Orientation Week
Day 1
- Mr Satyendra Singh was the first speaker of the orientation week. He spoke on the topic of POWER OF MIND.
- He spoke about the conscious and the sub conscious mind, how they work and the role played by them in the human thinking process.
- He gave day to day examples and scenarios of Positive Thinking.
- He spoke about Twenty-Five things mentally strong people do. Things such as taking responsibility, acknowledging your weakness, being kind etc. He stressed upon the girls that if one follows all these 25 points, one will become mentally strong and successful
Orientation Week
Day 2
- Raashi, a Law student, started her session with a quiz on Legal Trivia
- She designed a power point slide deck along with polling options to ensure the session was interactive.
Orientation Week
Day 3
- Kaavya Jayaram, a 10th standard student held a live quiz in an extremely professional manner, on the lines of KBC.
- There were almost 30 girls in the ZOOM meet who joined and tried answering the questions.
- An incredible amount of knowledge was exchanged and it was a great learning experience for the girls as well as the mentors.
Orientation Week
Day 4
- Arti Mehra Patt, Drama Teacher and Founder of Creative Expressions, asked the girls and the mentors to give her various different phrases and she acted it out with expressions, voice modulation and emotions.
- It made the girls open up and come up with some interesting phrases and we could see their love for acting and drama.
- Some girls came up to say that they love acting and would want to take up acting as a full time career.
Orientation Week
Day 5
- Sajimol, a storyteller, started her session with a lovely slide that said “SEEING IS BELIEVING or IS IT??”.
- she emphasized on the concept of “Mind of the Eye” and “Focus on Positive”.
- She asked the girls to focus on the details and told them the importance of positive thinking.
- She gave the girls the three mantras to follow to achieve their dream: Intend, Manifest and Attract.
Orientation Week
Day 6
- Aradhita Basu, a Marketing Professional, explained in great details all about short form plays.
- Aradhita made the session interactive and more interesting by asking the girls which skills like acting, direction, stage management, creatives etc could they relate with and if given a chance what responsibility would they like to take up.
- The girls enthusiastically participated in the discussion.
Book Release Note from the Founder of SHAKTII – Ms. Vimala Nandakumar
I had always wondered how many people and places in our county have been left out of the pages of history. I wanted to bring out a book on this topic for the edification of the SHAKTII girls, to begin with. I worked on some of the great women who have sacrificed their lives for our land. Ms Kalyani Basu who is a mentor of SHAKTII worked on some places in India about which little is known to most of us. We
compiled our articles with illustrations into a book entitled, “The forgotten Treasures of Indian History”. We wanted the book in its present form to be released by the most appropriate person. That appropriate person is Mrs Yashomati Chandrakant Thakur the Minister for Women and Child
Development, Maharashtra. Ms. Yashomati Chandrakant Thakur is the guardian minister of Amravati.
We read in the newspapers and social media about the kind of work she does for people at grass root
level. Mrs Ujjwala Haware who has been closely associated with SHAKTII since its inception came
forward to help us in introducing SHAKTII to the Minister.
On 24th June came a phone call from Ms. Haware that we would be meeting the Minister for Women
and Child Development, Maharashtra – Ms Yashomati Chandrakant Thakur, the same evening. At that
time I was preparing for SHAKTII’s Founders Day event. I dropped everything and got ready to meet the
Minister. This is the first time I was going to meet a minister at her residence. Mrs. Haware picked me
up at my residence and took me to the residence of the Minister near Mantralay.
As we entered the hall, we saw that the Minister was in the middle of some presentation about
women- their health and hygiene. In a few minutes time the Minister joined us, with a big smile on her
face, shook hands with us and welcomed us with a warm hug. I was floored by her simplicity and
humbleness. Mrs. Haware introduced me and then the work that is being done at SHAKTII. I told the
Minister that we at SHAKTII feel very strongly about providing top-class facilities to the girls and not
deny them anything because their parents happen to belong to a poor background. This appealed to
her.
I had taken two copies of the
book that I had co- authored with
Kalyani Basu “The forgotten
Treasures of Indian History” with
me for the Minister and Mrs.
Haware to release the book. They
both graciously agreed to do it.
They agreed to read the book
and send their feedback. I
thanked both of them profusely
for giving me time and for their
best wishes.
I invited the Minister and Mrs Haware to be present for the Founder’s Day on 1st July. (True to their
word, the Minister and Mrs Haware graced the occasion on the Founder’s Day with their presence and
spoke to the SHAKTII girls.). I thanked Mrs Haware profusely and returned happy and satisfied that the
meeting was fruitful. I was delighted to have met a minister who is passionate about her work, totally
dedicated to women and children of Maharashtra!
Founder's Day
July 1, 2021
- This year we celebrated the 7th year of SHAKTII virtually.
- A presentation was made by Aparna Muralidharan, a mentor at SHAKTII, where she introduced all the other mentors
- We were honoured by the virtual presence of Ms Yashomati Thakur – Honourable Minister for Women and Child Development, Maharashtra
- Mrs Geeta Castalino, a psychologist and trainer, mentioned that she was super impressed with team SHAKTII and would also like to take a few sessions for the girls.
- Mrs Ujjwala Haware who spoke about SHAKTII, its inception and how SHAKTII has blossomed into a beautiful flower
- A Trivia Quiz was conducted by Mrs Vimala Nandakumar. She came up with some really interesting questions and concepts. All the girls, past and present students of SHAKTII participated
- Our guest mentors, Calkin Garg and Naveen sent video recordings of their message for the SHAKTII girls all the way from USA.
- The program was concluded by a vote of thanks proposed by Mrs Kalyani Basu.
- A very beautifully perceived and presented program by the senior girls and ex-students of SHAKTII
Rath Yatra
- We celebrated the Rath Yatra – the Chariot Journey of Lord Jagannath
- We invited Ms Ajita Priyadarshini De, from Pennsylvania State - to be our Guest Lecturer
- Ajita started her presentation by her own Odissi dance performance which was thoroughly enjoyed by the girls as well as the mentors of SHAKTII
- Ajita asked the girls to do some assignments for which the prizes would be announced very soon
- The whole presentation with story-telling was pretty enchanting and informative not only for the girls but also for the mentors.
Eid Ul Adha
July 23rd, 2021
- Our ninth grader SHAKTII-ite Ashura enlightened us all about the festival Bakri Eid or as in Arabic it is called Eid-Ul-Adha.
- We are citizens of a secular country and we believe in peaceful co-existence with the people of all religious beliefs.
75th Independence Day
August 15th, 2021
- Ms. Manisha Jhamb (founder of Mindbuddies and Zameeni s) from Kharghar and Ms. Manasvi Asthana, a Criminology and a Criminal Justice Administration scholar from Lucknow, had a wonderful session with the SHAKTII girls.
- Manisha and Manasvi very skillfully helped the girls appreciate the difference between real heroes and reel heroes.
- They also brought out the fact that freedom struggle was by people of all religious faiths.
- The message was that we are divided now, but it is time for us to reunite.
- Here are some quotes from the girls:
“Ma’am I loved today's session because there were many things I learnt about our India. I loved the quiz. I feel proud of my country .I will follow rules and I start to do good things for our country. I won't wait for someone to start good things” - Prachiti
“Learned something more about India like we can protest or stop if we see that someone is cutting trees or people are fighting etc. according to law” - Ashura
“I seriously enjoyed today's session. I got some more information about our country and our freedom fighters who protected us and risked their lives”- Heena
“I liked today's session because of Manisha Ma’am and Manasvi Ma’am i got know lots of things about our country” - Sneha
“Ma'am today you told us so many things about India that we didn't even know. And to told us who our real heroes are. You told us so many things about India Thank you so much” - Simran
“Ma’am, I got to learn the names of real heroes and also learned that we should be proud to be an Indian” - Shreya
“In today session was amazing! I didn't know about Muslim freedom fighters. But in this session I got to know about them” - Shradda
Rakshabandhan
August 20th, 2021
- Our artist mentor, Ms. Rupali Patole, taught our girls how to make beautiful Rakhis out the simple things found in your own house.
- A beautiful competition was conducted online. Ms. Sudha Bashikar , another well-known artist , and Ms.Rupali were our judges
- The points were given on five criteria , (1) Neatness, (2) Background, (3) Creativity,(4) Time management and lastly (5) Overall presentation.
- The prize winners were :
1st Prize : Prachiti
2nd Prize : Joint winners, Ashura and Simran
3rd Prize : Joint winners, Urvashi and Anushka
Consolation Prize : Anisha's rakhis were so beautiful that the judges could not ignore it and gave her the consolation prize.
Teacher's Day
September 5th, 2021
- This year at SHAKTII we changed the trend of Teacher's Day and celebrated the achievements of our SHAKTII Girls.
- We invited the girls along with their parents to SHAKTII Centre.
- All the Mentors were meeting this new batch of 2021 SHAKTII girls physically for the first time post pandemic.
- The girls were given their Student-of-the-month badges. Their prizes for the drawing coopetition, rakhi making competition, and the essay competition were handed over to the girls.
- Also, an amount of Rs. 1000/- was handed over to the parents to get Data Packs for the girls for uninterrupted online classes
International Literacy Day
- Dr. Reni Francis of MES’s Pilai college of education research conducted an expert talk on the occasion of International Litercy Day and invited Ms. Nandakumar to speak on the subject.
- The program was conducted virtually and the format was a question – answer session with Dr. Francis asking questions, and Ms. Nandakumar responding.
- a video from another student’s parent was played. She shared how proud she is of her daughter’s progress.
Daan Utsav week
Early October, 2021
- The Shaktii girls participated in an essay competition and a collage-making competition during the week.
- Innerwheel club of Vashi had organized a collage making competition on Swatchha Bharath or Daan Utsav. The girls had to submit a video of them making the collage. The results were:
1st prize – Simran
2nd prize - Siddi
3rd prize - Ashura
- The essay competition was organized by SHAKTII. It was about about Daan Utsav or Joy of giving. The following were winners of the essay writing competition:
1st prize – Ashura
2nd prize – Prachiti
3rd prize – Shrusti
- Ms. Sudha Kamath was kind enough to be the judge for it. She started her social work by joining the Lioness club of Nerul and served in various posts. She is also connected with various social programs and organizations around Vashi and is presently serving WE Club as Regional Coordinator.
- The girls were invited along with their parents to the SHAKTII centre. The girls showed up in their best traditional dresses, and brightened up the center with their beauty. SHAKTII mentors gave away gifts, cheques for some and prizes. The student of the month badges were given to Shruti and Riddi from std 8. Prachiti got her second badge for showing great interest in learning and progress. Since it was Daan Utsav celebration from 2nd to 8th Oct we decided to pay the fees dues that some girls. We are grateful to Siddharth Swarup for his huge donation for helping the parents who faced financial crisis due to COVID.
Children's Day Celebration
November 2021
- SHAKTII resumed online classes after Diwali 2021.
- Tanvi Sualy of Happy People and Co. readily agreed to organize the event for us. She decided that she will teach “coffee painting art” to the girls on the day.
- SHAKTII alumni, Pooja Lohar and Raveena Lohar decorated the hall for the function
- The children left the venue happy and satisfied having enjoyed every moment of 14th Nov 2021.
Story Writing Session
5th December, 2021
- The girls were asked to write two-line stories based on a few prompts
- Some stories that were impressively written by the girls:
A) "Why is your paper blank? You did not write what your dream is " asked the Tearcher "my dream is Big. Can’t fit it into a small blank paper" said Navya- Riddi
B) One night Tushar had gone to the shop and while returning he saw two eyes coming towards him. He screamed only to realize that they were the head lights of a car.- Shruti
C) Shaan was terrified to see a white ghost in the field. He heard a loud voice to make things worse. "what the hell are you doing here Shaan? come home for dinner"- it was his mother in a white saree!!! - Priya
D) Mom told her son " what if you don't have two legs. Be happy that you have two hands!!" Her son John realised that his glass was half-full. He said "I don't care that my glass is half empty "- Prachiti
E) She was crying with a smile when she held her for the first time. And even now she is crying but with tears because her daughter is leaving her- Ashura
F) Kiran would never help anyone. But she felt bad for a lame boy who was struggling to get up. She rushed to help him stand up. That moment changed her permanently - Nandini
G) Mother told her son to go to the market and buy some capsicum. But the son did not know what was capsicum. He was scared of asking his mom. He bought brinjal instead and said "look mummy , see these very fresh capsicums and nice blue colour."- Anushka
H) Sad and happy story! One boy was happy though he got second hand clothes as gift. The other one was sad though he received new clothes - he hated his mother's choice .- Shrusti
Be great with People course
December, 2021
- Aparna Saxena, one of the long-time mentors at SHAKTII, introduced the mentors of SHAKTII to Doyobi.com recently - an online virtual learning portal where the focus is on teaching STEM subjects through experiences and active learning.
- To get a taste for the teaching, mentors Vimala and Kalyani signed up for a course to learn Scratch, which is a coding program to create interactive experiences. They found the experience to be interesting and informative. This gave them a deeper understanding of how this could benefit the girls.
- Shreya and Shruti were identified to be sponsored for courses on personality development through better communication. The course was called “Be great with People”
- They showed their enterprising natures by working out a plan with their neighbor for a reliable wifi connection, and SHAKTII supported them with the equipment necessary.
- Here is a testimony on the course from them:
Because of SHAKTII, we got an opportunity to interact with other classes. We got confidence to talk in English with any person of any part of country. Because of listening sessions by Vandana Gupta ma'am of Shaktii, I was able to understand the speaking of foreigner's English accent . Thank you so much SAHKTII to give me the opportunity to attend the Singapore communication-" Be great with people " course. A big Thank you to Aparna Saxena for sponsoring us. It was very helpful for me. It taught me about how to speak confidentally with a person, what are the important points while communicating with others. - Shreya and Shruti
- This course was sponsored by Aparna Saxena
Poetry Competition
11th December, 2021
- The girls of SHAKTII participated in a poetry competition conducted by Mr Saurabh Anand, Ph.D. Student, Language and Literacy Education, TWLE, University of Georgia, US.
- He offered a $100 prize for the girl who wins the contest to motivate them.
- The girls were given 10-15 words in English and Hindi and instructed to design poems to describe their Naani-mas
- Anushka was the winner of the poetry competition
- Shreya received a special prize because she was the only girl to write a poem in English.
National Girl Child Day
24th January, 2022
- Fun activities were organized instead of serious work to celebrate National Girl Child Day
- The session began with asking the girls what G, I, R, L stood for according in their imagination. A few girls were quick, but Tanisha, who is normally quiet, came up with a fabulous one “Goddess In Real Life”. On a lighter note Anushka wrote “Ghost In Real Life”.
- The following is a list of the fun games that they played, along with the names of the girls that did well:
Memory test – Shreya
Simon Says – Anish Urvashi
Dumb Charade – Priya, Riddhi, Armaish, Sneha and Simran
Writing on the wall - Riddhi & Vaishnavi
Hunt for things – Vaishnavi and Srushti
Name Place Animal Thing – Shraddha, Prachiti and Shreya
- Mentor Shubhangi gave a much needed support to conduct the event.
Addition to SHAKTII’s book library
- In January, Aparna Nagda, who runs Book It Up, requested book lovers to donate books for SHAKTII. As a result, the book library grew by many newly acquired treasures. A big Thank You to the donors!
Vasanth Panchami
5th February, 2022
- We at SHAKTII, celebrated this festival by arranging a doodle art competition and dance workshop
- Ms Pinky Takker, Ms Daksha Varma and Ms Nirma Bhandari- the three adorable sisters of Adore Charities sponsored the event
- Ms Arti Patt and her daughter Nandini conducted a workshop on dance.
- The winners of Doodle art competition were:
I prize Richa
II prize Prachiti
III prize Roshni
- Shreya gave a brief speech on the festival of Vasanth Panchami. A pleasant surprise was a visit by former Shaktii-ite Samriti.
Gender Equality
February, 2022
- SHAKTII conducted a session on gender equality with the girls
- Ms. Sathya, who is a former student of Ms. Vimala, spoke to the girls from her own lived experience and work in the gender equity and feminism space, and invoked the examples of the pioneers of girls' education, Savitribai, Jotiba and Fatima Sheikh
- The girls got the chance to share their input and opinions on gender equality. Each of them was asked to identify one area of challenge, and talk about it.
- Ms. Manisha encouraged the girls to think critically and use their voice.
Guest Teachers
February, 2022
- SHAKTII had guest teachers join the group of mentors to work with the girls. These were MBA students from NMIMS that were volunteering their time as part of their “We Care” program.
- They engaged the girls in teaching Maths, English and Science. In addition, they worked on arts and crafts, had jam sessions and quizzes for the girls. These volunteers also integrated technology beautifully into the lessons. Finally, they helped in enhancing the presence of SHAKTII on social media by doing research, creating posts and vidoes of the work. Their teaching styles were effective in encouraging the girls to participate and improve themselves.
- The girls made progress academically as well as in learning new tools and gaining additional confidence to speak and participate in different types of events.
Connectfor
February, 2022
- Connectfor is an organisation which connects volunteers to NGOs
- Shaktii girls participated in this fun learning session of doing some science experiments with simple things available at home - Music maker (with water in glasses and a spoon), Tornado in a bottle (with a plastic bottle of water and soap or glimmer) and lastly Paper & Eraser drop.
- Mr Sydney Lobo conducted a session for Shaktii girls on the topic of Environment and Diversity of our Ecosystem.
- Ms Kavya Jayaraman conducted yoga classes for Shaktii girls
Last day of classes
February, 2022
- Two students from Georgia University, Erin Rachel Mundy and Hannah Rose O'Connell interacted with the SHAKTII girls over zoom.
- They made the girls feel at ease with some ice breaker games
- The class ended on a happy note with a lively discussion of different cultures and festivals of three different countries, USA, Columbia and India.
- Learning never ends at Shaktii.
Farewell to IX std girls
27th February, 2022
- A loving farewell from SHAKTII was organized by Ms. Tanvii Sualy of Happy People and Co.
- A few quotes from the girls:
“Ma’am, today it was the best day for me. It was very enjoyable farewell. The cake was tasty. Thanks to Tanvi and Shreya mam. They have done a marvelous job. It was so memorable. I will write this day in my dairy. Thank you for everything in this whole year” - Shreya
“Thank you so much for everything finally we had a grand farewell... Today was the best day of the year finally we were in the center and had a great fun enjoy the farewell we'll miss you all ma'am I will definitely visit the center to meet you” - Ashura
“Ma’am thank you for the wonderful farewell party. I never had so much fun” - Nandini
“Thank you everyone- Vimala ma’am, Kalyani Ma’am and all the 8th girls .You made today memorable. We all enjoyed a lot; the games were too good and cake was delicious. I'LL NEVER FORGET THIS THIS DAY” - Prachiti
“Today’s farewell will be the best memory of SHAKTII I will carry with me.. I can't describe in words how much Vimala, Kalyani ,Tanvi and Shreya ma’am took efforts to give us this beautiful /grand farewell. I enjoyed a lot today. It was the best day for class 9th” - Heena
7th Anniversary Celebration
- The 7th anniversary marked as copper anniversary was celebrated in presence of Chief guest Mrs. Ujjawala Haware and guest of hounour Ms. Geeta Castelino along with all students, mentors and a few alumni
- Students Ashura, Shreya and Sushmita spoke about the woman that inspires them the most from the book Forgotten Treasures of Indian History written by Ms. Vimala and Ms. Kalyani
- The prestigious year end awards were announced with Ashura as the student of the year and tie between much deserved candidates Shreya and Prachiti as runners-up
- All the students were handed over the Scholarship envelopes
- Ms. Vimala Nandkumar, the founder praised SHAKTII students for their learnings with enthusiastic participation in the program. She thanked Ms. Haware for her unwavering support of the program and how she has been instrumental in realization of the SHAKTII dream. She also thanked all the mentors in India as well as abroad for their valuable efforts towards fulfilling SHAKTII objective. Special mention was Ms. Lakshmi Ravindran for her behind the scene support and encouragement of the program. Ms. Rupali handed over the token of appreciation to the esteemed guests and the founder. She also thanked the pillar of foundation Mr. Nandakumar for all the unseen, quite contributions to ensure the success of the SHAKTII Education Trust.
- The program concluded with hope of promising future for these girls while enjoying delicious snack box.
Awards
- Ms. Vimala Nandakumar, Chairperson of SHAKTII was felicitated by Ms. Divya Gaikward- ex Corporator of the 64th Ward of Vashi. Ms. Gaikward is highly respected for her excellent work and commitment to the citizens of her ward in Vashi.
- Ms. Nandakumar dedicated the award to the entire team at SHAKTII.
16th March
- On 16th March we received 12 laptops and a printer from IDBI Intech under the CSR .
- We thank Manish Khot and Anushka of IDBI InTech