Children Aren’t Failing, Pedagogy Is | Dr. Sunita Gandhi | TEDxDWPS Ludhiana Youth

Dr. Sunita Gandhi challenges one of education’s most accepted assumptions: that learning must be slow, expensive, and teacher-dependent. Drawing from groundbreaking work across thousands of schools, she reveals how a simple shift from teaching the unknown to building on what children already know, can help learners read, think, and collaborate at remarkable speed. Through the power of peer learning and near-zero-cost innovation, she presents a bold vision where quality education is not a privilege, but a scalable reality for every child. Dr. Sunita Gandhi is an educator, researcher, and innovator on a mission to end illiteracy in our lifetime. A Cambridge-trained PhD in Physics, she turned the rigor of science on humanity's most stubborn failure: the hundreds of millions of children who attend school yet never learn to read. Her answer is ALfA (Accelerating Learning for All), a pedagogy where children teach one another and master foundational literacy and numeracy in just 45 days. Through Dignity Education Vision International (DEVI Sansthan), her work reaches millions of disadvantaged learners worldwide. Honored with the 2025 FICCI FLO Award in Education, she believes universal learning is not a dream, but a solvable design problem. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx