Methodology: Survey Technique
Language: Hindi, English
Catalysts: Cecilia Cardozo
Youth Fellows:
Olinda Gonsalves
Scony D’souza
Jacinta Munis
Maria Bendomar
Julietta Nato
Severin Fernandes
Pramila Govind
Jordan Govind
Coordinator:
Anita Patil-Deshmukh
About the Subject:
The young women who joined this project belong to the fishermen’s community in the small villages of Uttan and Chauk, some fifty kilometers north of the city. Most of these girls had to leave the school after completing third or forth grade in order to help the family business of fishing. The reality of their day to day life depicting their brothers in school while their being at home helping their parents, made them choose the theme of drop out rate as the research question. They decided to survey 100 households in the village to find out the truth about education in their village.
Challenges & Learnings:
This particular group’s participation in this project is an interventional activity by itself. They had not stepped outside of their village until they joined PUKAR Youth Fellowship. Their coming to the meeting to PUKAR Office was a stellar accomplishment for these girls. Therefore assembling of the group, convincing parents about the “Moral Posturing” of their participation and finally taking the first small steps towards assertion and freedom have been huge struggles for this group.
They had to be strong willed to face the barrage of questions, remarks and comments from their own villagers when they went door to door for the completion of the survey. In that difficult process they made many friends, a few enemies and learnt some vital things about the people and their attitudes. While they were using the traditional methods of investigations like survey, they were also keen to learn new methods like theater to express the conflict they faced continuously between their own dreams and desires and those enforced by the family and community. With a help of another Youth Fellowship Research Group, they had their first experience of enacting a street theater.
Conclusion:
Girls from the fishermen’s community were pulled out of school at 3rd and 4th grade to take care of younger siblings and cooking at home, their brothers were also pulled out of school at 9th or 10th grade to join the family in maintaining the family business of fishing. The major cause of their own failure in 4th grade (statistically significant value for that variable) was due to the poor education at the village level Zilla Parishad School from where they graduated at 4th grade. So they decided to gather the community together and request to start a private school which would prepare them better for the 4th grade.
End Product:
Posters, Street Play at mid term, Dance at the Graduation ceremony.
