rates are comparatively low than the rest of the country. ILMpossible is working in close coordination with the Ministries of Education on both provincial and district levels which validates their efforts and makes the cause more impactful.
What have they achieved?
ILMpossible made it possible by enrolling almost quarter of a million children (225,000) in primary schools among which 137,000 are girls, with the help of 350 Mohalla Committees and 15,000 Youth ILMbassadors that were trained by the experts. ILMpossible made sure that not only the children but also the schools get to benefit from the cause and so granted 67 schools with funds to further enhance and upgrade their facilities such as, building new walls and rooms, furniture, installation of water pumps and innovative solar powered fans. A component of them called DOSTI which is specially designed for sports and life skills was also implemented in 350 schools with a direct and indirect reach of almost 35,000 children. This shows how rightly ILMpossible filled the void.
ILM Summit 2017
British Council being the key initiator of the programme celebrated the enrollment of 225,000 children in primary schools throughout Pakistan. More than 150 British Council Pakistan volunteers that are also the ILMbassadors for this programme were invited to celebrate and share their inspiring stories. ILMbassadors are people from different walks of life like community mobilisers, teachers and students who have given their time and volunteered as people who make sure to enroll as many children as they can into schools and provide them with basic education for a better future.
The ILM summit was a 2-day summit that took place on 12th May & 13th May 2017, it brought policy-makers, parliamentarians, academia, civil society, project managers, teachers, students and community leaders from 65 districts of Pakistan. There were panel discussions and additional sessions where education ministers from all provinces were seen engaged in discussions with the audience.
Mini-workshops were conducted for Mohalla Committee members, youth volunteers, project teams, university students and teachers which focused on polishing leadership skills, advocacy and enhancing teaching practices to overcome the challenges associated with child enrolment and retention across Pakistan.
In the end there was an award distributing ceremony followed by keynote sessions by Haroon (Famous singer/Creator of The Burka Avenger), Mohammad Yousuf (Former cricketer), Talat Hussain (TV Anchor/Journalist), Abrar-ul-haq (Singer/Chairperson ‘Sahara Foundation’) with a musical performance by Abdullah Qureshi as a cherry on top.
Follow #ILMPossible hashtag on Twitter to know more.