Perspective: Making a Difference

ARTICLE BY SRIRAM RAMGOPAL

We have been going to the Ramavaram slum for over a year now, and our goals and objectives for the community are maturing in many ways as we learn more about the people there as well as about ourselves. The educational programme that we started from March of this year has been working well, but perhaps not in the ways that we expected it to. We worked hard to elucidate the goals of what our program were going to be; and we decided on a number of objectives. These were based on the information that we had about the children from numerous visits, from their parents, and from a visit to their school that some of our members made earlier this year. As Bhavya described, these were health education, teamwork and trust, values, etiquette, citizenship and creativity. These goals were selected because we thought they would help these children become responsible, hardworking adults, who had careers and a bright future ahead of them.

It remains too early to know whether or not we achieved our objectives. We have tried hard to develop and carry out activities teaching these values, but whether or not they learn something from it is not so clear. It is difficult to change the way people are. It’s hard to make people, especially a group of children, realize the importance of things like handwashing and hygiene when their parents and surroundings tell them otherwise. Likewise, it’s hard to convince children that with hard work and with a positive mindset that they can indeed be doctors, cricket players and policemen, when everyone and everything around them seems to contradict that notion. The effects of health education, etiquette, citizenship and creativity are hard to impart to a group of children who have been taught that such things are meaningless. Thus, though we have tried very hard and will continue to do so, we may or may not reach our objectives. Nonetheless, we will do our best to reach them because we strongly feel that these things have value and are important.

However, I have realized over the last several visits to Ramavaram, that we are making a difference here, though in an unexpected way. Though we may or may not be successful in reaching arbitrarily stated objectives, something is changing, though slowly and subtly, in this group of children. Every time we go to the slum, the children rush out and are excited to see us. They are excited when we sit them down in groups, and though they quickly grow tired of being lectured, they are immensely excited by the prospect that young adults, coming from entirely different walks of life, take time, every week, to go and see them.

For a group of children who receive little attention from their parents, the adults in the community, or from their teachers, the fact that we come there for the sole purpose of spending time with them carries great meaning for them. We sit down with them in small groups, and they take great pleasure in sitting next to us. Many of our members speak little or no Tamil but despite this, the children love to talk to us about everything they can possibly think of. They love the thrill of communicating with somebody who cares about them. Some of our members are especially successful at talking to the kids there and finding out what their problems are, and by listening to their problems with a sympathetic ear, we can connect with these kids on an emotional level and produce more positive change than we could by merely following orders on a checklist.

On Saturday evenings, as we come home from another day at Ramavaram, we wonder whether or not we were able to teach anything to the kids, and whether anything will change there as a result of it. No doubt that progress comes slowly and it is too early to expect dramatic changes. No doubt that the things we are teaching the children there will slowly but surely change their behavior, as long as we are consistent and clear with them. Of course, we will continue to refine our lessons and our plans in the community as we gain more and more experience with the people and from other organizations. I strongly believe that we can make a difference here and break the cycle of poverty and hopelessness for at least a few families here at the Ramavaram slum. However, after spending time with these kids and showing them that we care about them, I’ve come to realize that there is more than one way to define success. By sharing happiness, compassion and goodwill in these children, I believe we can give them something more meaningful but less measurable: hope. And for this reason we will keep trying to make a difference here despite the odds we face.