India has seen multiple educational headlines this year, emerging on the backdrop of newer technologies that are disrupting workforces faster than anyone could have ever imagined. While we’ve made substantial growth on foundational literacy and numeracy and our poverty numbers have gotten better, our demographic dividend, long heralded as our biggest opportunity, is at risk of fading. Underlying all this is an Indian educational system that must rise to the challenge.

We, at The Circle, believe that work begins and ends within our schools. Reinvention, beyond starting anew, demands the wisdom to know when to innovate and when to replicate. Over the last year, we’ve launched new schools and programs in Uttarakhand, Punjab, Ladakh, and Manipur and deepened our presence in Karnataka, Maharashtra, and the Delhi - UP belt, where 50% of our models now reside. We are now working with 8000 kids through 31 models. To ensure our greatest learnings are finding their way into the hands of educators, our Labs programs have engaged with more than 5500 educators. We also launched our third flagship program: CircleU, an aspiring teachers’ college that’s offering a one-year signature course for new teachers and teacher coaches, beginning with 126 participants coming from 15 states. These efforts are empowering kids to not just climb out of poverty, but to thrive and become future changemakers.

As we enter another year, we recognize that realizing an ambitious vision for India will demand more. We’re moving faster, working more closely with local governments, and paving the foundations for deeper, systemic change. None of these steps could have been taken without a supporter like yourself. Reinvention takes a community and I want to say a big thank you for having the courage and the fortitude to be on this journey with us.

Sandeep Rai