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WOMEN UNITE!! SURVIVE AND THRIVE!! I n t e r n a t i o n a l W o m e n ' s D a y A C T L O C A L N E T W O R K G L O B A L Women's Marches and Rallies are called on or around March 8th Each Year |
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We started this programme in Tehsil Daska Dist Sialkot in the Province of Punjab in 86 villages. The aim of the project is to benefit the women 15 to 25 years of age who have never had a chance to attend any formal or non formal education or are dropouts at a very early age . This project is meant to provide them with another chance in getting some basic education and also functional literacy to improve their quality of life by giving them awareness about health care, preventive medicine the importance of clean drinking water and some first aid. A great deal of time and effort is required in a project of this magnitude. It all starts with the construction of a very devoted team which consists of Project Director who designs the project and all its technicalities and also guides and directs the whole team throughout the execution of the project .the Project Managers and Coordinators who work in the office and in the field to implement the project at every stage and also provide constant monitoring, trouble shooting, providing the resource materials, developing books and other resource material necessary. They also arrange various training sessions and are responsible of the delivery of all the necessary resources as the project carries along. Then comes the social moblizers, another team of young men and women who constantly visit different villages right from the very start of the project to survey the villages to make village profiles, meet the village elders ,conduct informal meetings with them and motivate the community and after the setting up of the centers for regular visits and monitoring. Another vital link in our project is our teachers who are local girls who had the good fortune of getting education and they are now serving their community in the best way possible. Hats off to them. Then there is account officer, clerks, computer operators and the drivers. The team then starts visiting the villages in the selected area of the Project and starts to make village profile of the villages to asses the need over there. All this data is collected by meeting the elders and resourceful persons of the village. Meetings are held with the influential persons of the village to seek their cooperation in the setting up the literacy centers because nothing is possible without the cooperation of the key persons of the village. It is not very easy to do because the area of the rural Punjab is still very backward and it is not easy to motivate the people to send their women folks for an adult literacy programme. They are usually apprehensive of anything new and they are not very willing readily for something with which they are not very comfortable. But once the team visits any village for a number of times and a number of meetings are held with them they slowly start to accept it and offer their cooperation as well. For the Adult Female Functional literacy Project in Daska all these efforts were put into setting up our 100 centers in 86 villages. Out of the 106 villages surveyed 86 villages were finally selected. The village elders gave their consent and provided us support in identifying the appropriate locations, teachers and also the learners. You can imagine that the life of a women in the rural area is a very tough life and they are busy from the crack of dawn doing their household chores working in the fields and also incase of Daska, stitching Foot balls to earn money .So it takes the extra cooperation of their husbands, fathers and mothers in law to spare them for the duration of the literacy centers. The basic aim of the literacy centers is to provide opportunity to the women of that community to be able to read and write and do simple arithmetic on one hand and learn some vocational skills on the other to improve their quality of life and may be provide a relief from stitching footballs for a very meager sum of money. With the Grace of Allah SW our 100 centers are running smoothly and each center has 25 to 30 learners .Almost half of our learners are married women and they have varied number of children also .But still because of the efforts of our team the married women are also attending the centers regularly and we encourage them to bring their children along if there is no one to look after them. In this case our teachers and their families are to be given all the credit for not only teaching in the centers but looking after the kids in the meanwhile. The teachers are also helping the social Mobilizer in case there are any dropouts or if someone is coming late, or irregularly. It is most heartwarming to see the women learners in the centers and they are mostly very enthusiastic about the centers. Now as mentioned earlier the next phase is the vocational skills training. That’s where we need the help of the volunteers. The vocational training is the most vital part of our project because our target group is adult females and they need some skills in order to improve the quality of their lives. We conducted a survey to assess what best skills could be imparted in our limited budget which serve need based and also in most popular demand. We came to know that the community mostly wanted to learn cutting, sewing and Machine embroidery. That was in huge demand. Unfortunately we have a limited budget and we cannot set up embroidery machines and even sewing machines at every center. We have of course other skills which we will include which are low budget, very useful but less in demand. So we would like to ask for help and cooperation from anyone who wants to pitch in and provide assistance, suggestions, and or funds to provide resources for the literacy centers for vocational skills and also books and other resource material such as paints, pencils, books etc for our learners. We also invite you to visit our literacy centers and see the enthusiasm with which our learners are attending the centers. Regards: Noreen Haider
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