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The Idea
Inclusion is both a process for and an outcome of understanding, accepting and valuing differences. Within the school setting, it signifies much more than the presence of students with disabilities in regular classrooms. Rather, it includes both an acknowledgement that a child’s academic potential cannot be developed separately from their social, emotional, and physical potential, and taking the efforts to support these.
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School Services
Ummeed’s School Services Team (SST) was set up in 2013 to specifically work with and across school and education systems in a systematic and strategic way. SST works with both mainstream and special schools, to promote the development of an inclusive environment and to sustain it by creating an understanding of inclusion and inclusive practices, mental health, and social-emotional wellbeing to support the school’s journey into inclusion.
The SST comprises people from diverse backgrounds including Mental Health, Special Education, Social Work, Social-emotional Learning, and Inclusive Education.
Ummeed’s other teams also offer trainings and other interventions for educators and schools, e.g., Know Your Rights, Writing Made Easy for Teachers, etc. Please click here to view all the training courses offered by Ummeed.
Our Approach
Awareness
Ummeed’s SST is involved in creating awareness about inclusion and inclusive education, through print, social media and various sensitization programs in mainstream schools and organizations working in the space of education. These sensitization programs (on topics such as Understanding and Responding to Challenging Behaviours; Exploring Inclusion and Inclusive Education etc.)s are designed to bring forth the importance of respecting diversity and adopting an inclusive outlook by various stakeholders engaged in the education process to increase participation for all learners in a school system.
Advocacy
The SELebrating Inclusion Summit (SIS) is an annual event build as part of Ummeed SST’s advocacy efforts to enable dialogue and collaboration across organisations (civil society, government, others) annual event built as part towards creating social-emotional learning informed inclusive school systems. Ummeedhad partnered with Apni Shala for the first three years. The team members also regularly participate in and attends, other advocacy events, meets and conferences.
Trainings
Ummeed offers various short-term, and long-term trainings such as (School Inclusion Training Program -SITP) and a two-year fellowship on school inclusion called Ummeed Inclusion Fellowship Program (UIFP). Together, these programs aim to help teachers and education professionals understand the needs of diverse learners in their classrooms, and how their inclusion can be supported in different school settings. These training programs are offered in online, in person or hybrid mode.
Online Learning Content
FIRKI is an innovative online portal developed by Teach for India, aimed at empowering educators with valuable resources to enhance their teaching skills and competencies. In a progressive collaboration, Ummeed has joined forces with FIRKI to create an assortment of online content on inclusive education. The content created by Ummeed, available around-the-clock, allows educators to access and assimilate this crucial information at their convenience.
Research and Publications
In 2021, Ummeed launched a document titled Differently Together Inclusion in Education (Inclusion in Education | Ummeed) on inclusive practices (academic and social aspect of inclusion) from schools across India. The team continues to research, publish and disseminate its learnings through peer-reviewed journal articles, conference presentations, seminars and white papers.
Partnerships and Networks
Ummeed’s partnerships in the education space have included schools, education-focused organizations (Apni Shala, The Akanksha Foundation, Teach for India, etc.), networks (Gati by Atma, TFIx and Maharashtra Collective, etc.), universities (Azim Premji University) and government (multiple trainings for BMC teachers, special educators and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan [SSA] in Mumbai)
If you are a school or education-focused organisation, and would like to collaborate with us
Team Members
Joyeeta Sen
Deepti Adsule
Sajida Vadagama
Sadekha Sheikh
Tayzeem Rasool
Preeti Baghel
Shamin Mehrotra
