Sthree Jyothi is the federation of women' groups in our organization. There are 1830 women groups working in all 7 regions. Many awareness classes and training programmes are conducted in these groups. Issues like torture of women, dowry, alcoholism etc. are taken up by Sthree Jyothi.
One of the key focus areas of NIDS is gender development. Women and child development commission could move forward to a great extend in the efforts to ensure the integral development of women and children by organizing various awareness programmes, trainings and action programmes. Several seminars are conducted every year on various aspects of women leadership.
Training programmes are conducted in order to improve the entrepreneurial skills of women. A socio-political leadership course was organized. Training to women on cycling and auto driving was organized. Those who learned cycling were given cycles.
This is a special programme conducted in collaboration with Caritas India to organize and promote socio-politic leadership among women at the grass root level. As per the programme women from Self Help Groups (SHGs) are given special training.
Poor unemployed women are assisted to taker up income generation programmes after successful completion of training with revolving fund. Many women started for income generation programmes with revolving fund assistance.
Widows in our operational area are one of the most marginalised people. We organize them into different groups and conduct awareness classes and income generation programmes for mainstreaming them.
117 nursery schools function under NIDS with the aim of promoting the integral development of poor children. These nurseries follow an alternative and balanced nature friendly syllabus. All the study materials and text books are prepared by NIDS. Regular Onam and Christmas celebrations, vegitable gardening, cleaning programmes etc are conducted through the nursery schools. Arts festival both for children and teachers, are conducted every year to bring out different talents amoung them. The regular monthly evaluation and yearly refresher courses guarantee the efficiency of our teachers.
Many teachers and helpers work in our nursery schools. Every year refresher trainings are conducted for both teachers and helpers. A one month training programme is conducted every year and the participants are awarded with certificates of Janasikshan Sanstan, Government of India. Every month they come together to evaluate the progress and prepare the lessons as a team. A welfare fund, introduced in the year 2000, for the welfare of the nursery workers is enhancing.