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A classroom program in India aimed at improving students’ well-being for better academic outcomes
- Progress stage
- Nov 2024 to Oct 2025
The Indian NGO Labhya, in partnership with the Tripura Government, is offering a learning program aimed at enhancing the overall well-being of students enrolled in public schools of India across the state of Tripura. FID funding seeks to understand the potential impact of this program on students’ academic performance and overall social-emotional learning and development.
Project deployed by:
Context
In India, the prevalence of mental health issues among students is a pressing concern. Studies indicate that one in four Indians aged 13-15 experiences depression (Llamba 2020; Thomas 2020). The ongoing challenges posed by COVID-19 have only exacerbated this issue, leading to a reported 20% increase in mental illnesses (Thomas 2020).
This heightened vulnerability has strong implications for social emotional learning, overall well-being and, consequently, educational and economic outcomes (Currie and Stabile 2007).
In classrooms, poor mental health can lead to lower academic performance, but focusing on students' social and emotional needs through programs can possibly lead to gains in both well-being and students’ learning outcomes.
While initiatives aimed at improving well-being and mental health in schools are on the increase, in India and elsewhere, their effectiveness is rarely documented. This program is helping to address this knowledge gap.
Innovation
Based on this hypothesis, Labhya co-created the ‘Saharsh Curriculum’ along with the Government of Tripura, a holistic school-based learning program. A daily well-being class ‘Saharsh’ has been seamlessly integrated into the existing curriculum and school day. It incorporates mindfulness sessions, reflective stories, and engaging activities that aim to address the broader aspects of students’ overall well-being and the socio-emotional management of students. Each day, the program replaces 2 to 3 minutes of each hour of lessons, freeing up 30 minutes for a "Saharsh" class at the beginning of each day .
The objective of this initiative is to foster lifelong learning skills, particularly focusing on the social and emotional aspects for elementary school students.
During the 2023-2024 and 2024-2025 school years, FID granted funding to implement the program and collect data on its impact in Tripura public schools, which take children from the most vulnerable families, from grades one to eight. The funding also made it possible to collect impact data through a randomized study conducted by researchers in economics and public policy across 100 primary schools.
Results and learnings
Between 2023 and 2025, 29,164 students and 2,089 teachers in 100 schools across the state of Tripura took part in these initiatives. The final results from the project evaluation at the end of the second academic year (2024-2025) are particularly encouraging.
- The evaluation has shown: A significant improvement in fluid intelligence, i.e. the capacity to reason through logic and solve problems (+0.11 standard deviation).
- A significant improvement in math scores in the second year, even with reduced program support, equivalent to an additional academic year (+0.26 standard deviation). For example, 51% of students who took part in the Saharsh program are capable of long division, compared to 33% in the non-participating group.
- The program is highly cost-effective: an improvement of 0.1 standard deviation in math skills costs €4.47 per year on average. It is estimated that this figure could be reduced to €0.69 with full government support.
- The initiative's impact on anxiety and mental health was less significant, especially in the second year. This may suggest that Saharsh primarily improves individual and social skills, as well as pupils' ability to manage their emotions, which in turn, facilitates learning. In the first year of evaluation, the impact was more significant among girls (-0.12 standard deviation), the poorest students, and those exhibiting the most acute signs of anxiety (-0.3 standard deviation). However, there was no marked difference between the various groups in the second year. Similarly, there was no real impact on reading skills.
These results suggest that, although these classes take up a few minutes of traditional lessons each day, investing in student well-being does not have a negative effect on academic performance; on the contrary, it can complement and even improve it. Such efforts are therefore essential for overcoming learning challenges.
The team has learned a lot from this first impact evaluation and will find out more when this program is rolled-out in other regions.
Following this evaluation under real-world conditions, the project team is planning to expand the program to other states across the country. The project is set for initial scale-up in the state of Gujarat, with 7 million students, 9,5 million in overall, who will get the opportunity to improve their academic performance and mental well-being, which could benefit them throughout the rest of their lives.
Research team
Kevin Carney Dr. Kevin Carney is a development economist who completed a PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University and a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Chicago. Kevin is an Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Michigan.
Avinash Moorthy Avinash Moorthy is a PhD candidate in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School and a pre- doctoral fellow in the Harvard Environmental Economics Program, Stone Program on Inequality, and the Centre for International Development. He formerly worked as an Associate Economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago and majored in Economics at Carleton College (Magna Cum Laude).
Projects
Projects funded by FID
