When the going gets tough, the tough get going…

Shiva Jayagopal 

The year 2020 has been a tough year in more ways than one. Till then, at WinVinaya Foundation, we used to train Persons with Disabilities with various innovative practices – Soft Skills through Physical Games, Digital Evaluation, Face to Face Mock Interviews by Industry Experts, Inclusive Programs for kids and adults through dance, drama & songs; Training by experts and more…    

The unprecedented lockdown announced in March pretty much-changed everything. And whatever worked till then had to be either dropped or re-imagined completely.  

But then, WinVinaya’s team, friends, and supporters are not weak-hearted.  Within just a few weeks of lockdown, we launched WinVinaya Academy – a digital learning platform on the cloud which enabled our candidates to learn anytime, anywhere.  Our friends at Amphisoft provided the digital platform for free; With Yunikee, we created courses in Indian Sign Language; With Chipper Sage, we launched the English Learning Courses.  Now, we have courses in Java, MySQL, English, Banking, MS-Excel both in English Medium and Indian Sign Language medium.  We will be adding more in the days to come.  

Our trainers, on the other hand, had to work from home along with taking care of their families.  The number of companies recruiting PWDs dropped drastically, and we had to reimagine the entire training and placement framework. As a leap towards achieving this, we introduced:  

• An enhanced process of Infrastructure Readiness, and Career Counselling with candidates to check their readiness and interest in Virtual Learning 
• Daily meetings with candidates, trainers, and employees through MS Teams, Zoom, Google Meet; WhatsApp Groups for clarifying questions/ doubts. 
• Organized digital mock interviews along with waiting rooms, multiple rounds – with internal teams and corporate volunteers. 
• Provided Soft Skill training through online games, storytelling, and Inclusive events by interns. 
• Created placement focus group to connect with more companies, research and add more placement question papers, intense mentoring to prepare students better  
• And more… 

Prior to the pandemic, we used to train about 100 candidates a year.  In an uncertain and challenging time like this, we have trained 150 candidates in 9 months – 50% more social impact in 25% less time.  We also launched the Edu-Connect Program to share the digital platform and our best practices, with inclusive schools and colleges so that foundational skills like English, Coding (yes! coding is a foundational skill) can be taught much earlier, equipping them for the future ahead.  

We want to co-create new courses along with corporates which will be a win-win to companies and candidates, train teachers in schools and colleges in industry-ready skills to magnify the impact, reach out to more people for financial support, and more…  If you are interested to learn more or help us in any way, drop an email to info@WinVinayaFoundation.org and we will get in touch with you.  

We are NOT interested in just surviving during the hard times.  We want to dream Big, set Bold Goals, and reach out to the Stars…
“When the going gets tough, the tough get going…”