https://communityinitiative.in/
Founded: 2002
Geographical Focus: Manipur
Organization Overview:
Centre for Community Initiative’s (CCI) leader Pauzagin Tonsing’s personal experience with his son, who was born with a disability, prompted him to work with Children with Disabilities(CwD), specifically in Manipur, where there is a huge gap in infrastructure, community support and resources for disability. CCI focuses on building community ownership and agency in several ways. While working with CwDs, they take an individualized approach to building a customized plan for each child. To ensure the child can receive the support required, they engage and capacitate different stakeholders in a community. With parents, they heavily engage in identifying needs, monitoring progress, forming parents’ groups, training them to advocate with different authorities for the rights of CwDs, facilitating access to special educator learning courses and providing counselling. They also train the staff of government and private schools in the area to enable the inclusion of CwDs in mainstream education facilities. In addition, CCI also runs a school for children with disabilities to ensure that access to education is not hampered.