Where there is a will, there is a way. If you have passion to do something, nothing can stop you. Kavish Gadia is an example for it.
Having an intense love for reading books, Kavish found his mission, purpose, business and his place in the world.
When he was just 10 years old, he moved to Jhunjhunu in Rajasthan to live on his grandparents’ farm. There, he developed love for reading books. Over the next few years, he went on to do an MBA at IIM Lucknow and got placed at a top investment firm. He started his own consultancy firm and was earning very well, leading a comfortable life with his partner.
But Kavish found something is incomplete. Even though he is earning good income, he was not satisfied at all. He craved to do something different.
He quit his job and decided to help millions of children to find their place in the world through reading. In 2008, he started Stones2Milestones (S2M) Education Services.
The primary goal of S2M is to create a healthy reading ecosystem for children. And these skills and concepts are taught in a planned, logically progressive sequence such that students are engaged to include reading as a part of their daily lives.
Kavish didn’t want to make S2M an another shark-like profit making venture in education. So, he started after-school centres first, and then conducted programmes in nine schools and now that impacts 60 schools across the country.
During 2008-2015, S2M was able to find the best possible way to change the way that children learn. They experimented with several kinds of interventions, one with 70 schools of the Meghalaya government too.
Second, they started a flagship programme, Wings of Words (WoW), to transform the way children learn to read English. WoW is integrated with a school’s curriculum and focuses on creating a reading culture in school and improving fluency and comprehension in English.
As part of programme, they trained over 400 teachers to be emotionally intelligent educators to facilitate a creative learning environment in their classrooms. Through an app WoW, they support the teachers and keep in touch by providing training videos and other interesting material.
S2M team has enabled over 30,000 young children to read with skill and will. Today there are 20 full-time employees strong and work with freelancers in different cities across India.
They also launched Freadom, an android app to help parents and children in grades 1-3 bond over small activities around reading.
It gave pride and fulfillment in his work after he received feedback from parents and teachers. One parent told S2M that his child won the spelling bee at his school because of their programme and one headmistress said that her teachers have become more effective and efficient leaders because of S2M.
You are doing a great work Kavish. We wish you to succeed in building a nation of readers.