Masoom is a not-for-profit organization with a passion for establishing quality education in night schools and strives to improve the learning environment and the prospects amongst the less privileged students of the night schools. Masoom's vision is to support youth "learn while they earn". The organization was the result of a social research project examining the conditions of the Night Schools in Mumbai by Nikita Ketkar.

In an exclusive interview with Women Entrepreneur, Nikita Ketkar talks more about her professional journey and what helped her to create a successful organization for Night schools.

Take us through your early educational journey and prior industry experience. How was the seed sown for your affinity towards social causes and establishing a system to better night schools?

I am a postgraduate in Political Science from Mumbai University. I cleared the UPSC exam in 1996 and joined the Armed Forces Civil Services. I served as a bureaucrat for a couple of years but I realized I was not happy dealing with just fi les and rules. I started volunteering for a few organizations and in 2001 while I was on deputation with the NCC Directorate I came across night schools inadvertently while doing a project on domestic help for an NGO, I was surprised to see that students who come to the night schools are working and come to night schools to pass 10th grade. I saw that these students do not have access to basic resources such as science labs, notebooks & textbooks. That is when I decided to give the best to these students. After talking to a couple of stakeholders I realized that there has not been a dedicated intervention to support night schools since the 1850s. Hence, I decided to bring in the best quality education for night school students. I resigned from my government service to research night schools. In 2006 -07, I researched along with night college students. As a result of which, we developed an intervention for night schools, consequently, a three-pronged model was introduced for night schools.

Masoom was formally launched in 2008-09. Masoom is race, class, gender, ethnicity, religious, and politically neutral. Our participants come from some of the most marginalized sections of Indian society. We work with students who are invisible to society and policy makers alike. Most have had to drop off from day school for reasons beyond their control. The night schooling system is amazing, as all those who come to study here are working students, and all are self-motivated. Around 15,000 students’ study across 173-night schools in Maharashtra. These students come with a dream in their eyes — a dream to make it big. Masoom was set up to make this dream come true.

Tell us about the various programs and initiatives spearheaded by Masoom.

Masoom’s three-pronged intervention model called Night School Transformation Program (NSTP) includes Educational infrastructure building & support, Capacity building, and Advocacy. Masoom has seen visible improvement on almost all parameters that are used to track the performance of our intervention – increased enrolment, reduction in dropouts, better pass rates in SSC examinations, and ultimately a larger number of our students wanting to pursue courses on vocational skills. Masoom is presently working in 85-night schools of across.

Mumbai and other parts of Maharashtra and plans to reach out to 170-night schools by2023 impacting 15,000-night school students in Maharashtra.

Apart from NSTP, there are three verticals namely Career Cell, Tech-on-Wheels (TOW) program & Evening Learning Centers. Through Career Cell we have provided skilling courses to more than 1900 students and 562 students have been placed in various sectors. TOW provides advanced technological courses to students through well-equipped buses. Through TOW we have successfully been able to provide advanced computer courses to 1900 day as well as night school students via 2 TOW buses. We are in the process of implementing the 3rd bus which shall be done by 2021. The ELC (Evening Learning Centers) program is specifically designed to support the out-of-school students/dropouts to pass class 10 especially in the areas where there are no alternative models like night schools or other platforms. We have set up 11 ELC centers in total at Ahmedabad, Bhavnagar, Mumbai, and Pune. Over the course of the next 3 years, we plan to start 20 ELCs in different states of India catering to 5000 out-of-school adolescents/youth.

“Empower, strengthen and transform night schools to ensure the youth learn better and earn better”

How has your corresponding journey been as an entrepreneur in the social sector?

As an entrepreneur, I have grown along with Masoom. From having huge challenges of understanding accounts and finance-related issues to becoming an effective speaker. From being able to confidently speak in Marathi and Hindi, to being empathetic about teachers’ needs. It has been a long way to personally bring about all these conscious changes. Managing home and work has been challenging but I am able to manage both comparatively well now than when I started. I love personal growth as an entrepreneur and I wish to work on myself to bring out the best and give the best.

How do you intend to chart your future journey in terms of championing social causes to bring about a real change?

In the next 3 years, we plan to have our presence in 12 districts (to identify 5 more) reaching out to around 120 schools from 85 schools currently. We plan to have our 3rd TOW bus up and running by the end of 2021. In the next 3 years, we aspire to become a National as well as Global Resource Organisation for the Evening Learning Center domain. We would be reaching 40000 adolescents/youth through our educational programs in the next 3 years.

In the long run, Masoom is to run a fellowship programme. At present, I personally am undergoing training with Teach for India to develop Masoom’s fellowship program. In the next 10-15 years our vision is to have at least 100 fellows who will be instrumental in running ELCs in the remotest areas of India. We also would like to explore setting up our ELC model in other countries where there are out-of-school students who would benefit from our model.

In the light of your strong experience, what advice would you give to the young women aspiring to become leaders in the social sector?

Always be passionate about your dreams. While you dream about making a mark in society, it is important to be conscious leaders. leaders responsible to their fellow human beings and leaders who are sensitive to their environment. Women are already gifted with traits such as love, creativity, compassion, and empathy. As leaders, we need to display these traits in order to bring about a better world.

Nikita Ketkar, Founder & CEO, Masoom

Nikita has worked in different capacities as a Journalist, Lecturer, and Social Worker before qualifying for the prestigious Union Public Services Commission. After spending over three years in various administrative positions in DRDO, Air headquarters, and NCC directorate, Nikita felt the urge to do something beyond and left the service to work for various NGOs. It was while working on a social project she came across night school accidentally. What she saw and heard compelled her to start Masoom in 2008, an organization focused on improving the night.