AshaKiran 

The Asha for Education Newsletter April 1998 

Newsletter in pdf

 
From the Editors: 

Hello and welcome to the first edition of the ASHA-wide newsletter!  

We hope that the newsletter succeeds in it's purpose: that of sharing information between the various ASHA chapters. Chapters can find out about different fund raising strategies, the various projects being supported and the activities ASHA volunteers are involved in. Sharing the project information can also give a boost to proliferate the ASHA Stars concept. The newsletter also intends to bring the chapters closer together as an organization without compromising on the flexibility and independence of each chapter. 

As most ASHA members know, there has been a lot of activity on the organizational front. We have a letter from the Board of Directors addressing this issue. On behalf of all ASHA-ites we would like to thank the folks who have been handling the legal and organizational issues and the ASHA web pages. We would also like to congratulate D.P. Prakash and Ranjit Kumar on being elected President and Secretary respectively. 

 -Eds.  
Prithvi Prabhu, Garima Bhatia & Ashok Naidu 

Note from the Directors: 

Asha has grown tremendously over the last six years from the initial group of 4 students to the current movement that includes 30 chapters worldwide. 

 We started under the nurturing guidance of Indians for Collective Action (ICA), a San Francisco Bay Area non-profit organization engaged in development activities in India for the last 25 years. Asha has operated as a legal and administrative component of ICA, and ICA's support over the years has been instrumental to Asha's growth. 

 Now, in our seventh year, Asha is a stable organization, capable of handling its own affairs. We have mutually decided to become independent of ICA and register ourselves as a new organization. We are changing our name to "Asha for Education" to emphasize our commitment to children's education. We are still in the process of registering as a non-profit organization in the US, and expect it to be completed in a few more weeks. 

 Our chapter in Delhi has also been busy with logistical changes. Asha had been registered in New Delhi as a trust in 1991. Recently, we received FCRA clearance to receive foreign funds. This allows the Delhi chapter to start funding projects, in addition to providing logistical support in Delhi. 

 So, we approach our seventh anniversary with several changes in the organization. However, our commitment to children's education is the same as ever as is our goal to keep Asha free of bureaucracy and administrative overheads. As we head into the new millennium, we shall continue to strive to make Asha a widespread movement instead of a just large organization. We look forward to your ongoing support for our efforts. 

Contribute for FREE 

ICM/AT&T Association Loyalty Program 

If your long distance carrier is AT&T, please take a moment to call 1-800-426-0015, select #3 and sign up for this program. Be sure to choose "Asha" as your beneficiary association. It costs you absolutely nothing. If you are not with AT&T and have plans to switch to AT&T as your long distance carrier, please consider using the above number for switching.  

Event Listing  

April 4^th: The Jazz Fusion group Nataraj will be performing at the fund-raiser concert for ASHA NYC/NJ. The concert will be held in the Altschultz auditorium at Columbia University. 

April 11^th: The Jai Hind group will be holding the 2^nd annual ASHA fund-raiser dinner in the Memorial Union in the Arizona State University campus. All proceeds from the event will go to ASHA-Arizona. 

April 11^th-12^th: The Thyagaraja festival is being held at Cleveland State University from the 11^th to the 17^th of April. Watch for the ASHA-Cleveland stall on the first two days of the event. 

 May 2^nd: ASHA-Indiana will be holding it's spring fund-raiser, UTSAV '98 at the Knights of Columbus hall 

 May 3^rd: The deadline for the ASHA creative writing contest is on May 3^rd. Asha Chicago is organizing this event with autographed books by renowned authors (Shashi Tharoor, Chitra Divakaruni, Vikram Chandra and Mitali Perkins) for prizes. 
 

•  For more info. on local events please contact your local chapter.

Happenings! 

  
Arizona: Indian Summer 
A local Phoenix band, performed on the 8^th of March in the Memorial Union at Arizona State University. The concert was well received with over 300 people from the local community present for the event. The band gave an eclectic performance with numbers from Santana to Chura Liya and Ravoyi Chandamama. 

Chicago: The 3^rd annual Net-IP Charity Ball 
The Network of Indian-American Professionals, Chicago held its 3^rd annual charity ball on the 7^th of March. The proceeds from this event were donated to ASHA-Chicago. Donations, ticket sales and a raffle for a round trip ticket to India (sponsored by Air India) brought the total proceeds from the event to about $6,900/-, all of which will be used to fund schools in Bihar.  

Neil S. Dhillon, formerly one of the highest ranking Indian-American officials appointed to the Clinton administration, was the keynote speaker. D. P. Prakash, the founder of ASHA-L.A and the ASHA Stars program and currently the ASHA President, spoke about ASHA at the event. 

MIT: Asha MIT volunteers, Shehla, Ashita and Srikrishna, gave a presentation at Aspentec Corp. on the 27^th of March. Handouts with information about ASHA, the ICM/AT&T scheme and the ASHA calendars were distributed to the audience. Information and photographs of ASHA-MIT projects were available for members of the audience to view. Corporate presentations are a good way of increasing ASHA's exposure amongst the professionals in the community. 

St. Louis: The 2^nd annual St. Louis Carrom-TableTennis-Chess open was held on 8^th March at the Gandhi center. Viren handled the Carrom tournament, Voora and Vijay took care of Table-Tennis and Sathya organized the chess matches. ASHA St. Louis volunteers cooked and sold food at the event as well. The event raised about $500/- for ASHA St. Louis. 

Seattle: The annual pledge drive is well underway at Seattle. Each year, ASHA Seattle volunteers put together a pledge packet containing a calendar, an annual report and a coupon book. The pledge packets are financed by ASHA Seattle volunteers and by local businesses. Donors are gifted a pledge packet for their donations. 

Stanford: ASHA Stanford received a commitment of $4000/- from Smart Modular Inc. Representatives from 14 NGOs (including ASHA & CRY) met the Indian Counsel General in San Francisco in support of the 83^rd amendment. The proposed constitutional amendment makes Education a fundamental right for every Indian child. Visit http://www.tulipcom.com/pratham/ for more information on the 83^rd amendment.  
  

Current ASHA projects: 
 

Singhbhum Legal Aid and Development Society (SLADS), Bihar 

This group needed funding (library, administrative costs) for an existing high school, which targets around 150 children from 50 villages in South Bihar. The project is being jointly funded by ASHA-MIT and ASHA-D.C. with $3000 per year funding approved for a 3-year period. A site visit by an ASHA member was conducted in Sept. '97 and funding started in Oct. '97. 

Swanirwar, W. Bengal 

The project aims at rural development in 5 villages in Bengal, and MIT and LA chapters of ASHA have jointly funded the educational component of the project for 3 years starting June 1995 with $1500/year. This included 5 pre-primary and 3 primary schools for 222 children in the area. Site visit was conducted in summer 1996, and the project nears completion in summer 1998. 

Ashraya, Karnataka 

The Chicago, Cornell and Delaware chapters of ASHA are jointly funding this group which has started a residential school for the children of migrant labor in Bangalore. The project requires funding of $2500 per year and clothes, books and medical care for approximately 50 children from the age of 6 upwards. 

Gramin Vikas Vigyan Samiti, Rajasthan 

This is an action group of Gandhian volunteers who practice alternative rural reconstruction in the desert villages of Rajasthan. Asha-Stanford and Berkeley have funded their primary schools which provide non formal education to over 150 children from the region.  

Abhilasha, Haryana 

This project funded by Asha-Indianapolis supports 50 children in a school in a rural region of Haryana. Students are provided with a uniform and ASHA has also helped with construction of lavatories and a water tank for drinking water by funding with $1800. 

Chromepet, Tamil Nadu 

This project was funded in 1997 with $1500 by Asha-St. Louis to rebuild flood damaged infrastructure in a middle school in the suburbs of Chennai. A site visit indicated that the construction was completed in time, and the roof of 3 classrooms rebuilt with the funding sent by Asha. 

Ankuran, Bihar 

Asha-Arizona has decided to fund Ankuran, a non profit agency which has been working in Chatra dist (Bihar) for the past 15 years. The project proposal was for launching 45 educational centers catering to children between 6-14 years of age. However, based on the site visit and the financial situation of Asha, they have decided to fund 5 centers this year. Future funding will depend on the progress of these 5 centers. 

Spotlight: 

Prachiti, Maharashtra 

  
This organisation runs a residential school with around 85 children in Padsare, a tribal village in Konkan. Asha-Seattle & Stanford are jointly funding the project with $6000/year, approved after a site visit by an Asha member, Pratibha Bachal, in Dec. '96.  

 Padsare is a tribal village in the Pali taluka of the Konkan region of Maharashtra. The school is residential for students coming from villages outside Padsare and is a regular day school for students from Padsare. Natu Foundation has sponsored the building of a hostel for the school while the operational expenses for the school are taken care of jointly by the Seattle and Stanford chapters of Asha for Education. 

 In addition to running the school effectively, Prachiti is also working on development of the land using horticulture to provide vocational training facilities for students after they reach Std. VIII and to aid in making the project self-sufficient. They have also applied to the government to obtain land along the road for wasteland development. Overall the school seems to be making good progress and other activities are shaping up as planned. With local funds becoming available, an interesting and successful model is shaping up. The villagers seem to be regaining hope about their future." 
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