HeadStart is an initiative to sponsor, mentor and facilitate children, who are susceptible to dropping out of school at the higher primary stage, to continue their high school education for Three years. The programme strives to reach the most vulnerable groups like children rehabilitated from Child Labour, orphans, with single parent, from troubled family situations - from dire socio economic conditions.

An event in DSF is conducted with a twin objective of fun and learning. One of the characteristics of our events is the involvement of children in the planning and organisation of the programme. This gives the children a chance to hone their organizational & creative skills under the watchful eyes of experts from the field.

We also celebrate our national days and other days of importance to children in the schools and our centres. Most of the programmes are handled by volunteers, who get involved right from ideation to execution.

In schools the events are large scale ones with the participation of the whole school. DSF works closely with the teachers to make it a memorable one for the school and children. An event means a lot of excitement for both children and adults (volunteers and staff) irrespective of its nature.The govt. schools are not able to conduct such functions or outings on their own without support of outside agencies - be it a trip to mysore, trek to ramanagara, an annual prize distribution or sports day, these are all now regular annual features at all DSF supported schools.

The advocacy and research wing of DSF strives to gather support and mobilize people in addressing the right to education and allied issues. Children’s issues deserve special attention as their voices are seldom heard and it's the responsibility of the civil society to make their issues heard and their opinions get discussed and addressed.

Our advocacy cell runs campaigns for Right to education and networks with other organizations that strive to solve equity and quality issues in education and rights of our children. The premise of our work and relationships are decided by external agencies and if we can't influence these decisions we may not bring about the desired social change.

We encourage our stakeholders to get into advocacy roles as it becomes absolutely essential when we work with the system.

We as a responsible civil society organization research, analyse and advocate the issues and align with advocacy efforts happening in the field across the country.

We invite you to be a partner in our research and advocacy efforts to mobilize civil society opinion and voices right from your home, office and community and to fight for the rights of our children.