When Aliza Ansari, a Class 12 Arts student from Varanasi, was asked about her dream, her answer was simple: “I want to become a professor.” Inspired by her teachers, she had set her sights on pursuing a B.A. B.Ed. program at AMU or BHU. But life was not simple. With just 65% in her board exams and her family surviving on an annual income of ₹60,000 from her father’s work as a weaver, the pathway ahead looked uncertain.
Her psychometric assessment under our SAARTHI program revealed an average aptitude in reasoning and verbal skills, below-average in mathematics, but a personality marked by resilience, cooperation, and adaptability. It was here that Aliza’s journey took an unexpected turn. Guided by her counsellor Somesh, she was introduced to the HCL TechBee program, a work-integrated IT training and employment opportunity. At first, she resisted. Technology felt alien to an Arts student with no background in mathematics.
Step by step, her counsellor helped her prepare for the entrance exam, sharpen her soft skills, and explore new possibilities. With iDreamCareer’s financial assistance covering her course cost, Aliza appeared for the TechBee exam and cleared it in her very first attempt. Today, she is training at HCL’s Lucknow centre and already earning a stipend of ₹10,000 a month. For her family, this means financial relief. For Aliza, it means a future she never imagined.
Aliza’s story is not an exception but a window into what SAARTHI makes possible. Across Uttar Pradesh, thousands of students face the same uncertainty she did. The state has one of the lowest higher education participation rates in India, with only 28.8% of eligible youth enrolled in tertiary education. Each year, an estimated one to 1.5 lakh students drop out between Classes 10 and 12, while many who continue restrict themselves to a few known career options simply because they lack awareness of alternatives.
To change this, iDreamCareer launched SAARTHI (Structured Approach for Awareness, Readiness and Tertiary Horizons Integration) in partnership with the Department of Secondary Education, Government of Uttar Pradesh and with support from the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation. SAARTHI provides structured career guidance, psychometric assessments, and one-to-one counselling to government school students, ensuring not only awareness but also transitions into high-quality and financially viable career pathways.
The results are striking. A quasi-experimental study across 71 schools in Lucknow and Varanasi found that the Eligible Enrolment Ratio (EER) for students who received guidance was 74.42% compared to 62.9% for those who did not, an uplift of 11.52 percentage points. Gains were equally strong across gender and districts, with enrolment for girls rising by 12.54% and for boys by 13.02%. Beyond numbers, nearly 70% of students began weighing critical factors such as cost and duration while making career choices, and many developed backup career plans.
The impact comes alive in individual journeys. Mukesh Kumar, who once believed engineering was out of reach, is now pursuing a B.Sc. in Mathematics with scholarship support. Khushboo Khatoon, once limited to graphic design, is studying Fine Arts in Animation and Multimedia while working part-time. Dileep, who thought engineering was possible only through JEE, is proudly pursuing a diploma in electrical engineering.
Each of these stories, like Aliza’s, reflects the same truth: with timely guidance, aspirations need not collapse under financial or academic pressures. Instead, they can be reimagined and sustained. SAARTHI is proof that the right support at the right moment can transform not just a student’s academic path, but their entire life trajectory.
