The Minds Behind Rangeet: Simran Mulchandani & Karishma Menon Share Their Story

An Exclusive Interview with Simran Mulchandani & Karishma Menon, Co- Founders of Rangeet

We recently interviewed Simran Mulchandani and Karishma Menon, the innovative Co-Founders of Rangeet.

They shared their inspiring journey, the vision behind their unique venture, and how they’re making a significant impact in the creative learning space. This conversation offers valuable insights into their entrepreneurial spirit and Rangeet’s mission.

Simran, you’ve worn many hats to impact investors, entrepreneurs, and changemakers. What sparked the idea for Rangeet? Was there a personal moment or insight that pushed you in this direction?

“We are solving the problems of a previous generation
Is Maths useful if there are no animals left to count?
We teach children language, but what if there are no forests left to describe?”
-Sean Bellamy, Advisory Board – Rangeet

A ten year old girl in a public school in Mumbai inspired me to believe I could take action instead of being a spectator.  Teaching at an under-resourced school shone a light on how most children, born into poverty, are victims of a birth lottery, and are in situations they might never find their way out of.      

Digging deeper we found that this is not a resource issue, it is a systemic issue. Across socio-economic strata, those lucky enough to receive a “decent” education are still being taught in the same rote manner of 25-50 years ago.

Five years ago, we were told that every child needs to learn to code. Today AI will do it for you.

I began to think:

How will education serve children in a world disrupted by AI and other technologies? How will they be prepared for a world plagued by mental health, societal justice, climate issues, digital addictions? How helpless and anxious will they feel?

These are the questions that plagued me as I witnessed children in schools, saw my city’s pristine mangrove coastline and flamingo reserves ravaged and destroyed over the years in the name of progress.

And I resolved that I must do something, and that’s how Rangeet was born.

Karishma, what drew you to co-create something like Rangeet that sits at the intersection of social-emotional learning, ecology, and equity?

I hated school; worst years of my life. For those who excel academically, school can be amazing, but for someone like me, who struggled, school is a brutal place. Every test score chipped away at my confidence and I felt like I didn’t belong. Even today that feeling follows me and I struggle with confidence.

I often question my purpose on this planet. How can I make an impact? I just may have found it through the work we do at Rangeet. I see the world in pictures, colours, designs. How many other children out there are like me? How can I make them feel like they matter enough and belong in a classroom?

How can I make them feel like their intelligence is just as beautiful as their classmates who excel at math? And finally, how do I enable teachers to rediscover the reason they became teachers in the first place: to know that one child breathed easier or felt like they belonged because of them.

The SEEK (Social Emotional Ecological Knowledge) framework feels both timely and expansive. How did you arrive at the three pillars of Self, Society and Ecology? And why these specifically?

Rangeet is a very personal journey. At the start we had no education experience, we had no baggage, frameworks or pre-conceived ideas. Our motivation was simple: we aimed to tackle the things we saw in the world that we didn’t like, and change them through education. We had a clean slate to work with.

Around us we saw a lack of physical, emotional and mental health; societal injustice, digital addictions and a negative narrative around the climate crisis. In addition we saw an education system that was understandably unable to evolve at a pace rapid enough to meet the shifting challenges of the world.

We wondered – what would happen to the fabric of society when children arrive at the job market of 2030/40/50 to find themselves ill equipped and unprepared?  

Our first teaching materials were a set of workshops that tackled issues important to us like gender, discrimination, bullying, mental health, climate change. We listened to teachers, incorporated their feedback and kept improving the product adhering to learning engineering principles.

The SEEK Curriculum and technology were born, and started to get shaped by the very community that would use it.

Through copious research and expert input we arrived at the following understanding: wellbeing isn’t just a mental health issue; wellbeing is the actions that one can take to address one’s physical, emotional and mental health; the fairness we see in the world, digital media addictions and the climate crisis.

And this helped us arrive at our biggest drivers – to develop a curriculum that is taught at a regular cadence (because repetition and regularity is important for learning concepts) and fosters agency – i.e. the ability to take action. Nothing drives greater competence, confidence and ability than a deep belief in oneself.

As important as the three pillars is the idea of skill development. Brookings Institution October 2020 (What Children Need to Learn and How They Learn Best – Kathy Hirsh-Pasek et al) articulates the “breadth of skills” children need to thrive (amongst others: communication, collaboration, content, creativity, critical thinking, confidence, resilience, growth mindset, flexibility) and how they learn best (through immersive play-based pedagogy).

Similarly, the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report stresses similar skills for future success. Hence, we thought about and designed SEEK to have primary and secondary effects.

Every curriculum element not only develops agency, and therefore, wellbeing around the areas laid out above, but skills vital to thrive. All of this is done using the latest in international learning science.

How does this work in practice: consider “The Social Life of Trees” – a six part SEEK story book that primarily teaches children about the unfathomable magic of forests and the role every living being plays in maintaining planetary health.

Dig deeper and you learn that it can be used to not only teach SEEK, but in a biology class, a language class and also develops skills such as communication, collaboration, creativity and confidence.

This is Rangeet’s evolution till date: a digital platform for teachers featuring the SEEK curriculum that develops wellbeing and agency in children around physical emotional and mental health, societal equity, digital citizenship and the climate crisis; while fostering the skills vital to thrive in a world changing faster than we understand it.

SEL is becoming a bit of a buzzword, but often gets lost in translation in the Indian classroom. What does it really look like when implemented meaningfully, say, in a government school or an NGO-led program?

To have real meaning in practice, it’s important for teachers to be trained on not just how to teach the curriculum but WHY they should.

They are inspired through a two hour workshop style training session, inducted into the Rangeet SEEKer community (to feel a sense of purpose and belonging) and are hand held through the academic year by Rangeet coaches.

And 500,000 students later, this is what a Rangeet classroom looks like in any setting – from the most privileged schools to community centres in tin sheds in rice fields:

Whilst most textbooks are simply black letters staring back at children, we wanted to ensure that through SEEK, children enter a colourfully illustrated world filled with poetry, stories, games, experiments and craft activities where the desired outcome isn’t a score on 100, rather knowledge of how to care for their mental and physical health, the importance of kindness and empathy and how to love, respect and protect nature and all the incredible beings that we share this planet with.  

So that children are prepared with skills they need to tackle the future and empowered with agency to take control of their own wellbeing.

Your programs run in very diverse settings, from Ranchi to Dehradun, even in Bangladesh. How does Rangeet adapt to such different realities? Can you share a classroom moment that really stayed with you?

In an Uttarakhand classroom run by Vaishali ma’am of Aasraa Trust, we met 10 year old Deepak who had just completed the Beyond Pink and Blue module that deals with gender equity.

Deepak was outraged that his 15 year old neighbour Sarika was being forced to marry and would then be denied education. He approached his teacher and shared his concerns.

Together teacher and student spoke with the parents involved, and prevented the marriage. Karishma and I were there in person, we heard this story.

Our hair stood on end. We had not imagined this kind of impact. And I don’t think little Deepak understands the real impact he has had on Sarika’s life.

Rangeet was developed to work in any setting. And by listening to teachers it has been continuously adapted and improved so that it can be transacted anywhere, anytime by anyone.

What this looks like in practice is that in a poorly resourced school, features like offline mode and the fact that Rangeet is mobile first mean that connectivity and electricity are not pre requisites, and resources that need to be shown to children (since the app is only in the hands of the teacher) are delivered via accompanying printed booklets (no tech in the hands of children!).

Whilst in a school with SMART TVs and SMART boards, the app allows teachers to bookmark activities and then screen-cast them easily so that children can interact with SEEK’s stories, poems and games on their in-class tech.

In all cases, Rangeet works by utilising available system resources, rather than placing onerous requirements on the user which ultimately creates friction in respect of adoption.

Through the academic year, feedback is collected through the app and coaches regularly visit schools to handhold and guide teachers.

This didn’t happen overnight though. It happened through a systematic program of active listening and feedback. Consider teachers from a Ranchi government school during COVID who inspired our “SEARCH” function which allows SEEK activities to be adopted in any core subject; or those from Cathedral and John Connon School and J.B. Petit Mumbai who have actively shaped how Rangeet is delivered via SMART boards and remain engaged with us to now test out the new AI chatbot which helps address teacher wellbeing – because a happy teacher is a happy classroom.

We adapt to different realities by immersing ourselves and openly listening to people who live that reality and through this process keep developing ever improving functionality that will serve all teachers and all children everywhere.

A lot of edtech still assumes access to devices or connectivity. But you’ve gone the facilitation-first route. What led to that decision, and how has it played out on the ground?

The requirement of devices and connectivity is based on the misplaced notion that technology can replace teachers. If anything, COVID proved this was further from the truth than one can imagine.

Now the widespread use of large language models like ChatGPT do our thinking for us; this is already showing reduced brain activity in users as per a recent MIT study.

We humans cannot compete with robots where it comes to computational speed, storage/recall of facts and large amounts of data.

But we have something that no computer has: the power to be human. And only a teacher (and families) through human interaction, care and emotion can foster this precious characteristic in children.

Hence, while during COVID edtech went through a boom (and then predictably bust) situation – we remained steadfast.

We remained committed to the notion that teachers are the greatest agents of change, and that everything  we do must be to enable them, make their lives easier to the extent we can and put them first. The platform, as described above, is designed for them in mind.

You’ve trained over 18,000 facilitators. What’s been your biggest learning from working so closely with teachers and community workers?

In 2023, the National Curriculum Framework (NCF 2023) had just been made publicly available and experiential learning and wellbeing were embedded at its core.

Oxford University Press India (OUPI) approached Rangeet after hearing about our curriculum, wanting to explore if we would author a work book series called “My Happiness and Me” for Grades 1-8 modelled on SEEK.

In December 2023 the series was launched with a webinar that was attended by 5,000 teachers from around the country.

What was the most recurrent feedback we received from teachers? “We love the series and really believe it’s necessary – but why are you only thinking about students? What about us?”

The biggest learnings are often the most obvious. Teachers are the agents of change that shape children – our future. They are struggling with heavy workloads, tons of admin work and often have no support systems.

If we don’t have happy teachers, then how do we expect to have happy learning environments? We are putting in all our resources, time and money into thinking about improving learning systems for children and are simply ignoring teachers’ wellbeing.

This is why Rangeet is launching the SEEKer Summit on July 31st in Mumbai. We are bringing together 150 teachers from a variety of schools to co-design a community that will serve to listen to and empower teachers – focussing on their wellbeing.

At the inaugural SEEKer Summit Rangeet will be unveiling Sara – a chatbot designed with Mon Brokman and his team at Behavioural Foresight (BF).

BF is a performance and health intelligence company that develops holistic practices, products and enduring hacks for everyday living. Amongst BF’s clients are the Indian Women’s Hockey team and some prominent cricket players.

BF and Rangeet want to partner to empower the most important workforce in our country – teachers – essentially democratising access to the same practices that elite athletes have to live their best lives.

And so this is our learning: whilst we focus on our future leaders, carers and learners – we are remiss to not focus on the stewards who shape their minds and hearts: our dear noble teachers.

Many teachers say SEEK changed how they engage with students. What are they telling you, and what shifts have you seen in classrooms after a few weeks or months?

We’ve heard a lot of promising stories, ranging from behavioural changes in students to changes in the teachers’ own pedagogical methods and planning.

For example, a third-grade teacher in Mumbai told us about a day when she was teaching from the SEEK Umbrella ‘Society’, about discrimination. After the activities, a young girl shared that she had seen it in her village, where men eat first, followed by the children, and the women eat last.

Her classmate, a boy, then mentioned that he had observed something similar at home, where the men eat first and the women always eat last. The teacher was impressed to see that the children understood the concept so well.

Meanwhile, a teacher in Pune called the SEEK curriculum transformative, saying if they consistently teach it to their students, they believe they’d grow into individuals who are respectful, kind, and harmonious members of society.

Another said: “Rangeet classes are fun and engaging for children. They eagerly look forward to these sessions and enjoy the activities while learning important societal values.”

Recently, a primary school teacher in Mumbai shared that earlier, students at her school were primarily focused only on academics and lacked broader exposure.

However, since the implementation of Rangeet, there has been a remarkable shift: “Our students have become more self-aware and conscious of their surroundings. They’ve grown so confident and engaged that they are now capable of conducting Rangeet sessions independently.”

She mentioned that she tried letting students lead a session once, and they did extremely well. The students are now well-versed in concepts such as gender, bullying, and how to effectively intervene in bullying situations.

This has even allowed the teachers to plan better for the mandatory ‘Anandi Shanivar’ days in school, as they can implement a meaningful session through Rangeet.

Lastly, a primary school teacher told us that Rangeet has made the process of guiding children easier with the SEEK curriculum. “Everything is ready, we just need to go through the material and teach.

The structure and content make our job smoother.” She highlighted that through Rangeet, students are not only exposed to a wide range of values, but also introduced to different countries and cultures, which adds depth and excitement to their learning journey. “Our students love being part of Rangeet classes. They genuinely look forward to them.”

Your impact numbers are powerful,  from increased empathy in teachers to better gender sensitivity among students. But beyond the data, what are some of the most surprising or heartwarming outcomes you didn’t expect when you started this journey?

Along with the story of the boy who campaigned to stop child marriage, there are a myriad heartwarming outcomes. Top of mind, some of them are:

Teachers in rural Rajasthan would typically refer to their students as son of X or daughter of Y e.g. “Rajesh ka ladka”; “Laxmi ki beti”. Our Hello Song—which is a song sung at the beginning of every class and is inclusive as it names every child had a surprising outcome—teachers began calling their students by name which leads to greater sense of self and identity.

Outside Alwar, a group of students who had undergone the Ecology lessons, used their newly discovered knowledge and agency to campaign for water conservation. They managed to then convince their elders to build a tube well which led to considerably less water wastage.

Across the board, we are seeing teacher pedagogy improving. Teachers from all contexts are feeling inspired by play-based pedagogies and are including these in core subjects e.g. teaching geometry using playdough to learn about shapes.

This is the beginning of systems level change. When acknowledged and empowered, and most importantly when teachers feel heard and included, the results are remarkable, and education is the winner.

What’s next for Rangeet? Are you looking to go deeper in India or scale internationally? And how do you see SEEK fitting into the broader conversation around NEP and 21st-century learning?

There are over 260 million students in schools. They hail from a myriad of contexts and cultures, study in a multitude of languages, are enrolled in schools with varying resources and have teachers with different levels of training.

The size and scope of the problem in India is mind boggling and it is a challenge we are committing ourselves to.

Speaking with the president of one of the largest philanthropic organizations in the world, we agreed that we have to be courageous to solve these problems, not get caught in analysis paralysis but aim to deploy our program and keep learning by  iterating; because the present generation cannot wait for future facing education like Rangeet’s SEEK.

Our primary focus will remain India. However there are other countries in the Global South that we have a presence in e.g. Bangladesh, Nigeria and South Africa.

India’s NEP 2020 seeks to transform the educational landscape in response to the fragmentation in the world caused by digital addictions, AI disruption, social inequity and ecological breakdown. NCF2023 has included and emphasised cognitive, social, emotional and ethical development of students.

Rangeet’s SEEK is research-based and has proactively been designed keeping these priorities in mind. A mapping of SEEK to NEP2020/NCF2023 has already been done and its relevance in today’s educational landscape has further been established.

If you could change one thing about how education is imagined in India today, what would it be?

A classmate drifted through school. He was social and popular but didn’t find his groove academically. School lacked meaning for him.

Years later in his forties he discovered his passion for photography and then art. Now in his fifties he is gaining prominence as an artist with a very unique style, with his paintings being sold nationally.

This story leads me to think about how we evaluate children, thereby assigning a “value” to them and in turn impacting their self esteem.

Very often children who are considered excellent academically are really good at regurgitating facts; whilst others with average or poor report cards are highly intelligent and creative with advanced problem-solving abilities, skills that serve them extremely well through life.

But report cards are not designed to evaluate these skills and often aren’t the right barometer for success in life. The real tragedy in all of this is that so many people are not as lucky as my friend who discovered his latent talents later on in life.

So many Einsteins, Picassos, Tendulkars go unnoticed, leading lives of missed opportunities and misfired attempts at finding meaning, success and happiness.

Hence, if there is one thing I would change it is this: rethinking the way children are evaluated. I don’t ascribe to de-emphasizing core subjects.

All children must go through this foundation, but instead of labelling a child “smart” or “stupid” through this unidimensional lens, a more rounded approach including and emphasizing a breadth of skills, and finding ways to meaningfully evaluate and emphasize them).

Therefore a child who is poor at math but is highly proficient in communication and creativity doesn’t feel like a failure at the age of 12. They see multiple meaningful pathways instead of the dead end they may see in today’s reporting context.    

The impact this will have on all children’s lives will be enormous. These skills have always been crucial but especially in the era of AI – there has never been a more important time to be human.

The interview with Simran and Karishma provided a captivating glimpse into Rangeet’s foundation and future. Their passion and strategic thinking are truly commendable.

This discussion underscored Rangeet’s potential to transform experiences and offered profound takeaways for anyone interested in innovation and purposeful entrepreneurship.

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