So Ehsaas did eventually *die* a silent death!

Nikhil/Bipin/Gabriel, that was some yeoman effort you guys put to keep the thread going! (And I apologise if I missed out on a few other names)

Once upon a time,
there was an active community called Ehsaas,
Which did a lot of work in Pune

But then the rains came down,
and a few members tumbled out,
And threw out all the good work away.

And I'm one of those chief culprits :)

great work Nikhil at keeping those fires burning.

I don't know how many of you have had the time to go through Ravi's latest post.

It's a really incisive post, with a great prespective surrounding the kids we interact with.

Just read it before any Ehsaas centric decisions you want to make going foward.

I have a few issues I want to discuss with the folks on the thread.

Time as usual is going to be an issue. Lets see if I can get a few quick calls in (before saturday) with some of the Ehsaas folks (Nikhil, Bipin, Ravi, Harshal, Richa....) before taking this foward.

Hi All,

Thought of putting in my thoughts.

I take pride in whatever little effort i m putting into the Ehsaas initiative. But my motivation takes a beating when i see students dropping out each week and new faces coming up. Though i dont hold any grudges about new students coming up, what worries me is that we cant sustain the interest level of the students. It makes me think that there is something seriously wrong in the planning and execution of the intitative, and is whittling away the effectiveness of the effort we all are putting in. It also hampers the enthusiasm(atleast mine). There is no bigger satisfaction than seeing a student grow and improve each day and the pride that it brings when you know all this is becuase of you.

I tried contemplating on the propable reasons:

1. Distance: Most of them come up with excuses that it becomes too much for them to walk all the way from Patel Estate.
   
2. Lack of Motivation: I strongly feel about it and i think the students are not at all at fault. If i were at their place, I would have been completey lost in the whole state of affairs. What i see is a bunch of teachers who come each week for a couple of hours to "teach" and leave. There isnt anyone whom they can look upto. They would want to have someone whom they can approach personally, whom they can interact, who would actually give them personal attention. Someone, who would be their mentor and would be available when they need him.

Solution:
Well i aint doing any good posing the problems coz we all know what the problems are. What i wanted to suggest is that to anchor their belief and trust in us, they individually need a mentor. For that, we can zero in on a few regular students, say 10. Then each of teh volunteers takes the responsibility of 2/3 students. And wud be always ready to give him personal attention. Would talk to the student if he remains absent, instill the discipline to be regular, track his performance and give him a push whenever needed. When i say a personal mentor, I dont mean there would be individual groups to be taught. They wud obviously be taught together. Its only that the mentor is accountable for his group. Only after the students are convinced that there is someone genuinely interested for their improvement, would they brave the distance to come to CYDA.

The mentors can arrange regular meetings where they can exchange and discuss the improvements and issues of his/her group.
I think we already follow a similar strategy in the corporate world where employees have 1-1s with their managers.

I know such a proposition is tough and tasking but if we have to make Ehsaas any effective, we need to resort to something of this sort. And with the number of volunteers pouring in I dont think resource should be an issue.

Regards,
Ravi

The mentor idea is good. I can see some of these kids need a mentor/motivartor. V

Very often, Vishal, hemant, or dhananjay call me just to say hello. I can see myself fitting into their idea of an aspirational figure. However, I don't think I'm doing the best job of fitting myself into that role. I havn't really been able to make a lot of time for Ehsaas in the last few weeks.

The strange part though is that the kids have contributed to me kicking the smoking habit. I was really embarassed when I asked the kids if they smoked, all of them resoundingly said no.

However, I think all of us can take on motivating/mentoring one kid. I can start this of by taking on the role of mentoring Hemant.

btw Nikhils access to PG from work has been blocked which explains his delay (;)) replying to these messages

Couldn't post about what happ on Sat - 10th June.

I gave up the first half of the England - Paraguay game to go CYDA.

I'm not a huge England fan, but watching any football is entertainment, so I thought I could atone for all my sins over the past few months by missing the first half.

Havn't made it to CYDA for a while now, and Bipin and I had agreed to take this class, so got there at about 6.

However there was a lotta entertainment going on at CYDA. Someone lost 2K at CYDA, so the class room that we conduct classes in was turned into an interrogation room. Matthew was playing supercop along with Priyanka. Our students were told that classes would not be conducted even before we arrived.

Matthew spoke to me about the situation. He also needed to speak to us about something else, which is really exciting.

One of our original plans about getting underpriviliged people to make stuff (food items, handi crafts) that we could sell at companies is coming through. He wanted to know if about once a month we could set up a desk for these products to be sold.

I'm intentionally using the vague word products because Matthew is in the process of finalising what can to be made. He was just sounding us out about potential marketing channels that the companies we work at, can present.

Also Ehsaas Employment Agency has begun new life. Let's keep our fingers crossed, caus if all goes well, Hemant will officially become the first student we have placed. June 30th is his joining date.

@ Grond: I agree with the spirit of the suggestions made

However, my perspective is that what is bringing the kids to the class is not just what is being taught. It is the opportunity to interact with people they view as aspirational figures.

Sometimes we just need to roll with the punches, and humour ourselves with the unplanned chaos. I think it's great if we can structure the classes upto somepoint.

However if they bring really young kids who do not fit into the planned curriculum structure, we just need to split up the volunteers like you and Ravi did, and continue. That's my take on the situation.

btw if we need to meet, thu evening/ fri evening works fine for me. Thu evening is preferable. If a convinient meeting time fails, we could do a con-call with 3 /4 people. Nikhil has been the most regular volunteer and understands the kids really well. We could do a short con-call later in the week with Ravi/Bipin/Richa.

- Binoy

Lets start a new thread for the poll ......."who's going to win the world cup 2006"

.. we have the permission from PG for this.

Lets see ... what teams shud we put up

Brazil
France
Germany
England
Italy
Spain
Portugal
Argentina
Netherlands

Any more nominations ??

Ivory Coast

Czech Republic

Aimar Says

Thank you so much for your enlightening declaration - however I'm wondering how 16 teams are going to contest a World cup quarter finals.

LOL!

Dude he seems to know everything and more. :satisfie:

Lolol do you really think that lowly of Argentina or is this to get a reaction from me? Either way it's not going to happen boss!

Dude, I'm backing IC to do some serious damage this year. That they have 2 Arsenal players means some pedigree ;)

As for reactions, I've been getting enough from you over the past year. We should watch a few games together

My prediction: 3-0 .............i'm guessing an early goal, and two more in the last ten -fifteen minutes

2 -0 to IC with Didane and Toure (Kolo or Yaya) scoring a goal.

For all Albiceleste faithful here is the probable line up for Ivory Coast :

Abbondanzieri
Heinze- Ayala - Burdisso - Sorin
Cambiasso - Maxi - Riquelme - Mascherano
Saviola - Crespo

Looks solid to me with Messi, Aimar and co. on the bench.

Lots of chatter going on on this thread. On Friday the chatter stops and the action begins. I don't wanna say whose going to win the cup - i hope fervently that my team can do it though.

Let the games begin.

Shouldn't it be Macherano/Cambiasso in the centre alongside Riquelme and maxi on the wing.

And wtf is saviola doing there