Teaching Latha Basic Computer Skills

This week, we took one of the Kodagali site managers, a sassy vibrant woman named Latha, to the neighboring city of Bannur, to teach her how to use email. To me, email is such a regular part of my life, I’m really not sure how functional I’d be without it. In teaching Latha the basics, I realized so many things I take for granted, in terms of computer skills and knowledge. Basic things- such as how to open an internet window, what a “username” or “password” is, or how to identify an email address by the “@” symbol and the .net/.com/.org. Another major thing I’ve taken for granted- having most of the internet in my own language. Plus any time I stumble upon a page that isn’t in English, google automatically translates it for me. Do you know how many webpages are in Kannada? Few and far between, relative to English.

Sanitary Health Clinic...

In our first session, we helped Latha create an email account through gmail. Another thing I take for granted- knowing my date of birth. After making her account, and adding several contacts, we had her practice writing a few emails. We taught her how to write a message by clicking “compose,” entering the recipient address, and then writing the body itself. After each of these emails, which we had Latha send to our personal accounts, we opened our own inboxes to show her that they had been electronically sent to us. Next, we sent her emails from our accounts, and had her open and reply to them.

Early on, we faced some resistance. Initially, Latha wasn’t even comfortable with the idea. She frequently became flustered and merely stared at the screen, quickly giving up. However, with our encouragement, Latha persevered. She began to enjoy herself, enthusiastically composing emails and was pleasantly surprised when we showed her that we had received her emails (and that this wasn’t just some American sorcery performed by charlatans). 

Additionally, we spent two days in Banvari. Life in Banvari moves at the speed of a turtle, but it was a refreshing calm. I realize this sounds so third-world-traveler-pretentious, but life here is extraordinarily real. I mean I can’t tell you how many times a day I have #India #notreallife moments, but at the same time, village life has a purity and a truth to it, that we have long forgotten. Banvari is quite picturesque- the fields and rocky terrain are the deep reds and faded browns of Monument Valley, and the foliage is vaguely tropical. Animals regulate- goats, cows, and roosters roam the dirt paved blocks. We ate a number of basic, but delicious meals- rice and samber, with mystery side dishes. On Friday, Dave and James (the other interns) took a long trek along the road, appreciating the scenery, although unfortunately not running into any elephants despite the warnings. 

Building Leadership Through Monitoring Quality Control

This week (July 9-13th) we worked on a range of projects. 

Our main goal was to work with the women at the Kodagali workspace to improve quality control. 

This week, we focused on quality control at the Kodagali workspace, where the women primarily screen print designs onto the cotton totes. Screen printing is not as simple as it seems. The women must make new screens everyday, concoct the paint, and print each part of the design onto the bags, one color, one side at a time. 

The women of Kodagali are prolific and have developed an efficient system in order to execute screen printing. They work fluidly as a team, and are each focused and consistent. However, we had detected some issues with “quality control.” In other words, there were often tiny mistakes, that in and of themselves would have been easy to overlook, but which were occurring semi-frequently. Things were occasionally printed crookedly, or there were slight smudges, or parts of letters were slightly deformed. First, we halted production, and with the help of Harish, we explained to the women the issue at hand. We had a range of examples to show them and explained that while we appreciated all their hard work, it was important to take the few extra seconds per bag in order to be thorough and to avoid such mistakes. We explained that while the mistakes were minor, for massive orders, there was an expectation to deliver consistent, quality, products.

The following day, we spent time analyzing each bag printed by the women. In particular, we worked in conjunction with one woman, with whom we examined each bag individually. Within an hour, she was not only noticing everything we pointed out, but was leading the bag checking process. Although she was one of the youngest women at the workspace that day, she began to talk to each woman, pointing out any errors they had made, and encouraging them to be more meticulous. By training her to detect any errors, whether it be obviously crooked prints, or slight deformity of letters in a language she wasn’t familiar with, she had the confidence to rise as a leader in the group, supervising and encouraging her coworkers.

Additionally, this week we visited another workspace, Banvari, for a day trip. Banvari is a small village of about 300 people. Despite its small size, there are 22 women in the village who work with Ubuntu. Currently, the women of Banvari sew the cotton bags that are sent to Kodagali for screen printing. Banvari is absolutely gorgeous- it is the colors of the American Southwest, the deep oranges and chalky reds of Monument Valley. The mountains and rocky ridges are surrounded by lush forests, home to wild elephants and tigers. Goal #8: Don’t get eaten alive by a tiger. Do interact with a wild elephant.  Next week, we’ll be spending more time in Banvari, as the workspace is newer than that of Kodagali’s, and the women are much less self sufficient. 

I also visited several health clinics in Kodagali and the neighboring town of Bannur. It was a mere reconassaince mission, and so I have only first impressions to share. Inshallah I’ll be able to go back with a translator at some point in the future and get a better idea of common ailments and treatments, the cliental, payment methods, etc. However, the overall initial impressions were interesting. The clinics were in some ways disorganized and unclean, with broken fans providing little relief from the heat, and people, presumably staff, in normal clothes, standing over patients who all looked zonked. In America, the fear of germs and recognition of the importance of sanitation has in many ways led to an obsessively pristine and orderly world of medical practice. Organization and cleanliness, to an often unnecessary extent, effect patient confidence in the doctor. While I’m not sure the details on how much general cleanliness of medical facilities effects the sanitation of procedures and practices, it was interesting to see how vastly different the conditions of clinics were in the region. 

Additionally, while looking for the maternal clinic in Bannur, I used simple charades to get directions from a man in the street. I indicated that I was pregnant and asked where I could find a clinic or a doctor. His first reaction was to ask if I wanted a “scan?” to see “boy or girl.” In light of the high rates of sex selective abortion and female infanticide in India, this was somewhat disturbing. 

OH! By the way! I rode an elephant last week when visiting Mysore Palace! Unfortunately they took our cameras away before entering the palace but that just means I have all the more reason to seek out wild elephants in Banvari..

Macro and Micro Perspectives of International Development Programs

As a student of International Health, I am well versed in statistics and lofty development goals. Public health campaigns are aimed at transforming health systems, educating entire populations, reaching the masses. Success is measured in achievement of quantifiable goals, improving rates. The United Nations develops the “Millennium Development Goals” and suddenly ministries of health focus on reducing the number of women dying in childbirth or increasing the amount of children enrolled in school, in a singular way. Achieving these goals becomes the sole end. Any program that will increase the stats is valued over improving the overall systems. Funding is shifted to programs that will achieve these goals, and while change is often successful, it is often inefficient or unsustainable. 

On-the-ground work is absolutely invaluable for a student or professional of international health or development. They are macro fields, yet without the micro perspectives, individuals will be sacrificed for the greater good. And the means and ends get all jumbled. 

For example, let’s take the role of women’s empowerment in two different fields- population and development. In population programs women are often reduced to wombs, while in development programs, women are often reduced to workers. Coercive population programs such as forced sterilizations under Indira Gandhi or the one-child policy in China may reduce total fertility rates, but increasing reproductive choice and rights or empowering women have been shown to be much more effective. Additionally increasing rights and empowering women are important in and of themselves. You want to stabilize population growth? Keep girls in school! Delay the age of marriage! Give them economic opportunities, thus increasing their power within the household and their say in reproductive matters, and giving them incentives to have less children so they can continue to be economically productive! You want to lift the impoverished out of poverty? Organizations like Ubuntu at Work empower these women through enhancing their skills, broadening their horizons, raising their confidence, and connecting them to markets. These are not only inherently worthy goals, but they increase the economic production of families, they capitalize on the most underutilized resource in the world (women), and they give women economic capabilities. Women consistently have been shown to spend more on their families, on their children, on health and education. Having a micro perspective allows an international health or development student or professional to keep their priorities straight, to develop sustainable programs, and to ensure efficiency by addressing individual concerns.

Without a micro perspective, without involved staff, regular check ups, and consistent evaluation and assessment, such individual concerns would not be addressed. And these situations aren’t unique to Ubuntu at Work. All kind of development studies have shown that without assessing individual concerns, programs are often largely inefficient. For example, subsidizing school uniforms or having appropriate, gender segregated bathroom facilities have been shown to keep girls in school longer. With a solely macro perspective, it would not occur to most professionals living wholly different lives that school uniforms could be a hindrance to a family’s ability to afford education, or that in a bathroom-less school, girls may stay home while menstruating. 

After just a week with Ubuntu at Work, I feel that I have learned so much. In some ways it has been very reinforcing of what I’ve studied in high-tech classrooms thousands of miles away, but it also has been an entirely unique experience. I am learning to think beyond numbers and ends, to put a face to the stats, to keep an intimate, individual, micro perspective in order to achieve macro goals. 

First Week: Ubuntu at Work

Background: I am spending 5-6 weeks interning for Ubuntu at Work this summer. Ubuntu at Work is a non-profit, that primarily works in India and South Africa. I’m sure you’ve deduced by now that I am working with the India operation. I am stationed in Bangalore, a city in southern India, and spending each week in rural villages where Ubuntu either has or is setting up work spaces. Ubuntu strives to empower women in impoverished villages and help them lift themselves out of poverty by teaching them income-generating skills and connecting them to national and global markets. However, in order to enable these women to connect to greater markets, when they are located in rural areas, the women must not only be taught skills, but must become more confident in their abilities and must broaden their horizons. These are all things Ubuntu aims to do. The women with which Ubuntu works often can’t even begin to visualize ways to increase or supplement their income, outside of the ways already practiced in their village- agriculture, maintaining snack stalls, buying a goat or cow and selling its milk, etc. Additionally, these women often have little confidence in their own skills. The executive director, Vibha, told a story about a woman in one village who sews saris, salwar kameezes, and all kinds of traditional attire for the villagers. However when she was shown a simple cotton bag (like the ones you’d use for groceries), she said there was no way she could sew it. If these women don’t believe in their own abilities, or engage in new activities, they have little chance of changing their stars.

Current Ubuntu operations in India focus on making a variety of goods, specifically bracelets and cotton bags. They currently have 10 workspaces in India and are expanding rapidly. My first week, the other interns and I, did a lot of observing, shadowing of the head field worker, Harish, and taught English classes to the women, children, and college students in the village. Additionally, we started a project to help the women get bank accounts. The village we were located in, Kodagali, is home to one of the biggest Ubuntu workspaces. Thus, we were able to get a good idea of what the other villages can aspire to, although the women of Kodagali are no where near the end stage. They are largely self sufficient, however there are certain processes that they still feel uncomfortable doing without supervision. For example, on Tuesday, the women were cutting fabric for bags, using a power tool that could cut through 200 layers of cotton at once. Harish was the only one using the power tool. For him, it was a really important job, and something that was just easier for him to do himself. However, that defeats the entire purpose of empowering these women and helping them become self-sufficient. Being the daughter of John Kelley, having cherished building book shelves and doll houses growing up, having framed the side of a house and shingled a roof at SSP, was all about the power tools. The other interns and I convinced Harish to let us use the machine, and then guided the women in using it. A young man hanging out at the work space said that it was “men’s work” and the women were hesitant to give it a try. However eventually we convinced them, and let me tell you, if I still feel like a beast every time I use a power tool, I can’t imagine how it felt for these women. 

Vibha herself was the first advocate for bank accounts. Setting up bank accounts will allow Ubuntu to pay the women via direct deposit, which is easier and safer for the company. However, helping the women open their own accounts has a number of fringe benefits. It gives the women greater power over their income, mechanisms to save, and opens the door for attaining loans in the future. The women all vehemently insisted that they use their income from Ubuntu for their children, and try to save as much as they can. However, when you are at that level of poverty, saving is far from easy. Saving is always a decision. For (most) Americans, saving money means forgoing eating out, buying a new outfit, visiting relatives, etc. For the people of Kodagali, it means forgoing basic medical attention, fertilizer for their crops, or even meals. Additionally, many of the women couldn’t previously get bank accounts because there was a 500 rupee (approximately $9) minimum to open an account, which they couldn’t afford. Thus, we spoke with a representative from the bank, and he agreed to allow the women to open zero balance accounts, and he came to the village to help the women take passport style pictures and fill out the appropriate paperwork. The bank is in the next town over, Bannur, a 15 minute bus ride away.

Kodagali fields

We of course thought this was a great idea. However, here the importance of a micro, culturally intimate, perspective comes in. The women were initially opposed to the idea of using these accounts. They just wanted to be payed in cash. If they were payed in cash, they could hide the money and use it how they chose. However, if they took a bus to Bannur, their husbands would know they had money on them, and would demand it. The husbands would then use the money to buy alcohol. If they were to lie to their husbands or refuse to tell them how much money they had made, their husbands would beat them. For them, this was just commonplace. They were laughing and joking around as we discussed the possibilities. For them, their short term goals were just surviving. Just not getting beaten that night. How can these women even begin to think about their future, when they are barely living above the subsistence level? 

In the end, we discussed the possibility of getting them checkbooks, so they could write checks to themselves, and cash them at the Kodagali bank. We will of course follow up to ensure that this system is working, but we learned a number of important lessons. We learned that lofty development goals cannot be achieved without a micro perspective. No development program can be applied to every country, every village, or even every person.