Indus Action, Saajha, Trickle Up, Rocket Learning, and IDinsight are partnering with a shared mission: the Care to Play program will provide capabilities of caregiving and opportunities for early education for more than five million vulnerable children in India, resulting in pathways out of poverty.

Nearly 90% of Indian children are born into families that struggle with substantial poverty. In this stressful economic context, caregivers — including parents and pre-school teachers — are only able to engage with their 3-6-year-olds for 30 minutes a day (25% of the desired time). As a result, these children lack access to stimulating environments in their early years, leading to opportunity gaps that grow over time and locking them into inter-generational poverty traps.

To solve this challenge, Care to Play (a partnership between Indus Action, Saajha, Trickle Up, Rocket Learning, and IDinsight in India), aims to provide early childhood education for five million vulnerable children, creating thriving environments for their families and resulting in pathways out of poverty.

Care to Play will achieve this through Parent Engagement Groups — building the capacity, connection, and assets of caregivers, as well as leveraging the services of government pre-school systems — to create a replicable model for all children in India.

(This content was originally posted to Lever for Change, last updated August 2023.)

Trickle Up is excited about this new partnership to layer our livelihoods experience with early childhood development support with this innovative consortium.

Read about the first of our ‘brain trust’ meetings with the partners of this project here.