An experience to remember

If you've been following my blog, you'd remember I mentioned I was interning at a social work organisation called 'Jaag mere taalib e ilm'. Well, it came to end today with the certificate ceremony which I sadly could not attend since my left eye is puffed up with some weird infection thing. Anyhoo, Let's get on with Jaag.

It was basically a project dominated by a majority of Szabist students. It consisted of a comprehensive language training course for more than 200 students of the area of Mehmudabad who can't afford to pay to learn the 'language of the elite'. It also had a wonderful workshop for the teachers of the host school where the project took place which was a mentorship program to help improve the quality of imparting education to these children.

The Jaag team consisted of very dedicated core team members who organised the whole program. To name a few I'd say Bemisal, who was heading the whole thing. Cute little thing she is. You wouldn't expect to see so much power and enthusiasm coming from her petite structure but, you'd be surprised. Manaal, who was basically the person from the core team whose job it was to make us internees work. And boy, did she make us work! :P But at the end of the day, if it wasn't for her, we would've been a lot more careless..so I have lots of respect for this woman.

Besdies the core team, it was us internees who helped carry out this project.

The language training course was conducted by us internees who were interviewed and then had to send our curriculum for approval to Jaag before every session. The teacher's training was conducted by several known speakers and intellectuals coupled with some Jaag members.

Another thing that Jaag did was the renovation of the host school by painting the walls, fixing the soft boards and setting up a reading room and art room.

There was a party day themed as 'Orange Day' where students rejoiced on successful completion of the program and enjoyed various activities arranged for them. Television personalities Sahir Lodhi and Faisal Qureshi (Anchor) graced the occasion with their presence.

All in all, it was a lovely experience getting to teach these children and getting to communicate with them. It's great to see that this wasn't just one of those random activities that are done without planning. It was a well thought out project that grasped the root of the problems of Pakistan: education. I hope Jaag receives enough funding and support so these people can continue their original project was of six months instead of six weeks and cover all thirty schools they had planned to.

Here's a link to the program: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=122838641073689&ref=ts#!/event.php?eid=122838641073689

P.S. I'd like to thank ASA- Assess, Solve & Apply since it was as a volunteer of ASA that I found Jaag. ASA was also a sponsor to Jaag's Mentorship Program. If you want to know more about ASA, go to this link: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?gid=17267799853&ref=ts