MAHARASHTRA, India (Reuters) — Aajibaichi Shaala is not your ordinary school in India.
The students at “grandmothers’ school” in the village of Phangane, 120 km (75 miles) east of the financial capital, Mumbai, are elderly women who are getting the chance to learn to read.
Clad in pink saris, their school uniform, the women walk every afternoon along dusty village paths to their lessons.
The women begin class with a prayer and then dive into their lessons, writing on slates to practice.
“So far we can’t read or write very well but still we are still trying and we are really enjoying it,” said one student, Gulab Shivaji Kedar.
Many of them say they have gained confidence after attending the classes, and it was a time they look forward to, especially being able to bond with other women.
“Ever since the school started here we have been really happy, we come and sit together with each other and we enjoy the atmosphere and the company here,” said Janabai Daji Kedar, 69, whose children have migrated to the nearby town of Thane.
At Aajibaichi, afternoon classes in the one-room school are held six days a week for two hours. The lessons are timed so the women can finish their chores, or their work in the fields, before attending class.
One of the few requirements is that all students are at least 60 years old.
India’s literacy rate grew to 74 percent in the decade to 2011, according to the latest census, but female literacy continued to lag the rate for males by a wide margin.
About 65 percent of women were found to be literate, compared with 82 percent of men, according to the 2011 report.
Education experts and researchers have cited outdated attitudes toward women, including a preference for male children over females, and child marriages as main reasons for the lower female literacy rate.
The school uses teaching aids such as the alphabet painted on tiles which can be read by students with poor eyesight. Many of the aids are made by the students.
“You can teach children by shouting or even scolding but you cannot do that with the grandmothers. You have to teach them over and over with a lot of love and patience. Some grandmothers are hard of hearing and some cannot see properly, so you have to go close to them and teach them again and again loudly,” said Sheetal Prakash More, their 30-year-old teacher.
She added that she would like to see women in other villages get the same access to education.
