Mangaluru: It was the motivation to teach and improve the lot of their less privileged brethren that pushed a group of lecturers, post graduation students and research scholars to take up the selfless task of academically guiding government administered rural high school lads across Dakshina Kannada for free.
Akanksha, set up as a charitable trust, comes as a boon for rural government school goers, who can now compete with their counterparts, based in the city, who are able to seek guidance from from prohibitively costly coaching/tuition centers because of their relative financial prowess.

Akanksha was floated by 12 teacher friends headed by Shreesha Bhat on Nov 4, 2012 with the sole aim to enhance the study skills of rural high school students.

Bhat, currently a Junior Research Fellow at the Mangaluru University floated this idea of a charitable trust during a tour to Dandeli. Bhat was then working as Physics lecturer at Vivekananda Degree College. This idea of Shreesha Bhat sprouted wings when his friends happily gave their nod to start a charitable trust to cater to rural children.

“We have conducted as many as 30 programs till today,” said Shreesha. The trust which now has 52 members, chooses 8 government schools each year to deliver the program. The programs are usually scheduled on Saturday and Sunday. As many as 100 students are divided into four groups and lecturers take classes in Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Commerce separately.

Shreesha Bhat told Newskarnataka.com that Akanksha believes in practical integrated teaching. “The students in the class rooms are exposed to lab experiments, namely flame test in chemistry, blood test in biology and filling up cheque leaves in the commerce stream. Akanksha also renders learning in basic Vedic Mathematics.  The trust enjoys the advice of A P Radhakrishna, HOD Physics Department St. Philomena College, and Puttur, he added.

The trust has worked across four Taluks, Puttur, Bantwal, Belthangady and Sullya.  “The trust will in the coming days, expand its activities to Benglauru, with 12 members, of the 52 members, all software engineers, covering schools in the capital city”.  Bhat explained that, in the beginning, a few high school teachers and students’ were very much resistant to the idea of conducting programs on Sundays, but as time progressed, everyone fell in line and began to enjoy the learning activity, due to the teaching style of the trust members.

The trust also provides counseling for village students suffering from learning disabilities, and awareness on menstruation for female children for free. The doctors for the same are provided by the trust. Interestingly, the trust also has Post Graduation students who support their many activities.

Bhat proudly says that so far the trust has coached 2800-3000 children and will continue to serve the cause.