The landmark news is that we have entered into an agreement for the purchase of the land in the village, to house the Society. We are now in the process of obtaining the necessary approvals and collecting the monies, so that the land indeed becomes ours. Donations are being sought since this purchase is not in our current budget. Any contributions are welcome. The deadline for the final payment is 31 st March 2005.

One another small improvement in the service to our children, related to the addition of one cooked vegetable in the meal everyday, supplementing the salad that is already being given. The meal given by us is the principal meal that the children eat and it appears important for their growth that this small additional expense be incurred.

I am happy to state that the general well being of all the children has improved significantly and that all are looking healthy and happy.

The half yearly exams for all the children is currently on and the results would be known by early October. They have all prepared sincerely for their exams and we do hope that we will witness satisfactory results. The new group of children meant to face their scholarship examination by April 2005 have also joined the scheme.

During the month a friend from Israel came and spoke to the children about his country. It was useful.

• Miss Kritika Kumari (Class VIII) – second prize in the School English Elocution Competition.
• Master Saurabh Joshi (Class VIII) – Second prize in the school Inter House quiz competition.
• Rakesh Joshi (Class IX) – Second prize in the “On the Spot” painting Competition.

The summer holidays were usefully spent – the children enjoyed sports activities now available at the new campus. This time was also utilized for spending time with their Mentors and catching up with Maths, Science and Language. The students are now ready to face their second term with greater confidence.

The first term results, only after four weeks of effective classes, has given us plenty of information for both the Students and their Mentors. It gave us an opportunity to evaluate our strategy to identify and overcome the weak areas of several children and also to counsel both parents and the wards.

There were two Guest Speakers during the month who spent quality time with the children i.e.

• General Nandwani, a Management Consultant who spoke at length on ‘ETIQUETTE' and
• Mr. Yadhav Mehra from Delhi who had a working session each for the Teachers and the Students wherein he helped them to comprehend the Importance of planning, strategy and the concept of pursuing excellence through a well designed and effectively executed management game.

We are grateful to both these gentlemen for the time they so willingly gave us.

Four of the Students who have graduated from Class XII have chosen to pursue the Bachelor of Tourism Studies (BTS) Degree through the Distance Education Program of IGNOU. Four ‘Friends of Purkal', who manage Travel Businesses in Delhi, have very kindly offered to provide hands on in-house working experience in their offices during the summer vacations. In addition these friends have been generous in providing these young students support to help them manage life in the city of Delhi!! One of the girl students is a houseguest with a sponsor.

For the first time in many months, our facility has all the teachers required in place and a teacher-training programme has been worked out for them. Experienced teachers from schools in Dehradun have offered to provide training sessions on an on-going basis. The first of these sessions was taken by a volunteer, Mr Tony, a teacher from Australia working with us, in the month of August. I am sure these training sessions will in due course enhance the teaching abilities of our young teachers.

We are indebted to Tony and Natasha, an Australian couple, both experienced and excellent teachers of Maths and Science. During their 8 weeks stay with us they have helped design methods to enhance learning of these subjects.

The half yearly examination for the year takes place in the second half of September and we are confident that the children will perform well. In spite of the very heavy monsoons this year the children's attendance has been good.

This is the first monsoon that the facility is facing at the new Campus. Since we are located in a hilly terrain we have had quite a few landslides. Extra expense has been incurred in building support walls to keep further land from eroding and to check future landslides. This work I am sure will carry us comfortably through the future monsoons.

The games facilities i.e.. Volleyball and basketball is being put to good use by our children. It has helped to break the rigour of the studying schedule. We would like to thank all those instrumental in making these facilities possible.

4 students who are currently pursuing a Bachelor of Tourism Degree with IGNOU did 6-week hands-on summer training with different Travel Agencies in Delhi. With this experience the children are now geared-up and ready to work hard for obtaining professional skills necessary for their future. We are deeply indebted to the FRIENDS OF PURKAL for giving the children this significant opportunity.

We need to record with great regret the passing away of one of our brightest boys in the VII class, Aman Joshi. He was all of 13 years and it is a brilliant life that is wasted.

The Society has spearheaded an initiative for making Purkal and its environs plastic free. The children have actively participated in the work. Apart from the bins that we have in the campus for non-degradable material, the village has also five of them financed by the community. The effort will be on going.

I am glad to advise all those interested, that The Society now has an entity registered in the USA that makes donations to us made from the US Tax Free. We now request friends to help us secure donations from the US since this concession that we have from the Internal Revenue Authority of that country could help. Such of those interested in learning the particulars of this arrangement should kindly write.

The Society has benefited significantly through the assistance that has been given to us by Mr. & Mrs. Upadhyaya of Manas Manthan, an enterprise that is helping children understand and appreciate Mathematics instead of merely learning it by rote. Our teachers spent over ten hours sitting with the couple learning various techniques. We are grateful.

The Half Yearly Examinations of both the Schools have been held. The results show that the children have all improved their performance over the term. While there are individual outstanding performances, the overall result is one of satisfaction. It is most heartening to see the way the new children have all fared.

Miss. Anshu Tyagi a teacher who stayed with us for over 5½ years and contributed significantly to the Society’s growth, did us proud by first winning a selection into Emirates Airlines as a Cabin Crew and then as the most outstanding student of her class of trainees at Dubai. Her performance is demonstrative of the philosophy at The Purkal Youth Development Society  - that the growth of our young teachers and their progress into life is as important to us as the shaping of the young student’s minds. Anshu joined us as an undergraduate, used distance study programmes and left us a well-qualified and competent postgraduate.

The Society has decided to launch in March 2008, a new Scheme known as “Bus Them To Purkal” Scheme. 20 very poor girls who live in very backward villages in our neighborhood – two hours walking distance from Purkal, in the age group of 8 to 9, will be identified and prepared for entry into class VI over a 12 to 18 months period. These children are different from those whom we having been handling earlier, in that; they will not have had the advantage of any serious primary education till now. The financial requirements to cover the first year’s requirements of this scheme has been received from the Emirate Airlines, Dubai, courtesy the promotion by our erstwhile teacher Miss. Anshu Tyagi, presently working with them.

We are also glad to report that one of our other Ex-teachers Miss. Shilpa Bohra, has passed her Service Selection Board Examination and joined the Air Force as a trainee officer. She will be commissioned as a Flying Officer in December 2007 We are proud of her accomplishment and Shilpa believes that The Society has helped her to train for this competition. We believe that all our teachers are students in our care and that they should be helped to identify and train for careers even as we focus on the children and their future.

“Stree Shakti” division of the Society mounted an exhibition at Gurgaon for two days in an attempt to exploit the festival sale opportunity. Apart from recording handsome sales, several lessons were learnt to help us enhance the level of this division’s activity in the future. The Society has now decided to gradually enhance the numbers of its women workers in this division to 60 from the present strength of 35. It has also been decided to launch the construction of a new workshop facility on the Society’s property. An initial donation of Rs. 10 Lacs to meet this need has also been received. We are in need of an additional Rs.15 Lacs to complete this building project.

The board of the Society, which met on the 12th October, also approved a few other new initiatives to target the education of young people from this area. We shall report them as these schemes get implemented.

Winter is with us. The evenings end early and the children are therefore compelled to walk home in the dark. This makes no difference to their keenness to attend class and pursue excellence. The report on the monthly tests held has since been received and the results show a marked improvement in performance all around. We should have very positive results in the pre-final scheduled for December 2007.

The playgrounds, the library and the computers are all being put to good use. Steady progress is being recorded in the number of children crossing the different milestones that have been prescribed to record progress.

During the month we have had two speakers addressing the children. Also, all of us were invited to an Odissi recital organized by Spic Macay. An Italian Juggler performed in our campus for the benefit of the children. The children visited the Virasat Exhibition, a major event in our city and four of our children recited their Hindi poetry to an audience at Virasat.

It was very satisfying to see about 10 of our children come back with Gold, Silver and Bronze medals from their sports day held at their school. The play facilities that we have here have given them enough encouragement to participate.

There are now more miracles to record for posterity. Dependent entirely on donations, the Society grew during the year and established itself more firmly. We thank every single friend of Purkal who made this possible. Among them is a new Army Officer, donating from his first month’s salary and one of our teachers pledging to donate a portion of her salary every month. There have been donors of large amounts as well, many of them responding to our capital investment needs. Our new bus has now arrived, meant to bus the very disadvantaged children from their remote homes. May the spirit of sharing thrive.   

Our attempt to help our children widen their horizons is yielding results. Sandeep Joshi of Class 12 secured a gold medal, participating in the International Informatics Olympiad 2007. Two others earned respectable State and International Ranks.

The results of the test held in December show that almost all the children without exception have improved their marks over the short period. The signs are hopeful.

Six students led by a teacher participated in a National Integration Camp held at Vizag for 10 days. The experience has done their personality plenty of good. 48 others are currently on an educational tour to the South of India. Generous donations have made possible these excursions. We do believe that these are important and necessary inputs in our bid for personality development.

The event that highlights the month is the commencement of the “Bus Them to Purkal” Scheme (BTTP), our work with 20 poor, poorly schooled girls of our area. We should see all of these girls go forth into the world as successful professionals, 12 years hence. The present signs are all propitious. We also commenced an English-speaking programme for a group of about 20 adult women of the Community. This is a six-month experimental programme.

A zero energy-cooling chamber meant to preserve the vegetables intended for the mid-day meals is now ready and waiting for the summer (uses the principle that evaporation causes cooling)

During the short winter holidays, about 50 children travelled to the South of India. They witnessed the architecture, history of the area and experienced the culture, cuisine and life of this part of our country. Five days of traveling and 11 days of sight seeing got them through five cities. A large number of Donors, a few of them big, made this most useful exercise possible. Another Group of seven traveled to Vizag to take part in a National Integration Camp.  The younger ones who were left behind had the advantage of being coached in volleyball, basketball and badminton. The sports facilities are now very well used and appreciated.

The exam fever is perceptible.  There is effort, but more importantly prayers and blessings!!!  Preparatory work is in full swing for the finals for the year and the Board Exams that will be conducted through March.

The 20 girls under our BUS THEM TO PURKAL (BTTP) scheme have settled down.  These young 8 and 9 years old girls are provided with Dalia and milk on arrival followed by fruit and our usual lunch.  They also get a small nutritious snack before closing for the day.  Just in one month the children are already beginning to look better and with this their lessons are also progressing well.

During the month of February the Stree Shakti women constituted themselves into 3 Self Help Groups of ten each known as PRAGATI, VISHWAS and AASTHA.  All patchwork sales effected would be credited to the account of these groups.  Each group member now makes a contribution of Rs.50/- per week into the group account.  This is meant to:

1. Cultivate their savings habit
2. It will also help the women create a corpus for lending amongst the group members

We notice that since the formation of the groups, the group leaders are taking more interest and initiative.  There is a greater sense of awareness and responsibility and we believe that a sense of belonging will happen over a period of time.

For the first time a MEDICAL CAMP was conducted for all the children of ‘Yuva Shakti’ and also the women of ‘Stree Shakti’.  With this we propose to have an annual comprehensive health check-up for each child in the beginning of each academic year.  This would enable us to maintain a medical record of each individual under our care.

We would like to make special mention of The Special Secretary (Health) Govt. of Uttrakhand, Dr. G C Baunthiyal, Chief Medical Officer and Dr. R K Pant, Chief Medical Superintendent from the Government Hospital in Dehradun, who most generously provided the services of a Pediatrician, Dentist, Pathologist and a host of medical personnel for this occasion.  Medicines were also dispensed wherever required.

Dr Vinod Arora, Eye specialist and Dr (Mrs.) Kalhan, Gynecologist also helped generously.

We hope to improve upon this experience in the future years and use these records to follow-up on the health of each of our wards.

Over the years we have been visited by a number of friends from all over the world – some out of curiosity and some genuinely wanting to visit the project and meet with our children and some to buy the beautiful, handmade patchwork quilts.  In the month of March a number of donations have been received from some of these friends and particular mention of the following: -

1. One English friends has collected all her weddings gifts in the form of cash and this amount has been sent for our cause
2. Another English Medical student raised a sizeable amount by organizing a charity Event on the completion of her medical program
3. Another group raised money over Dinner.
4. Many many gave us cash

All this enabled us to purchase a 14 seater van to help our teachers commute from the City.  Such acts of generosity steel our resolve to deliver the very best for our children in our care.

The results of the Annual Examination held in March have been received.  A very quick analysis of the marks would reveal the following:
-           Most children have improved upon their past performance and there is ample
            evidence to show that they are striving to improve on their past results.
-           The general performance in English and the Sciences have shown improvement but work still needs to be done in regard to Social Sciences and Hindi.
-           Some children have topped their class in Science.

The results of the Final Examinations received this month have now been studied. It is heartening to note that the growth in the learning abilities of the children has been very satisfactory. Most children are becoming good students. We have also short listed the names of those needing special attention for improvement and some ‘Experiments in Dispersed Learning’ using the children themselves to teach their peers, is beginning to yield results. We do hope that with this collaborative effort of the students teaching their peers, all these weaker children will also do better in the coming year.

We have taken several steps to help children learn Mathematics through activities. Some equipments and books have been acquired for this effort and the culture has to spread through the organisation and efforts towards this end are being made. The idea of using activities to teach Science is also being given a thrust.

In our bid to provide children visual experience for learning, visits were arranged to the exhibitions available with ONGC and the FRI. Notes were made; classes held pre and post these visits to help optimize the Learning experience.

Mr. Rajan Brijnath has kindly agreed to hold a series of 7/8 classes for ten of our children to help them play chess with competence. The first of these classes were held this month.

I am also glad to report that the five students who did their Class 12th this year are being given work experience for short periods in the under noted institutions.

1. Miss. Poonam Joshi - Placed at Lucknow; Courtesy Dr. Madan Godebole, Professor and Head of Department of Endocrinology, Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Research. This was arranged since Poonam wishes to pursue a Course in Bio Technology.
2. Master Sandeep Joshi and Master Sunil Dangwal are apprenticing with M/S Tex Industries, Roorkee for a period of two months in their Accounts Department; courtesy Mr. Vijay Toley, Chairman of the Company. These boys wish to pursue a Programme in Management.
3. Master Sudhir Dangwal and Miss Himani Joshi are with Exposure Media Marketing, Courtesy Mr. Rajiv Seth

Stree Shakti is making good progress. One of these girls has moved on, thanks to our English classes and our sponsoring her into a Para- nursing Programme, to become a nurse in one of the hospitals in the City. About ten other quilting girls along with ten others from the Community are attending regular English Classes. After a while all these girls will also be helped to learn Computers. The progress that these girls are making is heartening.
The new building for the quilting Division has gotten under way. Efforts are being made to assemble the funds required to keep this building effort progressing.

JASWANT MODERN SCHOOL (most of our children are enrolled in this institute) celebrated their 60th Founders Day on 17th May with a ‘Sound and Light’ presentation based on ‘My Incredible India.’ Almost 35 of our children participated in this event that highlighted the past and future of our country.

Three of our children i.e. Rakesh Joshi, Rahul Panwar and Swati Sharma who have a great aptitude for fine arts are being sponsored into a special program for 2 years.  This program is being conducted by Mr. Paul Damle, a renowned Designer based in Dehradun. The children will be under his care until they are ready to enter a professional college after class XII. I am sure with the right encouragement and guidance these children will achieve their goal.

The following Post XII students have been placed in various organizations with the help of  Friends of Purkal for summer training:

NEERAJ DANGWAL – is pursuing his Bachelors in Finance from ICFAI University.  He is currently working with M/s Fedders Lloyds in the accounts department.  This has been made possible thanks to Mr. Brij Punj, Chairman of the Corporation.

POONAM JOSHI – has just completed her Class XII this year with 77% marks and wishes to pursue a career in Bio-Technology.  She recently spent a month working with Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Research (SGPGI) thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Godbole from the Institute.

SANDEEP JOSHI & SUNIL DANGWAL are spending two months with Tex Industries, Roorkee as Trainees in the Accounts department to gain work experience.  For this we would like to thank Mr. Vijay Toley, Chairman of the company for extending this opportunity to our boys.

HIMANI JOSHI & SUDHIR DANGWAL are presently working with Exposure Media Marketing and we have Mr. Rajiv Sethi to thank for this opportunity.

During the month the students have been taken on local field trips i.e.

• ONGC MUSEUM
• FOREST RESEARCH INSTITUTE (FRI) MUSEUM
• ZOOLIGICAL SURVEY OF INDIA

In addition to the above Educational Films are being shown to the students every Saturday.

This summer has been rather mild and the children have had a good time attending the Learning Centre every day of their school holidays.  The centre was closed down for one week to enable children to visit grandparents and extended family. The summer break was utilized for:

The good news is that 3 out of the 5 students who graduated from Class 12 this year progressed into professional programs with the assistance of the Society, details as follows:

A few years ago these children would have never dreamt of these opportunities – this is what PYDS has been able to achieve collectively.

We are expecting 4 of our brilliant children to find acceptance from the Foundation for Excellence, USA (FFE) as sponsored scholars for the current year, thanks to their outstanding performance. The FFE program is managed by a group of NRIs in Silicon Valley. The criteria for this scholarship is that:

Some of our brilliant students have been getting this scholarship, which is Rs.6000/- per year presently, since 2005.

We were delighted to have Ms Sneha, a volunteer from Cambridge for 15 days for revamping and organizing our Library.  In this short fortnight she put life into this important facility and also devised innovative ways to make the children cultivate the habit of reading.  The effect of an active Library is electrifying and we are most thankful to her.

Another important development relates to our Society becoming a part of the ‘Leadership Program’ launched by the Global Leadership and Education Foundation.  This foundation started by the Khemkas seeks to nurture leadership qualities in students.  Four PYDS teachers attended a workshop at the Doon School and have now commenced administering the program in classes 8 and 9 at our learning center.  One of our girl students, Sonali Pundir has also been selected to attend an International Convention for Youth Leaders at the Raffles Girls School, Singapore in November 2008.  All costs connected with this experience will be borne by the Foundation.

Our children had an interesting session with a slide show on Afghanistan and the Cook Islands from Mr. Janoush (visitor from Canada) who has worked in both these countries.

In addition to the above Mr. Arun Mamgain made a very motivational presentation on the life at the Indian Military Academy – hopefully aspiring some of our children for an Officer’s life in the Defence Forces.

The first quarterly reports on the first terminal examinations are yet to be received.  We are quite confident that the average performance of all the children would have improved.

We were fortunate to have an article written about us in the national edition of the “Times of India”. The BTTP class are growing and progressing beautifully. We recently conducted our second bi-monthly assessment of their progress in English, Hindi and Mathematics and many of the children have shown significant improvement in all areas. Our drive is to keep reinforcing the concepts with these children, so that they have no problems when they reach school. In the next few weeks we will be introducing them gradually to Science, which started today with a nature walk around Purkal.

Stree Shakti building is progressing although the funds for its construction are yet being collected. We are attempting to find donors.

The Results of the First terminal Examination were received.  It is heartening to note that the marks obtained in all subjects are improving with the familiarity gained with the English Language. Nearly every child has improved his/her marks over the past examination. More children are nearer their 70’s and many more in their 80’s and the 90’s. With the induction of mathematics teaching aids, the fear of this subject is also receding.

During the Board Meeting on the 23rd August when many of our Directors were present, we attempted to evaluate the skills beyond the academics. We noticed that the competence in General awareness, reasoning ability, skills in mental mathematics, debating in English and Hindi, understanding of Science, the Social Sciences and the general level of Confidence were all growing among a wide spectrum spread across classes, sexes and age groups. We appear to be moving along the right track.

Witnessing the BTTP group grow into confidence and Learning has convinced us that we need to pursue with this idea. We have therefore decided to recruit another batch in the coming year, i.e. in 2009. All these children are being introduced to ‘Bird Watching’ and with some exercises concerned with identification of the Flora of the area, thanks to a volunteer friend.

A beginning has been made with the training of the Teachers. Ms. Kusum Kholi handled a workshop on Teaching of English through novels. We hope to carry on this effort into the future.

The Society has inducted eight of its children into a regular programme for the teaching of Art, Design and Technology. The intention is to prepare these children for careers in Art, Design, Architecture and Computer Animation/Graphics. We believe that this step takes forward our idea of providing these kid the same opportunity that is available to those privileged.

Four more children have joined IGNOU’s Distance Learning Degree Programme for Tourism Studies. We do believe that this is a course that many in our Community can take advantage of.

The Results of the First terminal Examination were received.  It is heartening to note that the marks obtained in all subjects are improving with the familiarity gained with the English Language. Nearly every child has improved his/her marks over the past examination. More children are nearer their 70’s and many more in their 80’s and the 90’s. With the induction of mathematics teaching aids, the fear of this subject is also receding.

During the Board Meeting on the 23rd August when many of our Directors were present, we attempted to evaluate the skills beyond the academics. We noticed that the competence in General awareness, reasoning ability, skills in mental mathematics, debating in English and Hindi, understanding of Science, the Social Sciences and the general level of Confidence were all growing among a wide spectrum spread across classes, sexes and age groups. We appear to be moving along the right track.

Witnessing the BTTP group grow into confidence and Learning has convinced us that we need to pursue with this idea. We have therefore decided to recruit another batch in the coming year, i.e. in 2009. All these children are being introduced to ‘Bird Watching’ and with some exercises concerned with identification of the Flora of the area, thanks to a volunteer friend.

A beginning has been made with the training of the Teachers. Ms. Kusum Kholi handled a workshop on Teaching of English through novels. We hope to carry on this effort into the future.

The Society has inducted eight of its children into a regular programme for the teaching of Art, Design and Technology. The intention is to prepare these children for careers in Art, Design, Architecture and Computer Animation/Graphics. We believe that this step takes forward our idea of providing these kid the same opportunity that is available to those privileged.

Four more children have joined IGNOU’s Distance Learning Degree Programme for Tourism Studies. We do believe that this is a course that many in our Community can take advantage of.

The event of the month was the inauguration by the Governor, Mr. B. L. Joshi of a partnership between the State Bank of India and the PYDS, to run a sales counter of Stree Shakti, every Sunday in the lobby of the Administrative Office of the SBI. Centrally located, it provides the clients at Dehradun a ready access to our different products. It also provides better visibility to our shop that will open in our premises at Purkal in February 2009. We have been operating the shop every Sunday since the 5th and intend keeping it open every week through the year.

The new building of Stree Shakti, being built at a cost of Rs. 40 Lacs will hopefully be completed in February 2009. We believe that this will help us employ many more women from the community and help them earn well.

All the children of Yuva Shakti have been introduced to the reading habit, thanks to the very fine library that we now possess. A ‘Reading Passport’ has been introduced to help record the books that each of them reads. Prizes have been instituted for a) Most books read b) The best reviews and c) The one who most influenced others into a reading habit.

You will recall that in early 2008 we had initiated a scheme called the ‘Bus Them to Purkal Scheme’ and 23 children with little or no education were taken in for a crash course. I am glad to say that these children have blossomed and now ready to enter Class 5 in March 2009. Guided by this success story, we have now decided to initiate a second batch of twenty more girls in the age group of 8/9. These children are being chosen from among several who have applied for admission into the Scheme. Specially designed activities are being used to test their potential for learning. Special attention is being paid to ensure that the limited number of seats reaches the most deserving among the poor.

Purkal Bulletin - July 2009