Longest Meeting of YATN

Yesterday was the longest meeting ever of YATN. The agenda of discussion was the final draft of MoA of YATN. Gagan, Danish, Hitesh and Nitish had volunteered to formulate the MoA and did the job very well. The entire idea of registering as a society is a very big leap for YATN. We had begun as a small group who went to interact with the kids of IISERm labors' and we realise by number of people interested in YATN that it is much more that that.

The best part of the entire effort is that now we have been able to mobilize a lot more IISERM students into the effort. Now we are a group which has all MS, PhD and faculty of IISER - all performing different activities of YATN and contributing to the cause. It has become a community effort.

Due to the efforts of IISER students and Yatn kids (read the Ravinder story!), we have been able to convince the school Sikhya to begin special classes for age inappropriate students. By the first week of May, about 50 of our kids will be going to school (many of them for the very first time!!:-)).

This raises many other responsibilities. We have to ensure that their going to school goes on. It is very easy for the students to get disinterested if the school teacher scolds them. This is very common and I have been called by the school many times to ensure that the kids dress, bathe, brush their teeth before coming to school. Some of our kids were cleaned and bathed in school. This was so embarrassing for them that they did not go to school the next day :-(. These are very small problems compared too the ones we have overcome as a group and I think we need to seriously think about ways to solve the problem.

It is important that all of us realise that for most of the kids, we are the motivation to go to school. Their parents might not think it as important and a yatn kid might even stay at home and look after the young/cook/fool around. We are the only people who tell them it is important and we need to ensure we keep doing that so that they are encouraged to go to school everyday.

Our YATN is looking concrete now :-)

I hope the ideas with which it was begun are propagated to our junior batches because as Keshav puts it ;-) -

"हम जाने वाले हैं :-("

The Sikhya experience

I do not know if some one has mentioned about Sikhya in any previous blogs but I'll do so here. In order to get our YATN kids into mainstream education the first agenda had always been to send them to a full fledged school and motivate them enough that even if they move away from this space they find new schools for themselves (maybe run by the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan !) and get themselves enrolled. In this regard we had in the first year of our functioning enrolled many of our students to the nearby Chilla school (that what our kids call it!). The outcome was initially very good, but eventually numbers reduced and only a few of our students continued on in the school. The reasons for it were mainly (as much as I can hypothesise!) that the Chilla school was Punjabi medium and had less infrastructure. Punjabi medium would have been a problem as many kids had migrated from Jharkhand, Bihar, U.P., Orrisa, Andhra Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh and that too not long ago. As far as the infrastructure is concerned, the school has a total of two classrooms for conducting classes till standard 5. Here we started looking for other schools and were helped by Anu ma'am who referred us to Sikhya - www. sikhya.org We went on to visit the school and it was everything that a good private school would be and interestingly had the specific aim of teaching kids of slums, migratory labourers etc. So they had devised special strategies to ensure the students get interested in education. Our interim agenda became to send these students off to Sikhya. The entire team of YATN participated in order to fulfil this aim. Our evening school teachers and R.A.W. (Research Analysis Wing) ensured that we could identify kids in the age group of 5-7 years and get them admitted to the preparatory class. These were a group of 25-30 kids who could be admitted. The organisation team ensured that the affidavits to be submitted to the school and the school admission forms were filled on time for school admission. The school helped YATN as it relaxed its admission criteria to 7 years for the prep class. Even the Auto Bhayiya whom we arranged for talking the kids to and from school everyday charged the least possible price per kid after learning that YATN is attempting to teach labour kids. Finally after the effort of all the YATN members (IISER M community!), and Sikhya and even Auto Bhayiya, we were able to send 18 kids to Sikhya :-) It has now been a week the kids are going to school. I urge all of us to interact with the kids and ask them about their experience (informally) and appreciate and motivate them to keep the continuity. Because in essence, Y.A.T.N. does not exist if we do not interact (in the form of evening school or otherwise with the kids!)

logo for YATN

Hey, I've designed a logo for YATN.

FUN!

All the plans we had made for 'the first official fun activity of YATN', seemed to sink when we realized about the occurrence of INTER IISER CHEM MEET!! We had thought of Paper Bag Making Activity for big kids, and a movie for the juniors. We had to either cancel up everything or change the plans due to the unavailability of space and equipments like projector. We picked up the second option.

Feb, 20 :Sunday : 2:00PM
Our Team had started to assemble outside the Hostel V, and within no time the Shuttlers picked the children from their homes, to our playground. The under-construction-road was leveled by a road roller. We started by dividing them according to their sizes. The Big Ones were taught Football, and the Little ones played tug of war or with a discus. I had encountered those kids like this for the first time, and they really are more energetic than any of us. We played with them, for almost an hour, and they wanted an extension of time, but unfortunately we couldn't give it. We were tired, at least i was. We decided to wrap up things, and escort them back to their homes. The Shuttlers did their job, and i came to the comp lab.

Meanwhile, i found a kid - Ravinder. He had used a tiny motor, a wire, a AA battery, and a tennis ball. He had plugged the motor into the tennis ball, and when motor rotated , the ball rotated with it. He told us that he got the inspiration from one his fellows, Hrihtik, who once had made a fan using the same apparatus. I had shot this footage, and probably i will upload it.

Well, innovation is everywhere. When we formulate it, we call it Science.

Regards

Hitesh
Y.A.T.N.

Contrast

On a fine Sunday evening you can easily make out this contrast if you are standing on a conditionally correct puddle of mud. On one side there are eight storied hostels, shining corridors, and branded clothes, while on the other side there are small huts, muddy pathways, and rags. But that day I saw an utterly different contrast, which is not generally seen everywhere; small children, most of them lowly or un-educated, with a will to learn, holding hands with adult college students with a will to nurture the future.

And above all this contrast, there were a couple of things that all of them shared; a beautiful smile on their faces and the warmth of happiness at their hearts.

This is our YATN to promise a brighter future with lesser contrast.

Look Around

By Danish Shamoon

Life's been very kind, the way I see it
False is this line, if you can't perceive it
People, nature and situations around
Are determined trainers & teachers, to you who are bound.

Hey friends, Look around
People are good, people are bad
Nature is also surprisingly clad
Challenging situations often make us go mad

Life's homogenized with happiness & sorrow
How it's spent depends on what we borrow-
An angel's or a devil's(advise)
I mean- Optimism or Pessimism to follow

No matter how crazy it might sound
When devil begins to deceive
Vain desires become our priorities
And we proudly compete in vanities

The will is Ours
We should be its Masters
Don't let the grinning devils play with it
We are what we Choose to be

Hey friends, again Look around
There is a way to deceive the Deceiver
To look carefully the worlds that surround
And pick a cause, give our life a Noble Purpose

The world holds so many problems

The ones who are intelligent can drive the crowds

The ones who are strong can help the weak

The ones who are wise can bring justice

A Noble duty of the People

The People who bring Revolutions