About Us
A curated collection of conversations, insights, and practices shaping gender-transformative education. Each of our issues is a dialogue between theory, experience, and change.
ABOUT BREAKTHROUGH
Breakthrough is working towards shifting social norms that enable and promote gender based violence and discrimination. In the last 26 years, our work on culture change has evolved towards working with adolescents and youth, in schools and in communities, aiming for a generational shift in reducing norms that perpetuate violence and discrimination.
At Breakthrough, we work with nearly 2.3 million adolescents in schools and communities to mould gender norms and beliefs before they solidify into behaviour. As we build their capacity by fostering aspiration, leadership, agency and negotiation skills, we enable a generational shift towards a gender-equal culture.
Our mission is led by young people aged 11 to 24. As they rise against gender-based violence, we also support them with media tools that shape public narratives and inspire people to build a world of equality, dignity and justice.
ABOUT ENGENDERING EDUCATION
Education has a significant transformational power. Gender Transformative Education System (GTES) moves beyond just access to education, and rethinks gender norms and binaries, raises critical consciousness about inequalities, biases and stereotypes not only amongst students but also teachers, school administration, parents and other stakeholders. Such a system is also in sync with the United Nations’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), especially Goal 4 (particularly Target 4.7) and Goal 5 (Target 5.1) that talks about inclusive and quality education for ensuring gender justice for adolescents and young people in all their diversity. As Breakthrough, we believe that GTES will go a long way in removing barriers and boost progress and aspirations for adolescents and young people.
In keeping with Breakthrough’s vision, we present to you the Engendering Education magazine which is a first-of-its-kind pedagogical intervention that brings together sectoral experts, practitioners and thought leaders.
Through the conversations featured in the magazine, we aim to create a comprehensive compendium of practices, experiences and curriculums that rethink academic learning and prepares gender-just citizens for tomorrow. We hope that this magazine will meet some of the long pending needs for a more holistic dialogue on intersectional education practices and experiences.
Commissioning Editor
Urvashi Sarkar is the Commissioning Editor of Engendering Education. She is an independent journalist based in Mumbai and writes on international affairs, power and governance, nuclear energy, and climate change. She has worked with The Indian Express and The Hindu and freelances for several publications. She is a visiting faculty for journalism and public policy. Urvashi is a recipient of the SCARF media mental health awards, ICRC-PII award for humanitarian reporting on climate change and the Laadli Media Award for gender sensitivity in reporting. She has been a fellow with the People’s Archive of Rural India, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and UN Raham al Farra Memorial Journalism fellowship programme.
EDITORIAL TEAM
Saswati Chatterjee
Saswati Chatterjee is Manager – Campaign and Social Media Engagement at Breakthrough. She has worked in the development sector for ten years and works on content creation and communication. She is interested in feminism, technology, gender and more.
Pritha Chatterjee
Pritha Chatterjee leads the work on Global Positioning in Breakthrough. In Breakthrough she anchors the work with different national and global alliances pushing a common agenda to create a feminist ecosystem. She has been a speaker in different conferences such as SVRI, Women Deliver, Beijing +30 etc . She is an active member of the Asia Network to End GBV , a CSO-led network to prevent and respond to gender-based violence (GBV).
Epti Pattnaik
With over a decade of experience in multimedia production and digital campaigns, Epti is the Senior Manager, Multimedia & Digital at Breakthrough. Over the past 13 years, she has worked extensively on digital storytelling projects-directing, producing, and shooting a wide range of multimedia content, including documentary films, corporate videos, podcasts, and ad films. As the Creative Director of Keeping It Feminist, Fursat Mein Serious Baatein and Assistant Director for #StandUp4Migrant by UNHCR, an animated storytelling initiative calling on people to stand up for the human rights of all migrants, she has contributed to and led projects that explore critical conversations around gender, labour, migration, pop culture, and gender-progressive storytelling.
Babita Pinto
Babita Pinto is a development professional, specialized in humanitarian aid and communications. In Breakthrough, she steers the government partnerships, promoting Gender Transformative agenda for system strengthening. Her approach combines field-level insights with strategic thinking to drive sustainable, inclusive change. She was the Asia Representative to the Women’s Leadership and Equality Committee for Caritas Internationalis at the global level for 2 years.