Minutes of Asha Seattle meeting on 07/20/2005.

 

Venue: Redmond Library

 

Attendees: Vibhavaree, Ken, Srijan, Sunil, Ravi, Raghav, Vani, Shayon, Swati, Subodh, Parna, Vidyanand, Soujanya, Anju, Kavita, Jayati, Vaibhav

Discussion:

1) West Side Meeting change of location and/or time

§ Meeting time decided to be 7 – 9 PM on Thursdays at Hub in UW.

 

2) Sumi’s fellowship:  Presented by Raghav

  1. Clarified that it is an out of school proposal (on the lines of CHETANAA) and not meant to encourage children to stay away from school.
  2. Involves children of lower middle class workers.
  3. Not sure about the activities planned for the school children – need to get more info
  4. Get more info about concrete plans
  5. Financial proposal would be helpful – send template to them.
  6. Explore the possibility of self starting the program initially and involve Asha after a 3 month period

 

3) Door step project – proposal presented by Vidyanand for funding 20 NFEs in Pune. The NFEs are run for  the children of construction workers and are targeting ~ 500 children

  1. Currently 80 NFEs exist.
  2. Sites visited by Vidyanand
  3. Total funding required is Rs.7,34,850 or ~ 17,000 USD
  4. Will the funds go to the existing ones or new ones?
  5. To involve other Asha chapters

 

Vote for supporting the concept   - Voted Yes

Yes - 15

No - 1

Abstained - 2

 

Vote for favor of funding 20 NFEs - 3

Vote for favor of funding 10 NFEs - 3

Vote for favor of funding 5 NFEs - 9

 

Voted to fund 5 NFEs

 

4) Feminist research and Activist forum (UW students) are planning to conduct an event on 11/08. The event includes movie screening (The Day My God Died) and panel discussion. Idea presented to involve Asha as co sponsor  

  1. Asha to be involved with publicity part of the event – details to be worked out.
  2. Discuss more offline with individual volunteers.

 

5) Chetanaa site visit - report presented by Srijan

  • Report available on Asha site.
  • Teacher training in work shops/ learning centers to be encouraged. Not very enthusiastic response was received for this idea during the site visit.
  • Need to communicate the need for more improvement and reform.       
  • Teacher retention is a problem at the school
  • Funding the project since 7 years.
  • Future funding contingent on discontinuing the practice of allotting work  (like serving guests and teachers) to children of certain castes at school                                                                                                                     

6) AllGoRhythms - to be held as one or a two day event?

  1. One day event will be held in Ken hall and the 2 day one in Mercer island.
  2. Will we have enough volunteers for 2 day event
  3. Will a 2 day event be loss making one? To increase the ticket price?

 

Voted on 1 or 2 day event

3 - 2 day event

6 - 1 day event

4 – abstained

            Voted to be a one day event

 

7) RHEDT - proposal presented by Vani.

  • Existing project which funds residential schools ( tribal) in TamilNadu – extend to classes  4 & 5.
  • Teachers ( 2 or 3) have some training
  • Try to get a site visit before Sept / Oct
  • Proposal to send $ 1000 ( till Sept)

11 yes – unanimous

 

8) West Bengal  JEE – BE education  funding for children of bus conductors – presented by Subhodh

  1. 4 lakhs over 4 years
  2. Fwd the email to Swati and get in touch with Asha Kolkata.
  3. Suggestion given to explore the option of obtaining Bank loan.

 

 

 

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