Performance indicators, covering the themes of infrastructure, teaching and non-teaching staff, scholastic achievement of the children, community involvement, and budgeting and other financials, were developed through a four-step process involving all stakeholders – citizens, BMP administration, parents, teachers, elected representatives and advocacy groups and these have been benchmarked against the best in practice. Score cards are created for each school to identify the areas of work and accordingly an action plan for intervention is designed and executed to improve service delivery in the selected schools. This exercise advocates following a Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle till the ailing public school system gains a level of competence in the delivery of quality education that we can be proud of.

First on the list is the improvement of toilets and equipping the 12 schools with better drinking water facilities. Teacher training sessions have been conducted by Akshara in collaboration with The Teacher’s Foundation for 28 teachers and 9 Head Teachers focusing on personal and professional development. Remedial education classes in reading have been conducted for students as required, following their performance in baseline tests conducted by Akshara. Libraries have been set up in 9 of 12 schools to encourage and reinforce reading habit among children. Parent Teacher meetings are being organized in schools to increase the involvement of the parents.

Since its inception in July 2003, PROOF in Education has come a long way. In the year 2004 and 2005, it created score cards to highlight the areas of achievement and concern in the schools which helps the Education Department in the process of budget allocation. An average improvement of 28% in school scores were recorded from July 2004 to Dec 2005 across all schools.
The PROOF campaign is based on the premise that in a well-functioning democracy, it is important for citizens to keep a check on government performance, so that they will be motivated to deliver better services. Education has for long been ignored in India. The PROOF in Education campaign aims to change this, with co-operation from the government, schools and the community.