Recognition in every form brings a lot of satisfaction to the work done and the Omidyar Network Award is an example of this. The purpose of the Network Award, first awarded at last year’s ONEF, is to recognize and celebrate those members of the Omidyar Network portfolio who have embodied and demonstrated network leadership in their sector and among their own communities – whether in collaboration with other members of the Omidyar Network community, external partners, or as individuals.

Finalists and winners were evaluated based on the SCALE criteria:
Sharing – Regular dissemination of relevant learning’s to others who are likely to benefit.
Collaborating – Working with others on problems or opportunities of mutual interest.
Assembling – Convening others for meetings and conferences that drive measurable action.
Leading – Serving as a network leader by advancing collective network goals, promoting cross-network achievements, celebrating network, milestones and otherwise demonstrating the values of a networked leader.
Energizing – Nurturing the network by building excitement and momentum.

Over the last year, Akshara has demonstrated leadership, innovation and stewardship in the area of public pre and primary school education in India. Akshara has also created partnerships and networks to create both scale and depth of engagement with the space and drive sustainable change in public education in Karnataka.

Gautam John receiving the Omidyar Network 2013 Award,on behalf of Akshara Foundation,from Mr. Pierre Omidyar

Sharing:
The Akshara Foundation makes all of its programmatic work content available under Creative Commons licenses, freely shares its expertise and training and makes much of its data and code available under open licenses for other organizations to build on.

Collaborating:
Over the last year, Akshara has anchored a Creative Dialogue on the 8th where multiple organizations, collectively, grappled with the question: How do we nurture and resource the children of Bangalore for a self-sustaining life? The collective insights and capabilities of the participants presented uncommon expertise and perspective and through a co-creative process have begun to essential value drivers and drive a multi-stakeholder change process.

Assembling:
Akshara has used multiple opportunities to bring together various stakeholders in the public education space – the Creative Dialogue, as detailed above, an annual TEDxChange event that has brought together a diverse set of voices tackling multiple problems and internal colloquiums featuring external experts.

Leading:
Akshara has positioned the Karnataka Learning Partnership as a multi-partner, multi-stakeholder platform that is poised to be the leading driver of change in the public education space in Karnataka. Indeed, our expertise has been drawn upon from diverse parts of India and across the world. Our programs and software platforms have found use across India and the world.

Energizing:
Under the Together We Can banner, Akshara launched a campaign to highlight success stories in public education to energize the larger ecosystem and to show that change is possible – indeed, it already exists. The campaign reflects Akshara’s efforts to replicate a collaborative model of education and it is a focused effort to extend a helping hand to all individuals and organizations that work towards this common goal.

The Omidyar Network Award has been extremely encouraging and Akshara Foundation aims to keep working on their crusade to better pre-schools and primary schools because we at Akshara firmly believe in our motto “Every child in school and learning well”.

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