NGO for Life Skills Education


This saying is never too old. It highlights the importance of Acquiring Skills, and the increasing importance that it has gained in the contemporary world.  Skill means an ‘ability to do something’.  While there are a wide range of skills that exist, which are the ones that are basic and must be possessed by every individual, equipping one not just to survive, but also lead a productive life? Let’s find out!

In 2015, the World Economic Forum (WEF) published a report titled New Vision for Education: Unlocking the Potential of Technology that focused on the pressing issue of the 21st-century skills gap and ways to address it through technology (source WEF Report).  In this report, WEF mentioned a list of skills called 21st Century skills.

What are 21st Century Skills?

The term 21st century skills refers to a broad set of knowledge, skills, work habits, and character traits that are believed—by educators, school reformers, college professors, employers, and others—to be critically important to success in today’s world, particularly in collegiate programs and contemporary careers and workplaces. Generally speaking, 21st century skills can be applied in all academic subject areas, and in all educational, career, and civic settings throughout a student’s life. (Glossary of education)

These are broadly classified into 3 categories namely:

  1. Foundational Literacy: How students apply core skills to everyday tasks.
  2. Competencies: How students approach complex challenges.
  3. Character Qualities: How students approach their changing environment.

An Educated person can be Literate, but every Literate person may not be Educated.

Literacy is the ability to read and write. But Education is a broad term. Along with ability to read and write, it also includes inculcation of basic values (moral, educational, social, and professional), etiquettes, and acquisition of all the skills that we discussed above. And these, you definitely must have realized, exist beyond books! They are not just to be taught, but ‘developed’. While high end formal educational institutions might exercise 21st Century Skills, a vast number of Children in India aren’t a part of one. For those lesser privileged, various social working groups and non –profit organizations come into play.

Muskurahat Foundation is a NGO for Life Skills Education that works towards reaching out to these less fortunate, but equally in need children and young adults. The Foundation, under its Project KEYtaab and Project Saarthi, has initiated steps towards Educating these growing kids by the means of Developing 21st Century Skills in them, helping them flourish, and most importantly ‘Enabling’ them to craft a shining life of their own, and eventually others!

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