Data Stories

The Data Stories project will showcase inspiring examples of how SPOs are using data and data science to transform their operations, program delivery, and impact.

Want us to tell your data story? Write to us at [email protected] with “Data Stories” in the subject line.

Teaching the teachers

  • Story & Pics: Phorum Pandya |
  • Editor: Sowmya Rajaram
Nargis FIT programme
Adhyayan Foundation empowers government schools to do a self-review, and then use that data to set goals and level up

Adhyayan Foundation empowers government schools to do a self-review, and then use that data to set goals and level up

It is an important day at Government Secondary School (GSS) Pabua, nestled in Seppa, East Kameng district, Arunachal Pradesh. Books are brought up-to-date, attendance is marked, Google forms are duly filled, and handwritten notes have been neatly jotted down in diaries. This is not a group of students taking an exam, but 14 teachers and a headmaster awaiting a review visit from Adhyayan Quality Education Foundation (AQEF). AQEF is a Mumbai-based capacity-building organisation that has worked with over 10,000..

An app to scale rehab

  • Story & Pics: Gitanjali Chandrasekharan |
  • Editor: Sowmya Rajaram

Amar Seva Sangam, a Tamil Nadu-based non-profit, has created the Enabling Inclusion app. Insights from it are helping create a disability therapy revolution across the state

A long and winding road leads to the Sankarapandiyapuram home of three-year-old Ishalini. Up on a hill near an Ayyappan Temple, with a road that’s motorable but not convenient, and leaves even Google Maps confused, the young child lives with her parents in a hut.

Ishalini speaks, crawls, and is able to pull and grab. That may not sound like much for a three-year-old, but it’s a big improvement for this child, who was diagnosed with cerebral palsy..

Manimala (right), a physiotherapist with Amar Seva Sangam, visits Veni and Ishalini once a month at their home.
Manimala (right), a physiotherapist with Amar Seva Sangam, visits Veni and her daughter Ishalini once a month at their home. She checks their progress on the Enabling Inclusion App with reports from Community Rehab Worker Manimala.

Collecting evidence to create change

  • Story & Pics: Phorum Pandya |
  • Editor: Sowmya Rajaram
Nargis FIT programme
Nargis, Santoshi & Narmdi are all smiles.

Udayan Care’s data-rich study, Beyond 18, is helping vulnerable children transition smoothly from child care institutions into the outside world, through evidence-based intervention programs and support networks

Dressed in a floral-printed white skirt and a maroon top, 19-year-old Santoshi is a teenager with big dreams. A confident Gen Z, she holds an internship at WWF as a fundraiser. She has also pursued courses in web designing and fashion designing, and plans to apply for a job as a cabin crew in an airliner. Her life today is a far cry from when she was brought to a child..

Drawing inspiration from data

  • Story & Pics: Phorum Pandya |
  • Editor: Sowmya Rajaram

Mumbai-based NGO Saturday Art Class (SArC) conducted a nine-month study to understand how art could improve behavioural outcomes in students from low-income communities. The result? Measurable joy

Animals are roaring, birds are flapping their wings, and fish are swimming in the sea. This isn’t the scene of a mythical jungle by the sea somewhere in Utopia, but in a 40-seater classroom of Shankarwadi Mumbai Public School in Jogeshwari East, Mumbai, where fifth-grade students are enthusiastically enacting the cues given to them by Priyal Patki.

Patki is a facilitator and researcher with Saturday Art Class (SArC), a Mumbai-based NGO..

Priyal Patki facilitates a Saturday Art Class session at Shankarwadi Mumbai Public School in Jogeshwari East, Mumbai
Priyal Patki facilitates a Saturday Art Class session.

A game a day keeps malnutrition away

  • Story & Pics: Phorum Pandya |
  • Editor: Sowmya Rajaram
Government Secondary School (GSS) Rajasar
An NSF toolkit games session in progress at Government Secondary School (GSS) Rajasar, Rajasthan.

Nourishing Schools Foundation educates children from lower socio-economic backgrounds about their nutrition with a toolkit of educational games. The result? A higher BMI, and increased fruits and vegetables in their diet.

It is a blistering July afternoon, but the students between Grade 5 and 9 at Government Secondary School (GSS) in Kawani, a 50-minute ride from Bikaner city, are not tired.

Ten-year-old Sangeet holds up a picture of a mango on her forehead. Across her, Sunita reads out clues from..

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