“Open source is a philosophy and a movement, and what makes open source thrive is the community that grows up around it.” says Abby Kerns in The Newstack. Community has no physical or geographical definition but rather is defined by a shared attitude, interest and goal and spans  geography, religion and political affiliations. Stories are the soul of open-source platforms, which prompt children to rapid fluency in their mother tongue, before they can read simple sentences in English. 

Illustration by Huynh Thi Kim Lien for 'Don't Wake the Baby!' 

Pratham Books’ StoryWeaver and Room to Read are partnering to combine the power of open, community and stories so that children can read over 400 storybooks in English, Bengali, Chinyanja, Chitonga, Hindi, Khmer, Lao, Marathi, Nepali, Sepedi, Sinhala, SiSwati, Kiswahili, Tamil, and Vietnamese. “Room to Read and Pratham Books share a common commitment to providing underserved children with high quality storybooks. We are delighted to have Room to Read’s books on our digital platform, StoryWeaver,  which are now available under open licences, so that children everywhere can discover the joy of reading”, says Suzanne Singh, Chairperson Pratham Books.

Room to Read is a non-profit organization that seeks to transform the lives of millions of children in low-income countries by focusing on literacy and gender equality in education. Founded on the belief that “world change starts with educated children," the organization focuses on working in collaboration with local communities, partner organizations and governments to develop literacy skills and a habit of reading among primary school children. 

They have partnered with StoryWeaver to publish 200 of their original language titles and their English versions on the StoryWeaver platform under the Creative Commons CC BY 4.0 license. The StoryWeaver team has worked closely with Room to Read on editing these titles for publishing in Engalish, doing image enhancements and migrating the books to the platform. Alisha Berger, Global Publisher at Room to Read says “We are thrilled to partner with Pratham Books’ StoryWeaver to bring our books into the digital space for the first time. We hope these 400 openly-licensed books will inspire, motivate, and share the joy of reading with the wide and engaged audience on Storyweaver, as well as showcase Room to Read’s 20-year commitment to making exciting and fun books for children in their local languages.” 

Having these storybooks under the CC BY license on StoryWeaver takes these Room to Read stories to a larger audience, worldwide. At the same time, it gives the StoryWeaver community new stories to read and translate, thereby giving children around the world access to more stories in their mother tongue. Many of these stories have already been versioned into other languages like Punjabi, Filipino, Malayalam, French, Italian and others. Here’s hoping the stories continue to grow so as to put a book in every child’s hand. 

If you would like to partner with us please write to [email protected] 

Be the first to comment.

---

UPDATE: This position has been filled

---

About Us:

Pratham Books (www.prathambooks.org) is a not-for-profit children's book publisher that was set up in 2004 to publish good quality, affordable books in many Indian languages. Our mission is to see ‘a book in every child’s hand’ and we have spread the joy of reading to millions of children in India. As a publisher serving every child in India, Pratham Books has always pushed the boundaries when it comes to exploring innovative ways in which to create access to joyful stories and have been fortunate in finding partners to collaborate with who share this vision.

In 2015, Pratham Books increased its footprint by going digital. StoryWeaver, is a digital platform that hosts stories in languages from India and beyond so that every child can have an endless stream of stories in her mother tongue to read and enjoy. The stories can be read, translated, versioned, or downloaded for free. All stories on the platform are openly licensed.

Illustration by Vibha Surya from Shruthi Floats an Idea, written by Navin Dorairaju, published by Pratham Books

We are looking for a Partnerships Manager - StoryWeaver

In the last few years, we have increased our impact by investing deeply in technology-based initiatives to further our mission. At StoryWeaver, we aim to do this by reaching out to more organisations, more educators, and many more children across the world - through our digital content. 

We are looking for a passionate individual to lead the StoryWeaver Partnerships function to make our impact wider by forging strategic partnerships with organisations that promote reading and learning among children. The Partnerships Manager will be responsible for strategising and executing plans to increase the user base of StoryWeaver and also provide the necessary resources, support, and training to the partner network.

 Key Responsibilities:

 New Partnerships and Key Account Management:

• Build and manage accounts with governmental and non-profit organisations and strategise, design, and execute plans to nurture sustained partnerships with them
• Expand and nurture networks of partners working with children and/or educators in the field of ed-tech 
• Identify and engage in-depth with key high-stake partners to understand their programmes, their impact, and provide content resources/training/support tailored to specific needs of partners 
• Implement strategies and initiatives to ensure large-scale adoption of new offerings through the network of partners
• Represent StoryWeaver at relevant platforms and events while being the SPOC for government and large-scale partnerships
• Analyse and interpret platform and partner data from the platform to devise and develop the strategy for the vertical

 Content Curation and/or Development: 

• Project manage collaboration with partners and external subject matter experts to curate and/or develop curriculum-based offerings for existing and prospective partners 
• Liaison with educational organisations, governmental partners, and teachers on curating content based on curriculum and structured frameworks

Others: 

• Provide information, feedback, and support to the internal product team for the development of new product offerings
• Maintain documentation for the various processes under the Partnerships function and to help with research and documentation for impact assessment
• Lead and manage a team to ensure a wide network of Indian and International partners 

  Required skills and experiences: 

• 7+ years of work experience in Education, Outreach, Partnerships, or related areas
• Direct experience working with teachers and/or in classrooms
• Experience in content design/development and training in the areas of literacy and primary education
• Exceptional communication and project-management/organisational skills 
• Proven ability to build consensus and work effectively within a cross-departmental team     
• Ability to network and make connections

Nice to have but not mandatory: 

1.      Experience working with non-profits     

2.      An interest in children’s literature, languages, and publishing

3.      Experience or interest in researching/documenting education/literacy programmes

Location: 

This is a full-time position is based out of Bangalore

Compensation: 

Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience.

 Write to us:

Email your resume with Partnerships Manager- StoryWeaver in the subject line to [email protected]. Also, send us a short paragraph on why you think you are suitable for the position.

comments (2)

---

StoryWeaver is a digital repository of openly-licensed, multilingual children's stories. A Pratham Books' initiative, StoryWeaver allows its users to read, create and translate stories into many, many Indian and international languages in the hope that children across the world can read quality stories in languages of their choice.

                                            

(Image by Nina Sabnani, from 'Counting on Moru' by Rukmini Banerji.)

As the stories on StoryWeaver are travelling further, we need more hands on board! Currently, we're looking for a full-time, Editorial Assistant to join our Digital Team in Bengaluru.

Job description

StoryWeaver is looking for an editorial assistant. The position involves, working with the editorial team, to adapt books for the digital platform, maintain quality on the platform and perform administrative and editorial tasks.

Required Skill-set

• Good communication skills in English

• Work with the StoryWeaver team to maintain quality on the platform

• Ability to tag stories and images before uploading on StoryWeaver

• Coordinate with the administrative team for documentation, records and payments

• Ability to maintain and document day-to- day editorial assignments

• Ability to multitask, meet tight deadlines and be team player

Desirable

• Degree in Literature/Journalism/Mass Communication/Media /Language

• Tech savvy with a sharp eye and love for languages

Experience

• 1-2 years work experience would be good, but freshers may also apply.

Location

This is a full time position in our Bengaluru office.

Salary will be commensurate with qualifications and experience. Please send your resume and sample of work to [email protected] with Editorial Assistant - StoryWeaver in the subject line of the email.

We look forward to hearing from you!

 

Be the first to comment.

---