Date

1/18/2006

Venue

RTC/LWSD No 414, Marton Johnson Room (16250 NE 74th St)

Attendees

Arvind, Srijan, Krish Gali, Tulika Agrawal, Rahul Lahoti, Shriram Lakshmi, Snigdha Goenka, Shruti Selvaraj, Vani Subramanian, Ken Miller, Vibhavaree Gargeya, Jayashree, Swati, Kavita, Gaurav Patni, Gazal Patni, Sandhya, Nisreen Kabeer

 

 

ORGANIZATIONAL: Asha Workshop - Srijan

  • Workshop will be once a quarter or once in two months to discuss projects at length, one at a time among many other things.
  • The idea of workshops is for collective learning and discussion - we don't plan to take votes in workshops.
  • Perhaps two projects could be discussed at the meeting.
  • There are approximately 40 projects that our chapter is involved in right now that needs to be discussed every year.

 

ORGANIZATIONAL: New Volunteer Orientation - Srijan

  • We'll have a new Volunteer Orientation at the end of the month or beginning of next month.

 

 ORGANIZATIONAL: Project Coordination - Vibhavaree

  • Project page for 2005 funding needs to be updated for them to be reflected as current projects on Asha webpage. Project coordination team will follow up with projects stewards on this.
  • Project teams to start working with project partners in India as a group. A selected set of project has 4 stewards right now, however, more can be assigned to a project, depending on volunteer interest.

 

 ORGANIZATIONAL: Discussion on School system in India - Jayashree

  • Jayashree initiated a discussion on the school system in India as introduction for proposed Right to Education Bill. A lot of points were discussed including:
    1. Common School System
    2. Lack of innovativeness in Indian school system.
    3. Past successful experiments on alternative education styles (for example, Ekalavya in M.P. It has been successful for 2 decades across 1100 schools.)
    4. Role of NCERT in creating the education framework for India.
    5. Private schools and their roles: a vast majority of schools in India are government schools, approximately 15% of schools are private.
    6. What should happen to make education equitable? Education today is not breaking economic barriers. Only the elite are getting the best education.
    7. Kothari Commission recommendations (1964). Open to all students without discrimination. Provide good education so that they do not go to private schools.
    8. Comparison of US and Indian school system.

a)     Charter schools in US: parents get together to start a school and get funding to start it.

b)     Average $8-10K per student is spent in US.

c)     Neighborhood schools, taxpayers, community involved in school system, not dependent on federal gov’t.

    1. Question that need to be explored:

a)     Why have the public schools in developed countries been so successful?

b)     Why has the public school system in India deteriorated?

    1. Education System should be equitable!!!
    2. Meeting on Thursday Jan 26, 2006 for in-depth discussion of Education Bill.

 

EVENT: Geetanjali - Snigdha

  • Geetanjali Tamil Music Program will be on March 4th, Kane Hall, UW from 5:30-9:30pm.
  • Need help for organizing.
  • Need to select a project that the proceeds will go to. Since it is a Tamil program, should the selection include a current project in Tamil Nadu?
  • Suggestion was to select one from T.N. and one from another region.
  • Plan to work off-line and then present selection to group for voting within a few days.

 

 

 

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