“TCF promotes a culture of observation, reflection, and continuous improvement. This practice not only helps improve the quality of our programmes, but also is a tool to deepen our learning and strengthening growth.”
The Citizens Foundation’s growth is tied directly to our culture of continuous improvement. Today we have embedded this principle into the very fabric of our organisation and believe that we need to make small, incremental improvements every day in order to progress radically.
QUALITY OF EDUCATION
Our biggest priority continues to be the quality of education that is offered to our children. We are committed to making our education system stronger and more effective day by day. This was another remarkable year for our matriculating batch as 61% of our students scored A+ & A grades, and the overall pass rate remained at 95% .
We developed three new textbooks this year for Mathematics, English and Science, and also introduced a series of 10 English readers, made to instill a love of reading and stories in children. TCF aims to have a complete range of its own textbooks, with quality content that’s not only relevant but also easy to understand for our students.
One of the prerequisites for imparting quality education is specialized training of our principals and teachers. This year, 454 rooms with audio-visual technology were set up in various school locations to assist teachers in preparing and delivering lessons more effectively. A video on-demand service using SMS or WhatsApp was also rolled out for teachers, giving them access to a library of 2000+ training videos sorted by key student learning objectives.
ENHANCING OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE
This year, we carved a specialized ‘Operational Excellence’ function within Operations Department in order to increase the efficiency of our process management efforts, especially at the school level.
This department made a concerted effort to localize our teaching staff. Local hiring was encouraged and more teaching jobs were offered to educated women from surrounding communities. This helped reduce not only the teacher transportation cost and turnover, but also promoted greater ownership.
A new mobile application was also implemented in 257 TCF adopted government schools and in 66 TCF flagship schools in Mansehra and Nowshera to manage student data, which includes enrollment, attendance, and other student-related information. The data captured through this application facilitates management decisions, daily operations and field and back office communications.
STRENGTHENING TIES WITH OUR ALUMNI
This year, we also reached out and re-connected with more than 15,400 TCF alumni to find out how they have fared since leaving the familiar walls of their TCF school. I’m happy to share that 88% of our alumni continued their education beyond matriculation. Of all the alumni aged 22 or more (male and female), 71% are employed or running their own enterprises, while another 15% are still studying.
ENVISIONING 2030
Our journey started in 1995 with the determination to uplift the lives of children in Pakistan from ignorance and despair. Nineteen years later, in 2014, we reached our first milestone of establishing 1000 school units across the country, giving children from low-income background the gift of education. But clearly much work remains!
This year, we have recommitted ourselves to advancing our mission to educate at a much faster pace with our strategy 2030. We’ve pledged to accelerate our programmes to reach out to 2 million beneficiaries in the course of next twelve years.
TCF promotes a culture of observation, reflection, and continuous improvement. This practice not only helps improve the quality of our programmes, but also enables learning and sustainable growth. As we close this year and begin another, I’d like to thank each and every member of the TCF family – our donors, volunteers, supporters, teachers, principals and office staff whose contribution and passion has evolved this organisation into a movement of positive change.
Syed Asaad Ayub Ahmad
President & CEO