Friday, June 12, 2009

Looking ahead

In Nithya's post on Pudiyador entering its 5th year we reflected on what Pudiyador has done for this tiny hamlet and also briefly discussed on the more pressing issues before us.

One of the long term aims of Pudiyador @ Urappakkam was to achieve self sufficiency. By self sufficiency what we envisioned would happen is that the community would accept Pudiyador as a way of life and take up ownership and ensure the smooth running of day to day activities. The inputs of the Urappakkam team may still be needed but we would not be involved in making day to day decisions. Some incidents do seem to tell us that we are getting there. The snacks which are provided in the evenings at the center were being prepared by Durgaiyyppan's mom. This was a pretty good arrangement and most of the times it went on quite smoothly. Unfortunately they had to move and the supply of evening snacks was interrupted. Other parents stepped up and have been taking turns and are now making sure that the snacks are made and distributed to the children every evening.

While stuff like this is encouraging we still have a long way to go. The center still heavily depends on inputs from people from the Urappakkam core team at Chennai such as Vinodh, Ronald. That sort of dependence on people is definitely not feasible in the long run. The best case scenario would be a few people from the community (maybe womenfolk) take charge and are able to handle day to day activities. I invite suggestions from all you folks on how best we can improve participation from the community.

One idea we had was to bring in the parents - the moms of the kids, one or two of them everyday, and make them see what goes on at the center in the evenings. They can even help maintain discipline and a semblance of order which would be too much to ask of just one coordinator. The benefits would be two fold - I am sure the parents, with a greater awareness of Pudiyador, will make sure their kids attend regularly, also a sense of ownership can manifest itself leading to our greater aim, that of Self sustenance. This is but one idea and just a vague one at that. Chip in with your ideas in the comments section and I am sure you guys can do a better job than us :)

Lets make this work!