Author: Mallika Sinha
Protsahan’s Girl Champions Program: Educate, Elevate, Excel has been selected as one of the 100 most impactful and scalable education innovations worldwide in the HundrED Global Collection 2024. Innovations from 73 countries around the world were reviewed by HundrED leaders.
Protsahan Girl Champion’s voices echoed loud amongst the top 100 (from a pool of 2998 reviews) at the HundrED Innovation Summit during Helsinki Education Week in Finland.
Nurturing Minds: Synergies between Finland Education System and Protsahan’s Trauma-Informed Care Model
In addition to building a global platform for education leaders from around the world to meet and learn from each other, the HundrED team also curated the Summit agenda to be holistic and experiential for all. We got the opportunity to visit Finnish Schools to better understand their learning models and why the education system of Finland is known to be one of the best in the world.
Even before subjects like Maths or Science are introduced, the first thing a child learns in school is how to take care of themselves, of their classmates, their peers, and the community around them. This fosters self-care as a foundation in these young learners in their formative years. As they progress in their educational journeys, they have regular Art classes, aimed at facilitating creative expression for children. The curriculum is balanced: Education goes beyond academics, emphasizing arts, music, and physical education.
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I couldn’t help but draw parallels here between Finland’s education system & Protsahan’s trauma informed care at our Girl Empowerment Centers. In our wellbeing work, we create brave spaces and individualized support for the girls that enable them to tackle the complex grief and trauma caused by gender based violence, structural inequity, and social marginalization, especially through art. For us, the smallest daily intervention is an opportunity for healing – a hug, a conversation, psychosocial counseling sessions, meditation at the beginning of every day or an ‘art as therapy’ class, through our gender transformative H.E.A.R.T Approach.
Celebrating Innovation & Understanding Definitions of Scale
Despite the biting cold and rainy weather (which, I must admit, took some getting used to!), the warmth and hospitality of the Finnish people were truly unforgettable. They made every effort to ensure our stay was comfortable and enriching. It was incredible to connect with education leaders from around the world. Exchanging ideas, sharing best practices, and forging connections with individuals who share our passion for education was an invaluable experience.
Deeply engaging with sessions & moderated discussions on scaling education innovations gave us excellent food for thought. At Protsahan, without a doubt, we are deeply grassrooted and scale deep to ensure continuum of care for the girls we directly work with. Scaling deep goes beyond simply expanding the reach of a program. It involves a transformative process that ensures the intervention’s core principles, effectiveness, and impact are maintained as it grows. It involves investing in proximate leaders, creating unapologetic systems of accountability in social work practice and continuously striving to creatively solve for some of the most pressing problems in addressing adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in our context, in India. Hearing about the various challenges being faced by other organizations made us realize how similar grassroots challenges are, and how critical it is to build to adapt & contextualize interventions to thrive and not just build to last. Perhaps, what Charles Darwin said centuries ago is still relevant, “It is not the strongest species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives, it is the one that is most adaptable to change.” The lessons we learned from this convening are more relevant in these times than ever before. The world is changing dynamically in many ways than we ever imagined. Build to last will always be important, along with it, build to adapt is paramount.
By focusing on dimensions like contextual adaptation, systemic change, quality assurance, and sustainability, scaling interventions deeply ensures that the positive outcomes achieved at a small scale can be replicated and expanded to benefit a larger population while preserving the intervention’s integrity and effectiveness.
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From a Volunteer to representing Protsahan on a Global platform
My journey with Protsahan began as a volunteer back in 2017-18. Little did I know that this would lead me to set sail on my own growth trajectory, as we bring back stability to this world, one girl champion, at a time.
Back in 2018, Protsahan had one Girl Empowerment Center, reaching hundreds of vulnerable girls and children. As a volunteer, I used to support our founder with logistical support in street plays, events, documentation of activities, and write ‘angry young woman’ articles smashing the patriarchy. From there to now 5 Girl Empowerment Centers and hundreds of slum communities where we spot bright girls and invest in them through depth of scale, moving into a humbling support office for structuring our ecosystem building work with stronger systems of accountability, and a 50+ strong team, we really have been living the phrase ‘onwards and upwards’. In the last 5 years, I have seen our girls and the organization take leaps and bounds in growing the idea and mission of trauma informed care for every girl, every child.
Being selected to represent Protsahan at the HundrED Global Collection 2024 in Helsinki, Finland, was a deeply humbling moment for a young person like me, a first for anyone from the second line of management. It was my first solo international trip, filled with equal measures of excitement and nerves and at the same time, an extreme sense of responsibility of the faith put in me. Just like our resilient girl champions, I powered through & what an honor it was to witness our work being recognized as one of the 100 most impactful and scalable education innovations worldwide at the global stage in Finland!
When I was returning from Helsinki, I carried with me a renewed sense of purpose. As I reflect on this unique experience, I am filled with gratitude for the opportunity and to be part of the Protsahan Team. With increased groundedness, a keen eye for compliance and procedures, and the art of mobilizing resources, I look forward to the journey ahead.
Extending deep gratitude to Saku, Lasse, Alex, Jamie, Ariana, Anna, Heini, Karin, and the entire HundrED Team for being such gracious hosts to Protsahan and continuing to strengthen the global education ecosystem.
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