Donor management

Suparna, from the marketing team at Parikrma, called me on Saturday morning. She was very concerned that she might not make it on time to meet the people from HSBC, who were going to be at the school that morning. Suparna and Saki had returned at 2 AM and needed some time to catch a shut eye. Parikrmas idea of "Friday night" is executing the Change Your World in Half a Day program. The team members spend time in different organizations, talking about Parikrma and getting donations. Some organizations work during the day, some (call centres) work during the night. Hence the Parikrma team works round the clock.


So that’s how I came to spend the Saturday at school, watching the guys from HSBC install a donor software that they have built for us. The software is yet to meet our needs. But what I am learning at Parikrma is to wait patiently and smile when I wait. That’s what one does when she sees the label: FREE! Most people want to get a beer on a Friday night and wake up late on a Saturday morning. Very few will spend the weekend building software for free. These guys deserve courtesy, in the least.

So if the software does not arrive on time or does not exactly meet our needs, the only thing I can do is to politely thank them for what they have given us so far and look at them with pleading eyes, explaining to them what we really need. I then just pray that they will get the time to understand and build what we need and remain employed with their organization long enough for the software to reach us.

I really look forward to see this software up and running. An organization like Parikrma has many small and large donors. They donate towards so many different entities: children, class rooms, schools, one special meal, a Christmas cake... And all of them will need acknowledgements, receipts and reports. And of course there is the rush during tax season. It almost requires a small army to manage all of this. However, donors often do not like donating towards armies of office staff. Yet, it’s this team that sends out all the receipts, reports and reminders that these donors need.

So I wonder if technology can fix this. Suparna and Saki will perhaps still have work days stretching from 9 AM to 2 AM. But can technology give them a small break during thier work day to enjoy a cup of coffee from Adigas next door?

United Parikrma sports day

No dry fit clothes, no running shoes. But eyes firmly on the finish line and all the determination in the world to "just make it happen". This never fails to awe me.

A whole new world for me

Many people ask me how different it is to work at Parikrma. On one hand I got what I wanted. I wanted to be in an environment where there was no wastage, specifically no waste of human resources. So, I have where there is absolutely no room for wastage of anything. But then again were surprises as well.

Firstly I needed to buy a lunch box and a water bottle. No cafeteria that has 2 caterers, a salad bar, coffee day etc. Then I had to get ear plus. There is a sand pit is right outside the room I work in. That not only means that everything from my laptop to my lunch is covered in a layer of dust. It also means that the children have a throughly good time during their breaks. Anyone who has been around children knows that when children have a throughly good time, adults need ear plugs. And to think that when I was at Yahoo, people complained if we talked too loud. Ha ha!

Then I was forced to make some reality checks. I came in here claiming that I knew everything about getting Parikrma to effectively use technology. And then the issues start surfacing one at a time. The heads of schools have been given laptops. Paper less office and all right! The heads of school admits to me that she does not really carry her laptop. She looks at me pleadingly and says "I travel more than 20 km each way each day, in a BTS bus. Its too heavy". Reality check!

And then of course, there is the power failure issue. No power means no connectivity. I guess one way to look at it is that I am forced to take a break on most days. But when the break lasts more than 3 hours then its a reality check!

But the most interesting change is my understanding of ownership. Its very wholistic. There is no concept of marking territories here and owning pieces of anything. Everyone feels ownership for the entire organization. If a marketing team member is not able to do her work due to power failure, she decides to go clean messy art room cupboards. When the physics teacher leaves the school, the head of ops jumps and the head of marketing jump in and start taking classes. Yes, roles and responsibilities are not clearly defined. But yes, work gets done. And how!

I have seen ambition or passion at work. But this one is new - love. I am stilly trying to understand it. But I cannot deny that I am feeling sometihng new too. Its positive. But what exactly is it?

I am also begining to wonder if its going to make it hard for me to return to my old life. Would I ever undersand it if someone said "its not my job", or if someone complained that the cafeteria did not serve italian food or that people talk to loud. Would I be able to relate?

Vicious cycle

Embroidery class in progress
Originally uploaded by sindhoor

Today I walked into the library to find a bunch of women stitching. Preethy, the Community Development Services (CDS) team lead told me that an embroidery class was in progress. Julie Kagti of Knots on Cloth was sending trainers to train these women. This would definitely increase their employability and might increase their incomes as well. Some might even get employed with Julie herself. What a heart warming story!

The natural question that came to my mind was "where are the fathers?". Did they not want better incomes? Turns out that the fathers were either too hard working or good for nothing. The hard working ones were getting paid by the hour and could not take time off for self development. But most were good for nothing, busy drinking away what little they earned and large part of what their wives earned as well.

This is the cycle of poverty. Debts to make ends meet. Alcoholism that pushes them further into debt and distress, putting them in constant state of stress and desperation. In this state, it takes very little to push them over the edge and wreak havoc in their homes. It can range from verbal abuse to more extreme things like setting each other in flames. And one can imagine the effect it has on the children. Thus the cycle continues.

So where does one start, if the cycle is to be broken? Is literacy sufficient? How about helping augment parents earnings through self development courses? Would de-addiction program for fathers help? Would a loving environment at school compensate for what they see at home? Would exposure to role models get them to aspire to be more? Would outlets for the children's energies through many extra-curricular act ivies like art and sport be relevant?

I now start to understand what people at Parikrma mean when they say that their end goal is not to impart education, but that education is a means to break the cycle of poverty. This cyle is more vicious than I can even comprehend. And there is no one thing that will break it. Many of these activities will slowly erode it. No one really knows how much more it will take to truely make it go away.


Training in Aplique work
Originally uploaded by sindhoor

One laptop per child

I have heard of the OLPC program. But I was not aware that Parikrma is part of the pilot program in India. So today, I sat in the Venus class (7 yr olds) where these laptops were being used.

When I walked in the XO machines had just been distributed to them and they were being asked not to start on their exercises yet. But they were so excited about it, that not even a single child looked up to notice a stranger in their class. The teachers had typed out a few math problems for them on a word-like application. The children were required to work out the solutions and type them in.

At first glance, the children seemed to love it and the teachers seem eager to use it as a teaching aid. On further observation and conversation with volunteers and teachers involved in this program, here are the insights I gathered:

• These laptops cannot replace a lab. The lab is being used to teach the children use of what the teachers consider "real world" applications - i.e. MS Office Applications. These laptops cannot run on Windows.


• The laptops cannot be sent home. These laptops do not retain power for more than an hour and if not closed properly, they run out of power sooner. The children do not have power at home to charge the laptops.


• The teachers are not informed enough to use these machines to full potential. There is not enough support from the linux developer community to build applications on these laptops. More importantly there is not enough training for teachers and there is not enough knowledge sharing among participants in this program.


• Affordability is an issue. These laptops are still too expensive, at close to $200 a piece. The Indian government is exploring other cheaper options.


• The laptop is very useful in the youngest of classes. It exposes children to some basic concepts like resizing, opening and closing a window, scrolling, typing etc.


• It also generates a lot of enthusiasm in class. According to the teachers, the students are a log more eager to learn

When was the last you heard a child look forward to a math class? Sometimes, perhaps, the end goal is just making learning fun. To get the children to enjoy the process of learning and thus make them good students for life. I am no educator, so I don't know technicality. But I look at how engrossed the children were in their math class and how eager they were to help each other, I do wish my school was as much fun.

Growing up

I have not really spent time thinking about what growing really means. Two incidences here at Parikrma made me wonder.

Slightly over a week ago, a 9 year old came and gave me a candy and said it was her birthday. "My sisters birthday is on December 5th but she is dead now. Her skin went bad, the doctor askes us to come back later. That evening she died. I cried", she said. Then she smiled at me and ran back to class, as she heard the school bell.

I could not sleep for week after. I could not understand why she was so casual about her dead sister. I had nightmares of my own sister being hurt. So I spoke to Shukla (CEO at Parikrma) about it.

The explanation is rather simple, it seems. I, as an adult, have many experiences to reach back to and hence have associated a certain image and value to death. Children take the incidences for what they are and do not make more of it. Hence for the little girl, her sister being dead is nothing more than a fact at this point. But, it will change in the years to come.

Later that week I met a 5 yr old boy and his is 7 yr old sister. They were both rescued from begging. The boy is a happy little child. The girl however feels shame. She has picked up the negative, derogatory tone with which people describe her past. She explains to Shukla that she is ashamed that she had to beg and asks Shukla not to let her classmates know. The little boy has not yet learnt to associate values or images with such facts. But the girl is fast learning. How fast we grow up!

This brother and sister pair were not part of a begging racket. Their only parent was mentally unstable and hence could not feed them. So they had to beg to feed themselves. At 7, the little girl was forced to understand the concept of "money". Some of the growing up happens sooner than we think. Survival instincts?

I do hope that coming into Parikrma, these children are given a chance to slow down "growing up" and have a chance to enjoy being children. I see them playing outside my room office, and I think they are getting that chance.

New Avatar at Parikrma

After having been associated with Parikrma through YEFI-Parikrma school for more than 4 years, I decided to take the plunge and work with Parikrma full time. So on one friday morning I walked into one of the 4 Parikrma schools and gave Shukla (CEO of Parikrma) the news that I had decided to leave behind my Yahoo! days. Then I looked at her hopefully and asked if there was anything Parikrma could use me for.

Things moved at lightning pace after that. She roped in Vivek and started running me through the role that they were just begining to feel the need for. I joined the following Monday and things are moving forward so fast.

Parikrma is a tech friendly school. It might have something to do with being in Bangalore, or being associated with so many tech companies, or the tech savvyness of the founders. In any case, they try to embrase technology as much as possible and recognize the role technology can play in their orgainzation. They needed someone to oversee all the initiatives they have started.

The 4 schools are connected through a dedicated wireless ring. They have in house servers and their vision is to have not just an intranet, but also have virtual classrooms. They are looking to get software for donor management, inventory management, child academic tracking, child health tracking, child family tracking etc. They hope to get a digital library as well. Now the challenge for them is to have someone head all of these initiatives and put them together in a cohesive manner. And of course, they have tons of logistics issues like no power backup, no dust free rooms AC rooms to put their hardware in, lack of trained technical staff etc.

As I write this, I realize, I have a LOT on my hands. I better get down to it right now.

Sign in to YEFI-Parikrma!

Sign in to Parikrma!
Originally uploaded by Sahaab

I first started getting involved with Parikrma more than 4 years ago. Back then, YEFI (Yahoo! Employee Foundation, India), used to donate to a slum school in Nandini Layout. One day the children from this school visited our office. I was shocked to discover that all the children of this class did not speak a common language. Made me wonder what their medium of instruction would be. I started thinking if we were really doing the right thing. We had yanked the kids out of their apprenticship (they came from a snake charmers community) and put them in a school, where their learning was rather suspect. So would they become at the end of this? What would we have done to them?

Enter Parikrma. On my visit to this school I was awestruck. They were talking of cloud seeding. They were bursting with confidence and enthusiasm. I saw that they had been enabled to dream, they had the confidence and were getting the skills to make their dreams come true.

However, our hearts were with the children at the Nandini Layout slum. So we requested Parikrma to set up one of their schools in Nandini Layout. Thats how the YEFI-Parikrma school was set up.