Friends of Children - Pune

More updates

2010-09-29T13:09:00.002+05:30

Our Engineering student Sachin Bankar has been offered a post of Asst Systems Engineer at TCS and will be joining them shortly.He has been sponsored by us for the past 4 years and we wish him well for a bright future. Other updates.. 1. Books for the Manchar library have been sourced and we will be delivering them tomorrow.We tentatively plan to open the office by Dussehra. 2. Vani and Aparna visited all the regions extensively thru Aug/ Sept. Our students have been asked to learn to access the web and also learn to email. The computer labs in all colleges have kindly offered their services for the same. We expect our students to access our website for updates on meeting and workshop details. We have begun posting the schedule already and hope this will become a permanent feature from now on. 3. We are in the process of organising an extensive workshop schedule which will cover every region at least once a month. Trainers from Pune will travel and handle the sameAs per present plans this will be set in motion from mid October.

Narayangaon,Junnar, Ale meeting held on 08'September

2010-09-10T11:05:00.001+05:30

On September 08, we had a series of meetings with all our students in the Ale phata, Narayangaon, Junnar, Ghodegaon, Manchar areas. Our volunteers (Vani, Aparna and Ajay) visited all the the regions and spoke to the students about the new training programs planned for them in the year. The new guidelines were also discussed with everyone. From this year onwards all students will be taught to use the internet and email usage by the end of September. After that all students will need to access our website to get information regarding all meetings, training dates which will be held in all regions. This will help students get more internet savvy in addition to being aware of all activities which will be conducted from time to time in all regions. This year we have prepared a detailed curriculam for soft skill trainings, computer skills, English skills and social responsibility which will be imparted to the students over a course of three years. All meetings were well attended by the students and regional volunteers and students were very enhusiastic about the coming year activities and training plans.

Schedule of activities for August and September

2010-08-12T19:55:00.002+05:30

The busiest time of the year for FoC begins from this month. With new admissions and fee distributions scheduled for all the regions, the next 3 months will be jam packed with activities.
August - 8th Interviews of new students for Saswad and Baramati
August -14th Interviews of new students in Rajgurunagar, Manchar,Narayangaon, Junnar August 29th Interviews of new students in Pune
Sept. 5th Fee distribution for Saswad, Baramati
Sept. 11th, 12th Fees distribution for Rajgurunagar, Manchar, N'gaon, Junnar, Ale
Sept 15th Fees distribution for Pune students
Sept 18th, 19th Interviews and fees distribution in Sangli
Sept 25th, 26th Volunteer training program

August camp cancelled

2010-08-12T19:52:00.001+05:30

Unfortunately because of the several cases of Swine Flu in Pune, we have been advised by doctors against conducting a residential camp in Pune. Hence the August camp stands cancelled.

Upcoming camp from 26 - 31 August 2010

2010-07-22T11:49:00.003+05:30

FOC will be organizing for the next residential camp in Pune from 26 - 31 August 2010. Like our previous camps, this too will focus on overall development of our students. Students are requested to get in touch with their local FOC volunteers or with the Pune office to register for the same.

Video of Residential Camp, May 2010

2010-06-25T13:45:00.000+05:30

FoC Camp, 8-12 May

2010-05-09T16:21:00.002+05:30

Our first residential camp of this year is on right now. We started out yesterday afternoon at Shatrunjaya Temple trust campus in Kondhwa, Pune.

48 students turned up for the camp. The gender ratio is rather skewed, with only 11 boys! Most of these students are in Class 11, and are new to FoC as well, so this is an opportunity to know them better as well as hope they can use their time well. Scheduled sessions are on topics such as positive attitude, confidence-building, public speaking, motivation, communication etc.

The duration of the camp is from 8-12 May.

Volunteers' Retreat, 20th-21st March 2010

2010-03-28T10:02:00.002+05:30

We capped our events for the year by the past weekend. March 20th, 21st was set aside for a volunteer retreat at the Shatrunjaya mandir, Pune. Around 20 volunteers from various regions attended.

After a session where everyone shared their childhood,their dreams and aspirations and why they choose to be part of FoC, we settled down to the serious business of FoC's path this year and where we are today. We were able to discuss numbers, the new admission process etc in great detail. The volunteers also shared their issues with us and this particularly was good as solutions cropped up from within the group, without Aparna or me having to provide them. The new Camp schedule was discussed as we will be making attendance to a camp mandatory for every FoC sponsored student from this year onwards.

Since the campus provides dinner at 6pm, we had a long evening to sort out all issues and went to bed tired but satisfied at 11.30 pm.21st dawned with the promise of Aniruddha conducting a day long session for all of us on Non violent communication and the role volunteers play in the lives of needy students. The session was well received by all participants and we ended at 4 pm with a promise to make this a regular feature in the FoC calendar.

FoC ended this year's activities on a high note as it was heartening to see the place we hold in the hearts of our volunteers. They unanimously confirmed that they were with us all the way in every effort we undertook. The path we have taken in the past 7 years has had many ups and downs, but this was a moment to treasure for us.

Khileshwar School Visit, 2 January 2010

2010-01-03T21:06:00.008+05:30

Friends of Children started off the new year by meeting children in a small village school. The school is in Khileshwar, some 150 kms away from Pune. It is a primary school with classes 1 to 4. We donated sweaters, flip-flops, school bags and stationery sets (pencils, erasers, sketch pens etc.).

Mr Upar, our volunteer who teaches at M.G. College, Manchar, had put us in touch with the school. Nilesh, Swati and I set out with the material. It was a long drive through scenic territory. We had to veer off the road and drive five miles over the dam on akutcha road to get to the school. The school stands near the river and flanked by hills.

It is a small Zilla Parishad school in an adivasi area. There are 87 students in all.

The kids were adorable and smart. They came forward one by one, and we handed over the stuff to them. Afterwards, the teachers called on two of them to thank us, which they did very prettily in front of all their schoolmates.

The headmistress informed us that attendance was high and that she tries to ensure it remains so. The children go on to study at a high school that is right next door.

Right now, they are repairing the roof on the school so that the children have to make do with a classroom that is also used for cooking and eating lunch. Also, power has been temporarily disconnected due to the construction work. However, once the improvements are over, there shall be five functional rooms. The headmistress also informed us that they are getting benches for the students. Some of the money for the same has been collected by villagers, and another NGO is expected to donate some benches.

We hope to visit the school again once all the classrooms are functional, and see if there is anything else we can help with.

Workshop: Sunday, 20th December, Pune

2009-12-21T09:30:00.004+05:30

We had two sessions yesterday for our Pune students: a)Creating Presentations, and b) Jobs in Banking. The venue was the FoC Library in Shivajinagar. Around twelve students attended.

The session on presentations was taken by Nilesh Bhojani. Nilesh walked the students through the process of creating a PowerPoint Presentation, and also gave them tips on presenting and presentation skills. He ended by giving them an exercise: all students present will work on individual presentations and present them in a follow-up session on Sunday, 21st February.

The next session was conducted by Himani Kaushik, who is a Relationship Manager with Citibank. Himani talked to the students about banking jobs and qualifications, skills and attitudes conducive to those jobs. She also encouraged them to look for temporary jobs during their summer holidays.

The next workshop is planned for 16-17 January, for Group B (senior students). This workshop will be focused on recruitment. All our volunteers are invited to attend, and any volunteer with substantial experience of recruiting and who is available to work with us on 17th January may please put in a comment here.

Wish you all a very happy holiday season.

Meeting Minutes: Pune, 8th November 2009

2009-11-09T10:48:00.000+05:30

The workshop on English communication was scheduled for 2 p.m., Sunday, 8th November at the FoC library. Around 20 students attended. Vani and I conducted the workshop; Aparna was also present.

We started out by discussing why it's important for the students to be able to communicate in English. The students came up with a number of reasons, including English being the medium for studies after a certain level; being able to communicate across regions and cultures; accessibility to knowledge and literature; and career growth. We then discussed problems they face in this regard, and arrived at lack of vocabulary and knowledge of grammar; lack of confidence and of practice; fear of embarrassment; inability to think in English as the most common.

We divided the students into teams and asked them to come up with solutions to the problems identified. We pooled the results together to arrive at a list of ideas that the students agreed to implement, including:

Read English newspapers and books
Watch English movies and news channels
Refer to dictionaries and textbooks
Practice speaking English with friends and teachers
Maintain a diary in English
Try to think in English
Get over fear of embarrassment

Having decided that practicing speaking in English, even imperfectly, would help improve their communication, we asked each student to stand up and speak for at least one minute on any topic of their choice. Some of the students rose to the occasion and spoke fluently, if not perfectly. Others had to be prodded to try, but in the end everyone stood up and spoke at least a couple of sentences, and four of these reluctant speakers promised to work on a topic and make a short speech at the beginning of next month's session.

It was also decided that one student would take down minutes through each session, and these minutes would be read out at the beginning of the next session, to reinforce what they had learned.

The workshop ended at 4 p.m. Before ending, we discussed with the students and agreed that interactive sessions like this one would help the students gain confidence and work on their skills. The next such workshop is on 20 December, with two main items on the agenda:

Making presentations
Common jobs in banking (to be taken by Citibank employee)

Meeting Minutes: Pune, 13th September 2009

2009-09-14T17:10:00.000+05:30

Below are the minutes of the meting held at Synygy on 13th September, 1:30 pm:

We had around 40 students present.
Main agenda was to show them the movie ('Iqbal') and talk about it before and after the movie.
Students were asked to write down the difficulties they face in their lives as a son/doughter, brother/sister, and as a student. After the movie they were to write if they could learn anything from the movie on these.
However, due to technical problem with my laptop we could not start the movie till 3:15. We used this time to discuss other things.
They were asked if they would prefer Monthly Meetings or Workshops. They said workshops will be better and they want that. They were informed that this is the last monthly meeting and we will have the first workshop (Focused on preparing for recruitment) on 27th September, 2:30 pm at Synygy cafeteria - only for graduation/diploma students. Other workshops will be planned soon and they will be infrormed about it.
We brainstormed other ideas for workshops and this is what the students came up with:
- Extra curricular activities
- Seminar, projects & presentations
- Computer courses
- Soft skills / personality development
- Sports
- Information about companies
- Industrial visit
- Competition
- Cultural activites
- Guidance on competitive exams
- Preparation of competitive exams
- Educational assignments
- Group discussions / mock interviews
We had a followup discussion on these topics (something we should plan to do - or follow up on - in the near future):
1. Workshop on Projects and Presentation (to be conducted in two parts):
  - Part 1:
    - Session on how to create powerpoint presentations
    - Decide topics
    - This will be an individual exercise and no topics can be repeated (this was decided by the students only)
  - Part 2 (with a gap of at least 4 weeks from the part 1):
    - Submit a word document (soft copy or a print out) on the chosen topic: 5 to 15 pages
    - Give a presentations (using powerpoint) in front of everyone for 5 to 10 minutes: minimum 5 slides
2. Prepare and present a drama/dance
  - Drama: Abhijeet, Pritam, Sachin, Suryakant, Vaibhav, Monali, Snehal
  - Dance: Gayatri
  - Students are to coordinate this and they are expected to come up with scrips by 1st week of November
  - FoC doesn't have anything to do in this, we will just provide them time to present these during one of the workshops
3. Computer Courses (to be done in workshop, no recurring classes)
  - 2 hours session: introduction to C/C++
  - 2 hours session: Introduction to hardware and networking
  - Discusson on new technology
  - No timeline or commitment of doing this for now, we will keep this in mind and will organize something if this looks important and feasible.
4. Industry visit:
  - We will continue to try for this but students need to think about what do they expect to learn from these visits. They want to visit a manufacturing company and a software company.
  - Have asked them to prepare a set of questions they would ask if they go for a visit.
5. Information about companies:
  - Not feasible to do this in detail using FoC workshops
  - Talked to them about the importance of them interacting with each other, apart from attending the FoC activities: creating groups amongst themselves and sharing information.
  - Formed one group of students who are doing computer engg or are looking for IT jobs. Abhijeet has the list of students (there were 8 in all). Each spoke about what he/she wants from the group and what is it that he/she can offer to the group. They are to tell us on 27th September that what they are going to do do as a group - collect information on companies, learn new courses, do a project etc.
  - If students are interested, we will form more such groups when we meet on 27th Septmebr for the 1st Workshop.
Unmana and Sajeel came with other laptops so finally we could start the movie at 3:15 and it completed on 5:30. After the movie we had a small discussion what one could learn from the movie.
Students were informed that there will be mentoring sessions on every 1st and 3rd Saturday at the FoC Library from 2 to 5 pm.

Meeting Minutes - Sangli, 7th June 2009

2009-06-15T17:57:00.008+05:30

The monthly meeting for our Sangli Students was held on June 07, 2009 at Yerala Bhawan, Sangli.

The meeting was attended by 29 students and 3 volunteers: Chavan Sir, Sujata madam & Santosh Sir. It was the first meeting after the residential camp at Soni.

The meeting started at 11 am with a discussion on 12^th class results. Volunteers congratulated the students on their performane and distributed sweets. Four students secured more than 82% marks while 13 students got more than 70% marks.

Next, we discussed what will be their choice/path after CET results will come on June 14th. We have discussed the suggestions of the Fuel group. Students were asked to get their parents' advice as well, and to inform voluteers about their decision. Students were advised to plan to reach their particular stream or college of choice. Volunteers assured the students that they would be available for any guidance or help.

The next item of discussion was FOC's decision to cease funding for engineering students. Students were advised to get in touch with nearest nationalized banks for educational loans. Volunteers assured the students that FOC will always be there for any support and guidance.

The meeting ended at 2 pm. The next monthly meeting is scheduled for July 5, 2009.

Residential Camps

2009-05-29T14:55:00.006+05:30

We have successfully completed the 2 residential Camps in Junnar and Soni, last week.

60 students attended in all and the sessions ranged from Life skills, Emotional management, Non violent communication and career guidance. Though some of the students expressed their misgivings on having to stay for 8 days on the very first day, the parting on the final day was emotional and with promises to keep in touch.

Sagar Jadhav coordinated the Junnar Camp and Venky coordinated the Soni Camp. The FoC Team wishes to thank Mr. Chavan, the Principal of KDP Vidyalaya, Soni for allowing us to use his school for the entire duration of the camp. He personally supervised all arrangements to make sure there was no hitch of any sort. Likewise, we wish to thank the Principal of SSC College, Junnar for giving us all the area for the second year in a row.

We wish to thank Capt Anand of Vidya Poshak, Dev Tayde, Anirudha of NVC and his members, volunteers of Synygy, volunteers of Infosys, Mr. Dinesh of Patni Computers and members of Fuel for making the camps useful and memorable for the students. Employees of Extentia Technology Ltd. contributed Rs 12,000 towards the camp along with 100 gift pens, Safe Hands Foundation contributed Rs 10,000, Synygy contributed Rs 4,000 and Rajyalakshmi T gave over 15 books as gifts. We are grateful to all of them.

With this, we complete the agenda for the present academic year and await the results of all the students in the month of June.

Excellent Exam Results

2009-03-01T11:16:00.006+05:30

Some FoC students performed exceedingly well in their exams this year. A sample:

81.6 % in B.Tech Agri SE...First in University
80 % in First Sem. Engineering
90.2% in Third yr Polytechnic
86% in Second yr Polytechnic
86% in Second yr Polytechnic
84% in First yr Polytechnic
81.7% Third yr Polytechnic
82.4% in First yr Polytechinic
78% Second yr Engineering

The fee distribution in Pune was completed on 22nd February, with 39 students having got second installent fees.

Our next mentor meeting is on March 8th at the FoC library at 2.30 pm. We plan to start 3 informal clubs among the students: trekking headed by Sagar Jadhav, book club and board games club coordinated by Nandini and Vani.

Fee Distribution in Sanghli on 21st Feb, 2009

2009-03-01T11:12:00.004+05:30

Our second installment fee distribution took place in Sanghli on 21st February, 2009. Aparna, Srikalyana and a new volunteer, Kiran, started for Sanghli at 7.30 in the morning. They reached there by noon and started fee distibution to around 15 students. Sujata Madam and Santosh Sir organised the fees distribution and helped us to complete it in time.

Aparna communicated to the new students about the agenda, rules and regulations, about letters to be written to FoC twice a year, student yahoo groups, and contact details for communication etc.

After completing the fee distibution, the volunteers visited Sony College 15 kms away from Sanghli to check the venue for FOC camp which is to be held in May, 2009.

Meeting Minutes: Sangli, 4th Jan 2009

2009-03-01T11:01:00.005+05:30

Our volunteers at Sangli, Sujata and Santosh, conducted the meeting. The venue was Yerala Bhawan, Sangli. 35 students attended the meeting.

The meeting started by 11 am and had a workshop on spoken English. The students were given 15-20 minutes to think and write 10-15 sentences about themselves in English. Then each student spoke about himself or herself in front of all the students. The volunteers gave advice and feedback. This workshop was a follow-up to the earlier workshop on spoken English, and there was already some improvement in the students. Feedback from volunteers and other students encouraged and helped them to improve. The session was ended at 3:15 pm.

Baramati Home Visits

2009-02-15T15:54:00.004+05:30

FoC volunteer Ramesh Girme went to Baramati on the 7th to visit the students and learn how they are doing in their studies and their preliminary exam marks.

Doing the home visits told Ramesh how much these students need help. They are struggling for their education and they have no role models or older friends who can advise or motivate them. But Balgude Sir is putting all his efforts in order to motivate the students, and the students are really happy at getting a helping hand from FoC.

Meeting Minutes: 28th December, Baramati

2009-02-08T20:59:00.004+05:30

The first monthly meeting at Baramati was held on 28^th December’08 at Someshwar College. Mr Balgude coordinated the meeting.16 students attended the same at 2.30 in the afternoon. 9 of the students are in 12th standard and the rest in 11th. CET books were issued to the 12^th Standard students.

A guest lecture has been arranged for the students on the subject "Career guidance & CET study guidance". Th next meeting was scheduled for the end of February ’09. (12^th Std. students will not be present for the meeting due to their final exam.)

Meeting Minutes: 1st February, Pune

2009-02-08T20:50:00.004+05:30

The 1st of February saw our very first meeting in our new Learning Centre in Shivajinagar. We had 35 students attend the same at 2.30 in the afternoon.

Suresh Frengko from CYDA addressed the students for half an hour on the rights of Youth, the avenues available for them to participate in social governance and all the details about the Pune chapter of CYDA.

Nilesh Bhojani, one of our core volunteers, then had a chat with the students, particularly the seniors about preparation for campus interviews etc. Nilesh along with Skanda will be taking on this responsibility of preparing our seniors in the course of the next 6 months for interviews, group discussions etc. The students were very keen to start off with the same. The first meeting for this group will be held on Feb 15th at the Learning Centre at 2pm.

A career guidance session was held by senior students of Fergusson College for the EYF children.

The FoC student yahoo group has been initiated. We now will use this as a common platform to keep contact with students from all regions (Pune, Sangli and Narayangaon). This would be a common forum to discuss problems and issues common to all the students.

The students' meeting was preceded by a volunteer meeting. We plan to take on a new chapter of 22 students at Ghodegaon which comes under a tribal area.Though there are a few colleges for students, few facilities are available for the local students. We received about 55 forms. 39 homevisits have been completed and 22 students shortlisted for fees. Fees will be disbursed for the same on Feb 15th 2009. The second instalment of fees for professional course students will be given during the same weekend on Feb 14th &15th in Sangli and Narayangaon.

Fee distribution for Pune is scheduled on Feb 22nd at 2.30 pm. The next mentor meeting will be held in Pune on March 8th at 2.30 pm.

Workshop in Pune on 20th and 21st December

2009-01-13T23:16:00.003+05:30

The workshop was held at Hutatma Balvir Shirishkumar School, opposite Modern College, Shivajinagar.

This workshop was special for us because it fulfilled our wish of giving our Pune and Baramati students a taste of what our residential camps are like. The idea was to have a more focused workshop with the kids rather than the usual 2-3 hour session. Hence we decided to make it a whole 2-day affair.

Saturday, 20th December: There were around 40 students present for the workshop. 25 students from Pune and about 15 from Baramati. We started at around 2:00 with an interactive workshop on “Nonviolent Communication” conducted by Mr Anirudddha. It was a very interesting workshop where he taught the students about the importance of effective communication. The students did some role play on to how to deal with friends, teachers and parents. He also gave a lot of tips on how to overcome destructive thoughts and become successful in life. The two and half hour session was just too short for all the questions the students had. The students ended up taking down his phone number and email id for further discussions.

We had a 20-minute tea break and the next session started around 5:00. There was a team of 3 people from CAT (Conservation Action Trust). This is an NGO primarily based in Mumbai working on different environmental issues including deforestation, pollution etc. They have now started working in Pune in collaboration with the Pune Municipal Schools to create awareness amongst children about various environmental issues. They did a one and half hour session on 'Environmental biodiversity in and around Pune' and what we as citizens can do to help. The slide show was brilliant and Mr Dillip did a wonderful job explaining the slides. It was quite a learning experience for us all.

Sunday, 21st December: We started off pretty early at 9:30 soon after a breakfast of poha and tea. Dev and Manasi Tayde had come from Mumbai to conduct the workshop. They did a fabulous job. Dev covered topics like Teamwork, Motivation, Commitment, Goal-setting and human values. The session was so well interwoven together that the students and volunteers didn’t realize that the topics were changing. He used a lot of illustrations, movie clips and games to get the point across to the students. He helped each student set short-term and long-term goals. Overall it was a fabulous session which was very useful to the children. FOC volunteers will be helping the students with these goals in the mentor meeting and we plan to do follow-up sessions with the students in May.

Baramati Visit on 14th December, 2008

2009-01-13T23:13:00.002+05:30

5 volunteers from FoC visited Someshwarnagar on December 14th to open a new Baramati Chapter of FoC.

We completed home visits and have taken 15 new students from Classes 11 and 12 under our wing. We have acquired 3 enthusiastic local volunteers who are very keen to take the initiative and take all activities forward. Mr. Balgude, Mr. Padwal and Mr. Shendkar have reassured us that they will take responsibility for these students and all their requirements.

As the first step, we have organised for these students to attend the workshop to be conducted on 20th and 21st Dec at Shivajinagar. The sessions will be on Non Violent Communication (Anirudha), your role in conserving the environment around (CAT) and an entire day's session on Life skills such as Motivation, Commitment and Teamwork (Dev Tayde).

We will also provide the Class 12 students with CET books to begin their preparation for the exams in early 2009.

Workshop at Sangli on 2nd December 2008

2009-01-13T23:08:00.004+05:30

Bhuvaneshwari from Vidya Poshak, Dharwad, has conducted this full-day workshop. The workshop started by 11:15 am and was conducted at Yerala Bhawan, Sangli. It was attended by 28 students and 3 volunteers, Sujata Madam, Prashant Sir & Santosh. It was a very well organized workshop. Bhuvaneshwari taught us from her heart!

For the first two and a half hours, she conducted a session on Motivation & Life Skills to Get to Success. It was a interesting and informative session for all the students. Then there was a break for lunch.

The 2nd session, on spoken English, started at 3:15 pm. Bhuvaneshwari gave the students some tips and conducted an exercise on how to give a “free speech”. She distributed 26 students into 5 groups and asked them to make a story on a picture shown on the projector. Almost every student actively participated and delivered a free speech on the prepared story.

Bhuvaneshwari’s focus was on Spoken English without bothering about the grammar and this gave the students great confidence to talk. It was a session which really boosted the confidence of the students.

(Contributed by Santosh Nalawade, our volunteer from Sangli)

Fee distribution at Sangli on 30th November 08

2009-01-13T23:04:00.001+05:30

We have completed our fee distribution for 22 newly selected students from Sangli. Fee distribution started at 11:30 am and was held in Pandit Nehru Vidyalaya, Kavalapur. All 22 students were present along with some parents. Prof. Nandkumar Chavan, from M.G. College, Savlaj was present for this program as our guest. It ended by 2:00 pm by informing all the students to attend the workshop on 7-Dec-2008.

Fee Distribution at Narayangaon

2008-11-24T10:44:00.002+05:30

The fee distribution program ( for new students ) took place in Narayangaon on the 16th, Sunday.
The volunteers reached Awte College at 9:00 am on Sunday. The program started at around 10 o’clock. Mr.Fasale had made all the arrangements for the program. The Principal, the chief guest & some students expressed their opinions about FOC’s work. The Chief Guest handed over the Scholarship cheques to 5 selected students from all the colleges. After that Sagar, Nilesh & Ramesh finished the fees distribution task.
In all , 47 students from 7 colleges were given fees. Besides the fee distribution, there were few discussions in a meeting with teachers regarding the following matters:

Monthly Meeting of the new students to be held by each college master.
Semester-wise results of the students (results have to be collected by teachers from respective students & to be sent to FOC, Pune every term.)
Semester-wise workshops/training programs (Teachers promised to arrange for the same)
Planning for the Camp ( 19th , 20th & 21st December is the convenient date as suggested by the teachers – Fasale / Kale sir will do the necessary arrangements). This is the follow up camp to the one held in May.
2nd installment of fees will be given on the basis of student’s performance

FoC Appears in News Daily Sakaal

2008-11-24T10:38:00.002+05:30

Meeting at Sangli on 2nd November: Minutes

2008-11-09T22:56:00.002+05:30

We started the meeting by 11 am and was conducted at Pandit Nehru Vidyalaya, Kavalapur.

It was attended by 25 students and 3 volunteers, Sujata madam, Prashant Sir and Santosh.

First one hour, we took feedback from the students about their activities at college & family grounds during last one month. It helps us to know if students are facing any problem on these fronts.

Our guest Lecturer, Prof. V. S. Patil from K.D.P. Vidyalaya, Soni conducted one & a half hour interactive session with students on use of moral values & behavior in day to day life. This small session was really good one which inspired all the students.

The meeting was ended up by 2:00 pm by finalizing the next monthly meeting date, 7-Dec-2008.

Monthly Meeting on 19th October at Synygy, Pune: Minutes

2008-11-09T22:54:00.002+05:30

This meeting was made special with the presence of two sets of guests: the volunteers and very young students of Tadivala road area and a group of students from MIT who are doing a project on FoC. Venky started off with a game to break the ice that was also a good exercise in teamwork. The students had a great time trying to extricate themselves out of the knots they tied themselves into!

After everyone had settled down again, we divided the FoC students into four groups and moderated a discussion, with one group initiating each topic then leaving the floor open for further discussion. The topics were: a) Most parents do not think a girl child is as good as a boy, b) No work is undignified, but some jobs don't pay well, c) Drink should be prohibited because it affects families badly, d) Earning money is more important than following your dreams. The discussion was lively and brought forward some interesting perspectives.

Then the children who were our guests for the day sang a song for us. We followed up with a game involving all but the youngest students. This game was meant to foster teamwork and communication.

We broke up at 5, with lots of smiles and wishes for a Happy Diwali.

Minutes of Monthly Mentor Meeting, 28 September

2008-10-04T16:52:00.001+05:30

The monthly mentor meeting was held at Snehankit at 2:30 pm. There were around 35 students who attended the meeting.

We started off with a preliminary introduction round because a lot of students did not know each other. The new students were basically from Narayangaon who were studying in different colleges in Pune. This went on for atleast 1 hour.The students introduced themselves and also told a lot of interesting things about themselves. We realised that we had a lot of trekkers in the group. One of our visually challenged students, Pandu, announced that he has been selected to go on a trekking trip to the Himalayas the next April.

After the introduction, the exam schedule of the students and their availabilty for the camp to be held in November was found. We addressed other common issues which the students had about their exams, interviews and further education on a individual basis.

The next meeting date, Oct 19th, 2:30 at Synygy was announced. The volunteers present for the meeting were Aparna, Joseph, Sagar and Nandini.

Volunteers' Meet, 21 September

2008-09-28T09:20:00.004+05:30

We had our first ever meeting of all volunteers, including those from outside Pune, on 21 September. I had a great time, and I think we contemplated and discussed some important issues. Dev Tayde conducted a workshop to help us understand deeper issues involved in volunteering.

And we were overwhelmed by the enthusiastic presence of our volunteers! People from out of town who came all the way from Sangli or Narayangaon (and Dev himself, who came down from Bombay), Venky who was in town just for a couple of days and was unwell but still came for the meet... We also had a bunch of new volunteers, who I hope are now enthused to be part of the FoC family!

Below are minutes of the meeting.

We started with tea, samosas and conversation at 10.30 am.
At 11, Aparna introduced the meeting, and all the volunteers introduced themselves.
Aparna continued with a history of Friends of Children, leading up to where we are now, five years later.
Nandini discussed some guidelines for volunteering with a special focus on mentoring students.
At 12, Dev started off the workshop. We started by discussing the need for sensitiveness and for students to be able to relate to us. The discussion soon became so animated that we it was nearly 2 pm when we broke for lunch.
After lunch, Dev continued with the workshop and we discussed the need for a positive environment for the students and how we can help create that, while ensuring that we provide the much-needed reality check. We also discussed the need for building trust. This was reinforced by an exercise with a team of volunteers, and Dev underlined the difference between a stabilising and a destabilising push.
Dev concluded by running over certain important principles for volunteers, such as fairness and encouragement. The workshop ended by 4.30.
Vani and Aparna discussed administrative issues with volunteers. We wrapped up the day by 5.30 pm.

Pictures are here.

Fee Distribution at Sangli

2008-09-15T10:43:00.001+05:30

Guest post by Nandini, a volunteer

Hi everybody,

Just thought I would share a slice of our Sangli fee distribution last weekend...

Our weekend began at quite an unearthly hour (at least for the most of us!!!) around 5:00 in the morning. We were a troop of 8 volunteers Vani, Aparna, Madhumita, Sagar, Ramesh, Vishal, Ketan and me, assembled in the Swargate ST stand for the 6:00 a.m bus Sangli. A special mention needs to be made about Sagar and Ramesh, our ex-FOC students who are volunteering big time with FOC. Most of the volunteers were still charged from the fee distribution at Narayangaon and could'nt wait to get into the bus. We rattled our way into Sangli at around 10:30. From Sangli we packed into a 'vadap' ( I know it sounds like vadapav, but it is just the name of the vehicle we were in) for a bumpy ride to Pt. Nehru school in Kavlapur. Kavlapur is a small village 10 km from Sangli.

We started our interview sessions with our old students at around 11.30. The interviews were mainly aimed at establishing a rapport with our students and assessing their needs. We took a well deserved break at around 3:30. We were all treated to a delicious home cooked meal at our local volunteer, Santosh's house, painstakingly prepared by his entire family. We started the second round of interviews for the new students at 4:00p.m and it was 8:00p.m by the time we wound for the day.

The next day we promptly started the fee distribution at 11:00 a.m. We started off with the 12th std students followed by the degree and the engineering students. In the meantime around 14 volunteers from Infosys had already arrived. It was really heartening to see the enthusiasm of the volunteers who had worked the whole of the previous night and left in the morning to come to Sangli and motivate the students. Some had even come on their bikes!! Hats off to them. They interacted with the students and held a 2 hour session with them. We left Kavlapur at around 4:00 p.m and it was pretty late by the time we reached Pune.

It was quite an exhausting weekend given the fact that we had to still go back to work the next day. But the smiles on the faces of the students and the thought that we had done our small bit in changing somebody's future made it all worthwhile!

2008-09-04T10:08:00.004+05:30

Hi, everyone! This is my first post here at the Friends of Children blog, although I had put in a few words as a volunteer a long time ago.

Last weekend, a group of volunteers went to Narayangaon. There was a fee distribution planned as well as some new studetns lined up to interview. We started bright and early at around 7 in the morning. There were eight of us in all: Vani and her mother, Aparna, Madhu – a new volunteer, Ajay – Vani’s driver, Sagar and Ramesh who were both FoC students and are now volunteers, and me.

We stopped for breakfast just before Narayangaon and stuffed ourselves with poha, missal pav, medu vada etc., knowing that lunch was likely to be late and inadequate. We had a long day ahead: about 60 kids to be interviewed, shortlisted from the list of about 150 that the teachers had sent us, and we faced the unenviable task of choosing 40-odd from them.

FoC has a symbiotic relationship with several schools and colleges in and around Narayangaon. Teachers vet the students and introduce them to us; visit their homes and make sure they need help; the colleges lend us their facilities to use. We in turn try to provide students scholarships without which they might not be able to study.

We were given a large hall to use: bunches of students came in and sat on the floor, waiting to be called. We divided into teams and got to work, interviewing each student, trying to gauge whether we should sponsor them. A difficult task. Each student needed the money: that we were already sure of, as the teachers vouched for them. But we have limited funds, and want to make sure that we are actually making a difference in our students’ lives. So we asked them questions about their homes, their family incomes and their aims.

Some stories are heartbreaking. One girl’s father is ill and unable to work. Her brother runs a stationery shop to feed the family. The father often turns up drunk; generously paid for by his friends. The family have stopped buying him medicines because his drinking isn’t doing him any good. And this girl scored 90 percent in her 10th boards.

Yet we were extremely strict. I marked green on my spreadsheet only those who showed their determination. One girl said she wants to get a job as soon as possible and support her father, who had done so much for her. There are girls – few, thankfully – who say they’re not sure whether their parents would let them study further or marry them off in a year or two. These we decided to reject. For others that we were not sure of, we postponed the decision, hoping to be able to take them if we didn’t overshoot our numbers.

We broke for a late lunch at around two, and sat on the concrete ground within the lawn, munching vada pav and bananas. Then we rushed back to work, to the kids who were still waiting and who had – unlike us – not had lunch.

We miraculously managed to wrap up at around 5.30: miraculously because at one point it looked like we had worked so long and the bunches of young people had not looked any smaller. But we were done, and by the time we had planned.

The men went off to Sagar’s house for the night, and we women planned to stay in a hotel. A teacher showed us the hostels, where FoC plans to have its next camp. (I’d gone to the last one for a day.) Then he guided us to our hotel and made sure we were comfortable before he left.

Next morning, we went to SSC College again raring to go, but had a long wait ahead. There was a kind of function, where we were welcomed and everyone involved made lovely speeches about the work we were doing. Some of the students got on stage and spoke very prettily: and nearly all of them said they wanted to become FoC volunteers once they had graduated and got jobs. Then Aparna made her speech.

My favourite part was when Aparna related the story of a boy who had come to her asking for help with his studies. FoC helped him, and he did his B.Com. He never spoke up at our meetings. Then he got a job and came over and gave a cheque for a thousand rupees. And at the next meeting, he stood up and spoke and encouraged the students to be confident. And that boy was Ramesh, who is now a volunteer and had come with us to Narayangaon. This little story is one reminder of why I love spending time with FoC.

It was nearly one when we started with our work. And there were over 200 students waiting. We broke into different teams, checking documents, dispensing advice, entering details, and – of course – giving away cheques. There were difficult moments when we had to turn away students because they didn’t have the right documents or because we discovered they were getting money from other sources – such as education loans. But by the end of the day, our work was done, and we were glad that we could go home.

Next weekend is the fee distribution at Sangli. I'm not going, but all the best to those who are, and I hope to have news from them to update on this site soon.

FoC Junnar Camp Pictures

2008-06-04T08:39:00.007+05:30

Check out the pictures from following link :
FoC Junnar Camp May 2008 - 1
FoC Junnar Camp May 2008 - 2

Pune Camp May 2008

2008-09 Budget

2008-03-21T18:50:00.003+05:30

Dear Friends,

At the onset we would like to extend our best wishes for a very Happy New Year. We sincerely hope that you have gotten off to a great start in 2008, and continue the same way throughout the year.

We at FOC have been busy too, making plans for 2008 -09. We have been looking at increasing our student base, making plans to conduct CET coaching classes for rural students, conducting residential camps and workshops for them etc.

We are looking at ramping up the number of students to 525 this year. The total budget works out to about 25 lakhs. (Attached is a budget outlay )This is going to be possible only if we are able to raise the required funds before the academic year begins.

We look towards you to support the children once again like you have always done, in our dream of “Empowering Children through Education”.

This year we also have the added advantage of tax exemption for donors. Cheques given in favor of Vidya Poshak can avail of 80G exemption. Other cheques could continue to be in favor of Friends of Children.( chqs could be posted to address given below )

Over the past 4 years we have kept our promise and accomplished targets that have been set. We are looking at a big leap forward this year and sign off with the hope that we will hear from you soon, pledging your commitment and reaching out to more children through us.

Every child has a DREAM & YOU have the POWER to fulfill it

Thanking you
Mrs Shantha Suryanarayana
President
Friends of Children - Pune

Note: Please pass on the message to your friends who would be interested to volunteer for Friends of Children

THE SPIRIT OF A VOLUNTEER

2008-02-26T07:02:00.000+05:30

FoC - Project Report for 2007-08

2008-01-01T18:00:00.000+05:30

I Identification and Selection Criteria:

We have followed two different models of identifying students in the city & village. The things which have driven us to follow this particular pattern are as follows:
· Cost of living is much higher in the city.
· More awareness in the city compared to the village.
· Availability of resources mainly volunteers.

City Students :

Identification& Home visits: Done mainly through our existingStudents, Students Welfare hostelA low cost hostel for rural kids

Income<60,000>
Cut off % X > 75 % Cut off % XI > 65% Cut off % XII> 70% Degree and other course : 1st Class

Fee DistributionHalf of the fees in the beginning of the year and second half based on performance through the year.

Meeting ScheduleOnce a month

Village Students :

Identification& Home visits : Teachers from the local schoolsidentify and do the home visits.Done by Infosys volunteers familiar with the area.

Income <36,000>
Cut off % X > 70 % Cut off % XI > 60% Cut off % XII> 65% Degree and other course : 1st Class.

Fee Distribution : One time payment Meeting Schedule : Half Yearly meetings / School Teachers Coordinates with Students

II Assistance provided to the students

(a) Scholarship provided for 437 students for the year 2007-2008 (Separate 25 Column excel sheet with details available) Rs 14,15,000 as of Dec 31 2007. an Approx of Rs 1,00,000 to be disbursed as second term for 60 Pune City students in March 2008.

Pictures of Fee Disbursement

Fees distribution at Narayangaon on 28th July
Pune Fee Disbursement August 11 2007
Sangli Fee Disbursement October 06 2007
FoC Nurture Merit Financial assistance - Dec 09 2007 Ale

(b) Books: Both text books and notebooks have been provided to the students.
The amount allocated to each student was based on the course they were in.

· Upto Rs 500 for a regular degree like a BSc, BCom, BA

· Upto Rs 1000 for a professional course and postgraduate courses.

· Additional Reference Books required by the students are maintained in the library which can be checked out on a monthly basis.

(c) Books only: Wasim is one student who was given books only. He is in his 2nd yr BCS. He scored about 58% in his first year. This student is from a very poor family with lesser than basic living conditions. He also works part time in Mc Donald’s. We were debating on what to do. But we realized that we had to draw the line somewhere. So we have promised him that books would be given no matter what his results are. But if he got more than 60% in the first semester he would be given the fees for both the semesters. Hopefully he gets the entire fees.

(d) Clothes distribution: A yearly clothes distribution was done along with the first installment of fees in Pune.

(e) Transportation: Jitendra Sassane is a 3rd yr diploma student. We had been helping him with the bus pass the whole of last year. It was working out quite expensive approximately Rs 350/month. This year we had requests from a lot more kids. At this juncture Mr. Sudanshu Sharma from Cognizant came forward to donate a cycle.

III FoC Learning Centre:

A library cum learning centre was set up in a room in a Government aided school in the city. Two rooms were shared rented with Snehankit, an association for non-seeing friends.

The expenses involved in maintaining the room are as follows:

Teacher who teaches the Visually Challenged students for Free which is 3000 Per month & Yearly 36,000

Ganpat one of our student worked part time for 3 months and Prasad, a part time employee started work from June onwards. Monthly salary of Rs 2,500. He helps out in managing the Library and Learning Center and also in preparing the softcopy of profiles. Year Expense Rs 30,000

(a) Library:
The library was started with 2 cupboards. Most of the books stocked in the library are a donation from Sparsh, Infosys Hinjewadi Foundation and from the private collection of a few individuals. These two cupboards contain computer and engineering reference books and other non-technical books.

Another cupboard was added in August. This was facilated through Mrs. Bina Sunder and family from Dubai. They donated about Rs 1, 00,000 for the sole purpose of adding books to the library. Fiction in English and Marathi, Inspirational Books and competitive books were bought with this money.

Reference books seem to be used more often than fiction. We are still having teething problems with the centre.

(b) Computers:
Five computers have been installed in the centre. The computers were donated by Ernst & Young Foundation. Two volunteers namely Nikhil Naik from Cognizant and Arshad from Infosys, checked all the dozen computers that were in the room, disposed the unwanted equipment and installed the functional ones. The computers still have only the basic software like MS-Office. Some students have been asking for additional software.

(c) English Classes:
A few of our students have been attending English classes conducted by Ernst&Young foundation for the last 6 months. Students who have been attending regularly are showing very good progress.

IV Students who have passed out and settled down in 2007

Appa & Vishal has got offer from TCS Pune and would be joining in June 2008

Ramesh Girme finished his B.Com and joined Patni computers as a permanent employee from September onwards.

Ganapat Lokhande who is doing his 2nd yr M.Com joined Thermax Ltd as a trainee for 6 months in September.

Deepika More finished a one year Diploma course in tourism and Hotel Management has joined Central Park Hotel Group from August. She will be trained and employed by them.

Devidas who is doing a part time civil diploma has become a permanent employee in Intervida as a site engineer.

Ujjwala Mane who has completed her BCS joined Accel Tree as a trainee.

Rupali finished her diploma in Mechanical and joined Virgo Engineers as a permanent employee.

Rukkaiya who has finished her Diploma in Civil has joined a small architect’s office.
Good News - September 2007

V Other activities:

Treatment of two kids of ages 1.5 and 1.1. One of them was suffering from a heart disease and the other had a kidney problem. A total sum of Rs1.8 lakhs was collected for their treatment. The money was collected mainly through the FOC yahoo groups.

Blankets worth Rs 10000 were distributed to the kids in the Sassoon Pediatric ward.

Pics of Baby Priyanka & Sushant Shivaji

VI Some issues to be dealt with:

Students not using library upto the mark.

Students being sponsored by other NGO’s

Not being in touch with us throughout and after completing the course.

We are working on the issues.

VII Unique Donors

Most of the donors give us donations in the form of cash. But Mr.Sri Vallabh from Infosys and Mr. Nikhil Naik from Cognizant came up with a unique idea. They did not want to stop with just giving money. They wanted their money to help students sustain themselves. They came up with the idea of a flower circulation library. The library maintains sets of artificial flowers and vases which are circulated among the customers. Instead of giving us the money in cash, they provide it in the form of pots ,artificial flowers and also with help in arranging and maintaining them.

Swati a first year BCS student has been doing this business for the last 6 months. Every 15 days she goes to the customers with a set of 3 pots and the customers chooses one from them. She charges a fee of Rs 75 a month and the customer gets to keep a new pot every 15 days. So far she has about 10 customers and she has been earning about Rs 750/month for putting in about 6-8 hours of work. She has not only been earning money bit there is a significant change in her confidence levels. She seems to be much more bolder and smart than before.

VIII Sample Student Profiles

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2006/12/foc-selected-students-profile-for.html

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2006/12/studentshome-visit-pictures-of.html

IX Volunteer Talk

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/01/eyes-they-dont-lie.html

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/04/volunteer-speak-unmana.html

X Donors Talk

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/12/why-i-didnt-sleep-for-31-hours-harsha.html

XI Student Talk

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/04/dr-harish-foc-student.html

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/02/meet-sadhanand-on-line.html

XII Media Talk

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/12/foc-news-articles-in-toi-and-marati.html

XIII FOC Activities 2007

http://focpune.blogspot.com/2007/12/foc-activities-jan-2007-dec-2007-recap.html

Every child has a DREAM & YOU have the POWER to fulfill it.

FoC Activities Jan 2007 - Dec 2007 Recap

2007-12-20T14:49:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends

The year 2007 has been wonderful and very eventful for FoC Pune. We have grown in numbers and we have now spread our activities to villages in 3 districts and with all your continuous support we are now supporting 450 students for their higher education.
Since we are reaching the end of the year, we thought it would be right to update you on all the events that filled up our calendar 2007.

January
Makar Shankaranthi is a very auspicious festival in Maharashtra. It was all the more sweeter for 150 students from various streams of education today.FoC Pune handed out scholarships worth INR 5,20,000 to 150 deserving & needy students from Pune and neighboring villages.
Related Posts
Student's Felicitation Day Pictures
The Eyes... They don't lie...
FoC- IBM SaradaMath Sweater Project

February
FoC finally after four years got a place which could be used for the students. We decided to set up a learning center and a Library. We kickstarted our drive for collection of books for an FoC Library in Pune. We hope to setup libraries in other locations soon.
FoC Library Project March.
After the Library setup we realized the need of computer education for the students hence with the support of E&Y foundation FoC set up a computer lab with 5 computers at the Learning centre. Related Posts Meet Sadhanand on-line /Dr Harish - FoC student

April
FoC volunteers got trained in ELIP (English Language Improvement Program) course by Capt Anand and Bhuvaneshwari. About 12 volunteers from FoC and other NGO's attended the 'Train the trainers' program for 3 days. Related Posts ELIP Train the Trainer Program / Volunteer Speak - Unmana

May
It was nowtime to giveback. FoC volunteers conducted the ELIP program for the students for 2 weeks. At the end of the course we also had a small function conducted by the students. As of now ELIP is being conducted by E&Y for 3 batches of students.

ELIP Students Training Batch - 1

June
With the beginning of the new academic year, FOC decided to have four different projects and support about 400 students for the academic year 2007-08 with an Approx budget of 15,00,000 Lakhs. The Students would be from Pune, villages of Manchar, Junnar, Narayangaon, Ale and villages surrounding Sangli District. Related Posts Students Guidelines 2007-08 / MoM June 23 & June 24 Meeting

July
97 students of Class 12 and degree courses were given fees for the academic year 2007 - 08 at Narayangaon on 28th. The Total Fee disbursed is Rs 3,20,000.

Related Posts : Minutes of the meeting held on 22nd July at Synygy / Fees distribution at Narayangaon on 28th July

August
60 students from Pune were given first term fees for the academic year 2007 - 08 at FoC Learning center in Pune on 11th Aug 2007. The Total Fee disbursed was Rs 2,78,000. The second term fee will be decided based on their first term marks and will be disbursed in the month of March 2008.

Related Posts : Pune Fee Disbursement / Minutes of the meeting held in Synygy on Aug 26th 2007

September
FoC got some very good news in the month of September
1. Ramesh Girme has joined Patni Computers as a regular employee from September.
2. Ganpat Lokhande has joined Thermax Limited from September.
3. Deepika More has joined Central Park hotel from August . She will be trained & employed by them.
4. Devidas has become a permanent employee in Intervida as site engineer .
5. Rahul Deshmukh (Visually Challenged) has stood first in Pune University in his M.A course. He is still looking for a job.
6. Ujjwala Mane is joining Acceltree as Trainee.
Good News - September 2007

October
Fees distribution at Sangli on 06th Oct 2007 was conducted. 135 students from the villages surrounding Sangli were given fees for the academic year 2007 - 08 at Sangli - Rani Saraswati Kanya Mahavidyalaya. The volunteers of FoC and Infosys Hjw foundation handed out the fees to the students. The Total amount of fee disbursed was Rs 4,20,000

Related Posts: FoC Picnic Oct 02 2007 / Sangli Fee Disbursement

November
We received an urgent request from two of our volunteers regarding the treatment of two young kids of ages 1.5 and 11 . The total amount required was Rs1.8 Lakhs. With your kind support we were able to raise the required funds in a week's time.
Now both Sushant Shivaji and Baby Priyanka are doing good.

December
FoC has extended support to 150 economically challenged students from Narayangaon and Nagar districts on 9th December 2007. Fees of Rs 4,01,740 was distributed.

FoC Nurture Merit Financial assistance Project Update - Dec 09 2007

MoM - Students Meeting Held on 16th Dec 2007

FoC News Articles in TOI and Marati News Papers

As of Dec End 2007, we have extended our support to 450 students from Pune, Narayangaon, Sangli district & Nagar for the academic year 2007-08.

The total educational expenses for academic year 2007-08 date is about 18,00,000 Lakhs(We have spent about 16Lakhs and 2 Lakhs is kept on hold for March 2008)

All in all, as you can see , we have had a very fruitful and fulfilling year. We have grown in more than one way and look forward to remaining committed to our cause of "Empowering children through education " with your continued assistance.

Every Child Has a DREAM and YOU have the POWER to fulfill it.

FoC Team

Pune

FoC News Articles in TOI and Marati News Papers

2007-12-19T06:28:00.000+05:30

MoM - Students Meeting Held on 16th Dec 2007

2007-12-18T09:41:00.000+05:30

Volunteers present for the meeting:Venky,Nandini,Unmana,Nilesh.
New volunteers:Kishan,Rita and Kalyan
33 students were present for the meeting. The meeting started at 2:30 sharp.

We started the session talking to the students about the usage of the library and the computers in the library.

A few students spoke about the books they read from the library. Kranthi spoke about the book "Not without my daughter" by Betty Mehmoddin. Vaibav spoke about "Da Vinci COde".

Vishal, a third year diploma(Comp Sci) student spoke about how he has been using the computer lab for the last three months for his project in Visual Basic. He gave a little insight into his project.

There were a few other students who spoke about the importance of reading and why everybody should develop the habit.

The new volunteers introduced themselves and got the students to introduce themselves.

It was also arranged for the final year students to meet early before the next meeting on Jan 20th for a short workshop on appearing for an interview.

Our visually challenged students Shivaji and Pandu shared their experiences in learning Computers. They informed the students that they could send e-mails, they can scan books and read.

We concluded the meeting by 4:30 since most of the students had exams going on.

Action for Students

1. Students to provide more work to volunteer in order to get back the missing volunteers.

2. Students to start using the library. During next meeting on 20th Jan 2008 every student should talk for 2 min about the book which they have read.

3. Students to note down the new book requirements for Library in the register.

4. Students should communicate only by mail. Every student in Pune should sent mail to friendsofchildrenpune@yahoo.com before 31-Dec-2007

5. Volunteers to meet and decide the action plan for next academic year 2008-09 before end of Jan 2008

FoC Nurture Merit Financial assistance Project Update - Dec 09 2007

2007-12-10T10:09:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends of Children, volunteers & donors

FoC has extended support to 150 poor students from Narayangaon and Nagar districts on 9th December 2007. Fees of Rs 4,01,740 was distributed.

Friends of children would like to thank our Donors, Volunteers, Friends for all the support extended to make this a successful event.
Specially we thank the following volunteers.

1. Home visits for the 300+ students – Narayangaon teachers Rokade sir, Kanade sir, Upar sir
2. Career guidance – Ankit and Isha from Fuel group
3. Volunteer support for softskill session, disbursing fees, collecting documents – Infosys volunteers and FoC students.
4. Logistical support for arranging transportation , projector – Infosys volunteers.
5. All the paperwork like preparing checks, documentation – FoC volunteers

We look forward to have your continued support to help FoC for supporting these students in the years to come.

Following is the plan for the rest of the academic year

In March we would be providing the last installment of fees to Pune FoC Students (Approx Exp : 1Lakh)

In April/May we are planning to conduct a CET course for the 80 Students who are in Class 12 (Approx Exp : 80,000)

In May we are planning to conduct a 8 day residential students camp in Junnar for the Class 11 students. (We are working on the budget)

Updates for the current academic year

As of Dec 10 2007, we have extended our support to 450 students from Pune, Narayangaon, Sangli district & Nagar for the academic year 2007-08.

103 students from Narayangaon area were provided educational support on 28th July. The total amount disbursed is 3,20,600

57 students from Pune were provided educational support (First term fees) on 11th Aug. The total amount disbursed is 2,61,815

135 students from Sangli were provided educational support on 6th Oct . The total amount disbursed is 4,20,500

150 students from Nagar/Ale/Junnar were provided educational support on 9th Dec. The total amount disbursed is 4,01,740

We have also spent about 50,000 for purchasing reference books for FoC Library and 30,000 for purchasing notebooks

The total educational expenses till date is more than 15 Lakhs

Some of our Major Donors were
1. VidyaPoshak , Dharwad - 9.5 Lakhs
2. Infosys Hinjewadi foundation - 2.0 Lakhs
3. Daman Raju and Friends from UAE - Rs 72,000
4. Bina Sundar & Family from UAE - 1.2 Lakhs (For Library Books)
5. Persistent systems - 20,000
6. Aparna Khatri - 20,000
7. Nandita Anjaria - 20,000
8. Sanjay Kirloskar - 15,000
9. Hemant Ramnani - 45,000
10 Sripad - 12,000

We have also received Rs 1,70,000 as Cash from many of our volunteers for the medical treatment of 2 small kids during Diwali. It is amazing that we received this amount in just one day. Now both the kids are doing fine after their treatment.

Why I Didn't Sleep For 31 Hours... HARSHA

2007-12-01T10:06:00.000+05:30

Why I Didn't Sleep For 31 Hours...

A casual glance at the excel sheet and I had enough reasons to worry. There are 85 students who needed Rs. 300 or less per year to continue their education. 85 out of 126! And there are many more students who's hopes for a bright future rested on the Pratibha Poshak scholarships, given by Friends of Children and Infosys Foundation. I am one of the volunteers from Infy who's helping Friends of Children in distributing the scholarships in Sangli, a town in Maharashtra near the border with Karnataka.

* So we started off to Sangli, my first journey into the Maharashtrian hinterland. A journey of 6 hours from Pune and yay, we're in Sangli. The school building was good, better than anything that I've expected. The town too, is unlike what I had expected it to be. There are some signs of development here and there, with all the hallmarks of an Indian town- chaos on the streets, unruly traffic, cows, and what not!

*The program started off with an intro to the whole program and when the name of Infy came up, the local volunteer asked the students, 'How many of you have heard the name of Infosys?' Not a single hand went up. The Infy people were stunned (and me, definitely not!) . A little prodding and they gave a better response to the next question, 'How many of you would like to join Infosys?' The response

*The counseling session kicked off very soon and the levels of confidence that many of these children had amazed me. All of them had scored more than 70% in the previous year and are very keen to pursue higher studies. But somewhere down the line, the session looked like a recruitment drive for Infy. Thankfully, the chief guest came and the counseling session came to an end. Otherwise, they would have been made to believe that IT is the only career option for all Indians and any Indian who doesn't know shell scripting in UNIX will not be allowed to vote in the next general elections.

* I didn't miss the chance to browse through their profiles while distributing the cheques. Most of the students came from very humble backgrounds that ranged from poorest to poor and depended entirely on these scholarships for continuing their education, which ranged from Rs.150 to Rs. 44,000. These are the students who are in real need of government help to continue their education, but they will never get it. Because once they're educated and cross the poverty line, the 'Garibi Hatao' and 'Roti, Kapda and Makan' (ok, now network too) slogans would make no sense to them. Will a certain Mr. Singh wake up from his deep slumber?

* Met an interesting person, Ketan Deshpande, a second year student of Engineering at Vishwakarma Institute of Technology, Pune. Coming from a rural area, he had to join a college that he didn't like, because he didn't have access to the information on admission procedures of various colleges . So he took on the system in his own way- he published a booklet with details of various colleges, their admission procedures, entrance exams, etc. and made it available to students at a nominal cost. He and his FUEL even received appreciation from APJ. I'm impressed!

*When was the last time I saw a police officer being mobbed by children? The SP of Sangli, Krishna Prakash was. He reportedly drove out all the illegal activities from Sangli in two months and made Sangli definitely a better place to live in. He gave a brilliant speech in Hindi, so said the people around me. After doing night shift the previous day and being busy shooting pix on the way, I had no time to take a nap and his speech gave me the much needed break to sleep. His soothing voice worked like a lullaby and I soon dozed off, only to be awaken by the thunderous applause by the crowd.

* Then came the part where I really enjoyed. The students were on a high after receiving the scholarships and meeting their SP, now they started asking the volunteers for autographs. I was just a volunteer to help the asli volunteers in distributing cheques and did nothing more than that! Though embarrassed at first, I had to give in and I have to admit that I enjoyed giving away autographs... Here are my 5 minutes of fame.

There are certainly many more thousands of students who may need less than Rs. 300 to pursue their education in India. But having seen the vigour with which the group of individuals are doing under the umbrella of Friends of Children, I feel there is still hope left for these students. Want to help these kids? Call Venky, FoC @ 9890393132

Posted by HARSHA at 2:39 PM

Pics of Baby Priyanka & Sushant Shivaji

2007-11-29T12:46:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends of Children

Sushant Shivaji and Baby Priyanka are doing good. They will be getting discharged from the hospital soon.

Update : Baby Priyanka More & Sushant Shivaji

2007-11-12T11:36:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends

With the assistance extended wholeheartedly by all of you, Baby Priyanka More is undergoing her heart operation today and we will update you on her post operative progress. Please keep her in your thoughts today and pray for her speedy recovery. We have provided 90,000 for her operation and we will spend rest of the money for her further treatment.

Sushant Shivaji More is undergoing dialysis treatment at Bharti Hospital for the past 2 weeks. We have given Rs 25,000 for initial treatment. We will use the rest of the money for his Dialysis and Plasma infusion.

We are have been in touch with the parents and are paying up the medical fees as and when required. Once the treatment is done, we shall post a complete breakup of amount spent for both children.

Following is the breakup of funds we received from all of you.

Sadanand Poorajan - 5000
Radha Narayanan - 2000
Girish Baxi - 25000
Sagar Chandratrey - 1000
Sri Hari - 25000
Sandeep Kirplani- 10000
Amit Verma- 2500
VW Team - 2700
Anand Ganesan- 20000
Extentia Employees- 16850
Amrut kale - 25000
Mayuresh Kasture - 500
Dinesh Kumar - 500
Kiran Khatri - 500
Supriya Kare - 500
Shruti Purohit - 300
Jolly Thomas - 1000
Aditi Chimbalkar - 1000
Aparna D - 5000
IMC Team -Manjiri - 20000
Pavan - 5000

Total : 1,69,350

Thanking all of you once again.
With warm regards

FoC Team

A Perfect Diwali Gift

2007-11-01T11:34:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends of Children

Advance Wishes for a great Diwali. We have received a urgent request from two of our volunteers regarding the treatment of two young kids of age 1.5 and 11 .

The total amount required is Rs1.8 Lakhs and in last two day with your great support we have got 90,000 and looking to mobilise the remaining 90,000.

Even a small contribution from you will brighten up these child's life . Kindly please provide your support and give a perfect Diwali gift to these two kids.

I would be personally visiting the kids and pay the amount to the hospital in person.
Following is the details of the kids

1. Name of patient : Priyanka Raju More.
Age of patient 1.5 years
Residential Address: C/O- Raju Baburao More Juna Nandni Naka, Opp Water Tank, Jaysingnagar, Jaysingpur-416101, Tal- Shirol, Dist-Kolhapur

Medical Illness 10mm hole in heart Hospital Wanless Hopital, Miraj

Since when is the treatment on? from 1.5 month Surgery Date 9-Nov-07

How are they taking care of the current expenses? Taken Loan of 50000/- from individual Person on interest rate of 5% permonth (15 days before)

Approx Expense : Surgery : 90,000 Daily Expense : 2500 (Taken loan 50K) Post Operation Expense : 30,000

Has the treatment been subsidized? Why are they not getting the treatment done in a govt hosp like Sasoon ? Expenses are same in near by Govt. hospitals

Earning Members' Details : Father Raju Baburao More working as Marketing agent for local Hindustan Unilever Distributor 4000/-
Mother Mrs. Vidya Raju More House Wife (Age:22) -
Number of dependents in the family 6
Details of family assets: House Ancient's house , Mobile Company Provided (#9822299320)
TV B/W Old , Fridge No , Washing M/c No , Computer No

2. Name of the Patient : Master Sushant Shivaji More (11 years old boy)
Suffering from Acute Renal Failure (Hemolytic Uremic Syndrome).

He is going to need Dialysis and plasma infusions for about three months. The approximate expenditure for the treatment is Rs.60, 000/- His father and mother are working as daily wages worker. The economic condition of the family is very bad. Kindly assists the patient. Contact Person : Mrs. Swati Jadhav , Medical Social Worker , Paediatric Department , Bharati Hospital, Pune., Ph – 24375541 .

Update : Today morning I (venky) have visited the hospital and met the boy's parents and the doctors who are providing treatment to him. The kidney of the this kid is not responding and hence he needs dialysis (Rs 700) every alternate day and Plasma infusion (Rs 800) every alternate day. The hospital is providing free bed, and antobiotics. But as per the doctor he needs to take treatment for 2 - 3 months and the approx expense would be about 60,000. I have paid 25,000 for the expenses for next 2 weeks.

Note : At Friends of Children we focus on supporting students for Higher education and whatever funds we raise goes to the trust account and would be spent for the students education purpose.

Also in our Trust deed document we have specified that 100% of the funds raised from the donors would be used for the educational expenses for the students.

Now this case is quite different we intend to help two small kids who needs emergency treatment and the parents are not able to take care of the expenses.

We have done a sanity check on the genunity of the both the requirement. We intend to pay the hospital by Cash and we won't be able to involve FoC account in this bcos of the above reason.

Hence we are raising the funds as Cash or online transfer to our personal account only and would be paying to the hospital directly. And inturn we would be providing the Receipt or the Voucher which is provided by the hospital.

FoC Updates

2007-10-21T16:59:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends & Volunteers of FoC

On behalf of Friends of Children (FoC) Pune, We would like to thank all of you for your support. We sincerely appreciate your commitment for helping the economically challenged student community.

As of Oct 2007, we have extended our support to 295 students from Pune, Narayangaon & Sangli district for the academic year 2007-08. We are in progress to support another 120 new students from Ale/Nagar district. in Nov 2007.

103 students from Narayangaon area were provided educational support on 28th July. The total amount disbursed is 3,20,600

57 students from Pune were provided educational support (First term fees) on 11th Aug. The total amount disbursed is 2,61,815

135 students from Sangli were provided educational support on 6th Oct . The total amount disbursed is 4,20,500

The total fees disbursed till date is 10,02,915.

The approximate fee requirement for 120 Ale/ Nagar Students in Nov 2007 - 4,00,000 Lakhs

The approximate fee requirement for 57 Pune students (2nd term fees) in Feb 2008 - 1,00,000 lakh

Some of our Major Donors were
1. VidyaPoshak - 7.5 Lakhs
2. Infosys Hinjewadi foundation - 2.0 Lakhs
3. Daman Raju and Friends from UAE - Rs 72,000
4. Bina Sundar & Family from UAE - 1.2 Lakhs (For Library Books)
5. Persistent systems - 20,000
6. Aparna Khatri - 20,000
7. Nandita Anjaria - 20,000 8. Sanjay Kirloskar - 15,000

Thanks and Regards,

FoC Team.

Sangli Fee Disbursement

2007-10-06T07:57:00.000+05:30

Fees distribution at Sangli on 06th Oct 2007

135 students from the villages surrounding Sangli were given fees for the academic year 2007 - 08 at Sangli - Rani Saraswati Kanya Mahavidyalaya on 06th Oct 2007.

The volunteers of FoC and Infosys Hjw foundation handed out the fees to the students. The Total amount of fee disbursed is Rs 4,20,000

FoC Picnic Oct 02 2007

2007-10-02T08:28:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held on 23rd Sept. at Synygy office

2007-09-23T08:36:00.000+05:30

1. A heated debate was held by all teams both for and against .....Polytechnic versus 11th and 12th as an option & Am I proud to be an Indian today??

Mr. Mantha and Yash ( from Synygy) kindly offered advice for better debating techniques and encouraged the students. Our ex student Harish also spoke to the students about debating .

2.Students were informed about the books bought at the library which would be available for them in a fornight's time.

3. Some software that students needed to be installed at Snehankit was noted down.
! Pro C , Autocad, Java, C ++ , Visual studio etc were some of the requests.

4. Dates for the picnic were discussed and a tentative date of Oct. 2nd was decided as exams begin in the latter part of the month. Students listed their names down for the same.

Aparna will check with Insearch about Thosegarh and Kas flower plateau so that we can reconfirm to the students about timings and location of bus stops on Oct. 2nd.

The meeting ended on a sweet note as our ex student Ramesh Girme distributed pedas on his becoming a permanent employee of Patni computers.

Thanks
FoC Team

Good News - September 2007

2007-09-07T08:37:00.000+05:30

Hi all

Updates from FoC Students

1. Ramesh Girme has joined Patni Computers as a regular employee from this month.

2. Ganpat Lokhande has joined Thermax Limited from September.

3. Deepika More has joined Central Park hotel from August . She will be trained & employed by them.

4. Devidas has become a permenant employee in Intervida as site engineer .

5. Rahul Deshmukh (Visually Challenged) has stood first in Pune University in his M.A course. He is still looking for a job.

6. Ujjwala Mane is joining Acceltree as Trainee.

Thanks
FoC Team

Minutes of the meeting held in Synygy on Aug 26th 2007

2007-08-26T08:52:00.000+05:30

1. Aparna held a 45 min. session on her trip to Leh and Valley of Flowers and showed the students many snaps.

2. The schedule for the ELIP English class was made. Students have enlisted for the same.

3. The debate teams were formed and topics were handed out for the Sept meeting.

4. Mentors met their respective groups divided into Engg., GPP, Degree courses and Junior college. All the needs and requirements of the students were address! ed.

5. Engg. and GPP students were provided with material like drafters, calculators etc.

6. Debashish has volunteered to hold aptitude classes/ group discussion & mock interviewa for senior students to prepare for interviews and competitive exams. Students have enlisted for the same and the classes will be held at Snehankit once in two weeks for 2 hours.

7. The next meeting is scheduled for Sept 23rd at 2.30 pm.

Thanks
FoC Team

Pune Fee Disbursement

2007-08-14T08:16:00.000+05:30

60 students from Pune were given first term fees for the academic year 2007 - 08 at FoC Learning center in Pune on 11th Aug 2007. The Total Fee disbursed is Rs 2,78,000

The second term fee will be decided based on their first term marks and will be disbursed in the month of March 2008.

12 volunteers from Infosys completed homevisits for 60 ! students in Sangli on 12th Aug. 35 homevisits were done previously. Priti / Santosh kindly provide more updates.

In Ale gaon and Nagar area the teachers are helping us with homevisits. We have selected about 50 new students till now.

Fees distribution at Narayangaon on 28th July

2007-07-29T13:48:00.000+05:30

Fees distribution at Narayangaon on 28th July

97 students of Class 12 and degree courses were given fees for the academic year 2007 - 08 at Narayangaon on 28th. The Total Fee disbursed is Rs 3,20,000.

The volunteers of FoC handed out the fees to the present students and will be following up with them in 3 months time again.

6 students await their admission into professional courses after class 12. Their fees will be given when we make a trip to Ale gaon in the last week of August.

Fees distribution for Pune city students is scheduled for Aug 11th from 10 am to 5 pm.

Minutes of the meeting held on 22nd July at Synygy

2007-07-22T08:55:00.000+05:30

An overwhelming 110 students, both from the previous year, aspiring new entrants and newly taken students of the EY foundation attended the meeting.

Mr Nikhil & Srivallabh addressed the students on the focus and determination required from the student to achieve good marks and the importance of IT in today's world. The students came up with many queries regarding the same topic.

Guidelines were then discussed and requirements for payment of fees on Aug .11th at Snehankit. We have also announced to the students that clothes will be distributed on the same day to them.

If any of you are willing to donate clothes, please drop them off between 1.30 and 4.30 pm on Saturdays and Sundays at Snehankit, Annasaheb Sathe school, Kumthekar Road, before Aug 11th.!

On July 28th, we will be distributing fees to our Narayangaon students ( 110 students ).

Vani

MoM June 23 & June 24 Meeting

2007-06-24T13:34:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the Narayangaon Meeting:

The meeting was held in the GRPS School in Narayangaon on 23rd between 9:30 and 2:30.

Volunteers who attended the meeting were: Venky,Anil,Aparna,Nandini,Aditi,Abijeet,Anitha
No : of students present were 125

The meeting started at 9:30 with a small welcome ceremony by the school trust.

10:00 - 12:00 An interactive session was held by Anil Chouhan and Harish Patankar (ex-student of FOC) based on the book you can win.

11-12- An informal interaction with the teachers and a few volunteers on how to take this project further in the villages through these teachers.It was decided to divide the area into a few zones and the teachers from these schools becomne in charge of that area.

12-1:00- We got the vouchers signed from the old students and got the applications filled from all the students for this years scholarship.

1-1:30- Spoke to the 12 th students on what they were going to do regarding admission.The students were given a date for the next meeting.
6 notebooks were distributed to all the students present.

Thanks,
Nandini

The meeting was held in SYNYGY on 24th June between 2:30 and 4:00
Number of Students present were 32.
Volunteers present : Venky,Aprana,Nandini,Unmana,Priti Buddhia,Abhijeet,representative of Atlas Copco
The students updated the results.

The guidelines were explained to the students. The cutoff of 65% for 10th,11th and 12th and 60% for all degree courses was explained to the students.

An application form was filled up from the students for the current year and also the book list was filled up.

The last date for receiving old books and getting the new book list was fixed as 15th July.

Thanks,
Nandini

ELIP Students Training Batch - 1

2007-05-31T13:38:00.000+05:30

Students Guidelines 2007-08

2007-05-01T13:19:00.000+05:30

FRIENDS OF CHILDREN - GUIDELINES ( 2007 –2008 )

Meeting Schedule

June 24th
July 22nd *
Aug 26th *
Sept 23rd
Nov 18th
Dec 16th
Jan 20th
Feb 24th
Mar 30th
Apr 27th
* In case of rains on any particular date, the meeting will be rescheduled for the next Sunday.

1. Student must be present at monthly meetings at 2.30 pm. Mentor sheet should be signed during that time from assigned mentors.
2. If student does not attend 3 meetings during the year, his name is automatically cancelled
3. No telephone calls/ other reasons will be entertained for not attending.

Fees schedule

Venue : Snehankit classroom
August 11th ( 10 am to 5 pm )
March 1st ( 10 am to 5 pm )

1. All fees will be paid against proper receipts ( orig. & Xerox to be shown )
2. All first time FoC students will be given fees to a maximum of Rs 5000. The 2nd yr onwards is based on performance.
3. Fees will be paid in cheque form. Student is required to have a bank a/c in a nationalized bank and produce pass book for inspection.
4. No interim payments of any form will be entertained.

Books schedule
1. All old textbooks to be returned by July 1st at Snehankit
2. List of textbooks reqd for this year to be submitted in given format .
3. For classes 11 and 12, 1 book per subject (6 books ) will be given + CET books
4. No guides for any subject will be given.
5. All other degree course students shall get 5 books only.
6. Notebooks will be given on July 15th at Snehankit

Guidelines for application to FoC
1. Family income should not be above Rs 50000 for rural areas / Rs 60000 for urban areas.
2. Students who have scored 65 % and above in Classes 11 /12 can apply. The eligibility for all other courses is 60 %.
3. In case student does not score required marks in certain semester, he can avail of textbooks alone for that particular term and apply again when he qualifies next term.
4. Eligibility will be considered after home visit conducted by FoC volunteers
5. Fees based on Govt .colleges only will be provided for any professional courses.
6. Student will be given fees only if application is complete with documentation and home visit is completed.
7. Student must not be sponsored by any other NGO for the same course.

Documents required
1. Income certificate of all earning members in family.
2. 1 passport size photo
3. Photocopies of all marksheets/ certificates to date. ( class 10 onwards )
4. Ration card copy
5. caste cert. etc. if available

(in case discrepancy in any documents is found later, the sponsorship stands cancelled )

ELIP Train the Trainer Program

2007-04-30T13:41:00.000+05:30

Volunteer Speak - Unmana

2007-04-24T10:20:00.000+05:30

As usual, I attended the FOC meeting last Sunday 14th April 2007. It was a long meeting, and one that I fully enjoyed. This time, the students participated in a quiz and solved puzzles, and each spoke about one famous personality. Their confidence, their attitude, was admirable. It struck me, not for the first time, that they only need a little help to stand on their own feet, to make their own way in life.

For me, the highlight of the day came some way into the event, when most of the young people (students whose education the organisation sponsors) were busy in a game and two young men got up to leave. They were blind, but easily walked over to the volunteers to say goodbye. Venky called out, "Unmana, these are your boys."

Venky led them over to introduce them to me. They held out their hands. They spoke, confidently, confidingly, mentioning in the same breath their challenging studies and their determination to overcome them. I wished them luck and said goodbye.

The world seemed to have whirled around me. I sank into a chair, my legs suddenly feeling like they could not support my weight. I just sat for some time, feeling numb. Then I collected my feelings and examined them. One was embarrassment. I had not done much for them - nothing to denote them mine. I did not deserve that. Connected to that was shame. Could I do no more? Such a little went such a long way for them! Then came humility and respect in the face of that optimism, that confidence! Also perhaps, a little gratitude - to be able to reach out and touch that piece of sunshine.

Dr Harish - FoC student

2007-04-04T22:42:00.001+05:30

Dr Harish has completed his course and got first class. He has joined as intern in Baramathi Hospital. He is planning to do MS after his work assignment. Harish is with FoC for last 3 years. We thanks all the donors for this wonderful achievement.

This note comes from our heart to yours

2007-03-27T12:26:00.000+05:30

FoC started off with 25 students in 2003 and has slowly steadily grown to 240 students now.

The last four years have been a very good learning experience for all of us. We not only earned the trust and support of hundreds of kind hearted people like you but also got ourselves associated with many other like minded groups & NGO's which have indeed been an eye opener to all of us.

The association with other NGO’s have helped us realize how little we were doing when there is so much of need around. We definitely have had our share of ups and downs when it comes to implementing our ideas. Not all them have been successful, but it has pushed us to do better the next time.

During the beginning of the year 2007 FoC with the support of VidyaPoshak Karnataka & SPARSH - Infosys Pune included 150 new students under our umbrella who were mainly from the rural areas.

The home visits by the volunteers brought out heart wrenching stories of what the children had to endure to get a basic education. We had stories ranging from children walking 1-2 hours to merely reach a bus stop to school and travel another hour to actually reach school, to enduring power cuts for about 18 hours all 365 days a year. It is difficult for us to even visualize this kind of life. But the beauty that really struck one and all of us was that these children were taking all these obstacles in their stride and scoring more than 70%. Based on our experiences with the rural kids we have decided to take this one step further.

Our current group comprises 240 students of which 100 are from Pune and 140 from Narayangaon village. We have decided to spread our wings further by going to the nearby Nagar and Sangli Villages.

We plan to take 300 more students from these two areas. With the growing number of students our funds requirement also increases. But we do not hesitate to take the plunge, for we know that we can count on you for support as we have always done in the past.

Budget for 2007-08

Estimated Expense for 500-600 Students(approx) Rs 25 lakhs
Commitment from Vidya Poshak Rs 10 lakhs
Commitment from Fuji Film Rs 3 lakhs

We are still short of Rs 12 Lakhs for this year, which we would need to raise in next 4 months before end of July 2007.

We stop here with a small note.

"Every child has a DREAM & YOU have the POWER to fulfill it."

Thanks
FoC Team

Meet Sadhanand on-line

2007-02-06T13:09:00.001+05:30

Sadhanand is with FoC for 3 years. He has scored above 75% in class 10 and scored 80% in Class 12.

His 80% in 12th is worth much more because he is working 8 hrs a day for 6 days a week and his travel time to and back home is about 2 hours to support his parents who are visually challenged.

He is right now doing FY BA in SP College. He has also completed MS-CIT. He is looking for a mentor to guide him to achieve his DREAM.

Last but not least Sadhanand is VISUALLY CHALLENGED. Click the below video to listen to Sadhanand

FoC Library Project

2007-01-25T13:14:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends,

With the successful completion of handing out fees to 150 students on Jan 14th, FoC is now moving on to the next imperative need.....a Library ....

We plan to have Libraries in 4 separate locations ( 2 in Pune & 1 in Narayangaon & 1 in Junnar) to stock various books that our students could have access to.

By having our own library of books , FoC would be saving the expense of buying books every semester and also building up a stock and if possible opening more libraries in further locations around Pune.

The library will be used by 600 students in Pune (250 FoC Students + 350 SWA students) and above 1000 students from 6 different schools and colleges in Junnar & Narayangaon.

The requirements are as follows...

1. Any Books - Academic , Non Academic, Management books, Stories, Entrance Exam Books, MBA , CAT, CET, MCA, Engineering (any branch), Commerce, Computers or anything which will be useful for the students in ENGLISH , HINDI & MARATHI
We request each of you to make a special effort in collecting books, You can put a notice in your office, Inform your colleagues, put notice in colleges, put notice in your housing society and let us know once you have a carton full. Our team will then have it collected.

2 Cupboards to store books

3. A keyboard and a monitor ( we have a CPU available ) / Tally software for accounting / Library Mgmt S/w / MS Office

4. If any of you prefer to give a cash donation to buy books or If you can buy books and give us, we welcome it as we have budgeted about Rs 25000 towards buy new books.

5. We also need a old mobile phone for the use of the proposed Librarian (would be a FoC student)

The aim is to get the Library started by mid March. So please extend your help as always to make this a success.

Please contact Venky @ 9890393132 or Aparna @ 9890093187
Thanks
FoC Team

Student's Felicitation Day Pictures

2007-01-24T20:49:00.000+05:30

Makar Shankaranthi is a very auspicious festival in Maharashtra. It was all the more sweeter for 150 students from various streams of education today.

FoC Pune handed out scholarships worth INR 5,20,000 to 150 deserving & needy students from Pune and neighbouring villages.It was wonderful to see 4 busloads of young people with their hearts full of dreams and hopes soaring skyhigh enter the Infosys campus at Hinjewadi.

Many students from FoC Pune participated in the programme and helped the rural children with many of their doubts about various courses . Mr. Tikot of Vidya Poshak and Ms.Priti Rao of Infosys graced the occasion with their presence.

These 150 students were chosen based on the merit of their marks and various volunteers from Pune made visits to their homes to confirm their need for assistance. Over 300 applications were received and 150 were chosen from these .

It is indeed hoped that we continue this tradition of FoC Pune doing something really good every Shankaranthi as last year was celebrated by handing out 160 sweaters to rural children in Lauki, narayangaon and this year has been celebrated by handing out scholarships to 150 childen.

Students Felicitation Day Picture Album . Click the below Photo to view the album.

FoCInfyPrerana Students Day Pics

Selected Students Profiles . Click the below Photo to view the album.

FoC_Students_Profiles

FoC- IBM SaradaMath Sweater Project

2007-01-24T16:20:00.000+05:30

Friends

Thanks to IBM Employees and Imprint 2006 team. We have distributed the sweaters to all the 197 Children who are studying in Sarada Math school. All these students are from slum areas who doesn't go to regular school.

The total cost for the sweaters is 30k. Attached Pics and receipt.

Sarada Math - IBM AMS Imprint 2006 Sweater Project

The Eyes... They don't lie...

2007-01-23T14:19:00.000+05:30

Sorry the article is bit lengthy but we don't want to edit the feelings of Abhishek.
By FoC Team

Name: Bhushan Malhari Borhade , Education: Studying in 11th Std.

Family Background: Parents working as farmer; Sister studying in Agriculture College, Dapoli. To support his family, Bhushan started selling cucumber since he was in 5th Std. Now, he works as a librarian in his village library. He has to walk for 4 Km everyday to catch a bus to his college which is 23 Km further away. The bus takes another 1 ½ hour to reach the place.

And lastly, he has scored 80% in SSC.

Annual Income: Rs.21000/- (Rs. Twenty One Thousand)

Remark: "Strongly Recommended"

I have a quick glance at the description and start leafing through the documents he has attached. The checklist for the documents runs: "Income Certificate Ok; College ID Ok; Fee Receipts Ok; Marksheets Ok… Ration Card? Where’s your Ration Card?"

"Sorry Sir, I don’t have the Ration Card Xerox with me. It’s with my uncle in Mumbai…" He replies with an anxious, rabbit – like look in his eyes, fearing if I would reject his documents and deprive him of the amount he is entitled to. I give him a "Now – what – do – I – do – with – you?" look.

I keep going on and on through the description and the family background. The look in his eyes grows even more anxious.

"Oh, don’t worry; I’m not here to reject your scholarship. Go; show this to the Ma’am over there. She will sort it out for you." A lost smile finds a place back on his face and he goes away.

A girl comes next, then a boy follows and they just keep coming and I keep running through their documents and their stories. The names change…the Annual Income hoveres around 15K – 25K… Distances they walk daily to reach their college/ schools vary a little… "Remarks" change from "Strongly Recommended" to "He deserves it" to "She desperately needs the help" to "The family condition is bad"… The plight remains the same but there is something else that was so bright that it blew away all the darkness. It was the spark in all those eyes and that smile on their faces – THAT was exactly the same across all those faces.

Venue: Phase I, B1 – C1, Infosys Campus Date: Sunday 14th January, 2007 Makar Sankranti:

For a 9:30 Bus catcher like me, (Oh, Where have you gone, you good ol’ days?), getting up early on a weekday is like asking for the world. And if it’s a Sunday and if it’s not for a trek, sorry, you are being too demanding – you are asking for the whole universe. But there I was, riding my bike on my way to office at 8:30 AM on the crisp and a little misty Sunday Morning. This wasn’t for a bug that slipped through, a release that broke or a deadline that spilled over. It was for a felicitation function – a felicitation organised by HJW Foundation along with "Friends of Children (FoC)" and "Vidya Poshak" for the meritorious students from economically challenged families.

Volunteers from both HJW Foundation and FoC had visited most remote places in Narayangaon and Junnar area to find out these gems and handpicked them for the felicitation in terms of reimbursement of their college fees and money for buying other things like books, bag, uniform etc.

3 buses full of these 150 odd students along with their professors and FoC Volunteers arrived at Phase I by 10:00 AM. Security couldn’t have been more cooperative as they let groups of students inside the campus without going through their regular process of clicking snaps for all of them and preparing individual ID cards. Trust speaks.

I was at the main door clicking snaps as the future of India walked in. And I must tell you, it was bright and determined. They were all neatly dressed – may be in their only set of dress specially kept aside for events and ceremonies. I could see a little expression of awe in all those eyes as they had a look around the state – of – the art buildings and the glass elevators going up and down.

Moments later, we escorted them for a breakfast of Poha and Tea. Mahipaalji and his team from Facility had made excellent preparation even though it was a Sunday. The students and their professors alike made a queue without any of us hailing "Linemein lag jaao". No jumping the queues, No jostling for the food, none of the things educated fools do. I wondered: How dare they be so disciplined with no cute curty to be seen around!? It appeared that the day had lot many surprises in store for me…

As I ran around looking for staplers and last minute Xerox copies, dragging chairs and tables (it reminded me of my college days and the events we used to organise – a happy feeling), the event had already started with introductions to the various organisations involved. Don’t worry if you don’t know or remember their names. Even I didn’t. But when I listened to all of them speaking right from the bottom of their hearts and the eyes only echoing the noble feeling behind, I realised there’s something Good happening around as I was laying back in my comfort zone. To an extent, I got the answer to the question that pricks me: "Why does the world still exist with all the inhuman things happening around?" There are these little thousands of Atlas who are quietly carrying the load of this world on their tiny shoulders, without a complaint… without a desire of recognition…

Since it was not feasible to invite all the students on the dais for the cheque distribution, 10 students out of the 150 were first given away cheques worth their fees by Pune DC Head and Chief Guest Ms. Priti Rao. In her address to the audience, she started in Marathi at first but then said "Since I just witnessed how fluently these students speak English, I’ll drop my plans to speak in Marathi and stick to English instead." She went on to affirm her belief that the next decade belongs to India and the students sitting in front hold the key.

Then, 7 students who were beneficiary of the assistance from FoC (Friends of Children) were invited on the stage to share their experience about the diverse career paths they chose – from Paint Technology to Engineering to Medical to Arts to Commerce. All of them preferred to talk in a mix of languages: English, Hindi and Marathi, although I’m sure they could have spoken well in any of them. There may not be glossy words, stylish language, the accent might show traces of Marathi but that was all immaterial.

All of them were just so HAPPY – enjoying every bit of the opportunity they got to reach the huge audience! They spoke their hearts out, talking about difficulties they had to face or are still facing, challenges they have to overcome but only ending with "khud pe aur khuda pe bharosa rakho. Sab theek ho jaayega" (Keep faith in yourself and in God and everything will be all right).

This was followed by a Question and Answer session. I could see the student audience relating themselves with someone succeeding from a similar background. So the questions and answers volleyed back and forth about careers ranging from IT to as diverse as Air Hostess and Pilots and IAS. The career counselling that happened later only extended the theme. We were asked to come up with 50 different careers and it wasn’t surprising to see that all the brains present there were not able to count beyond 15!

The people behind the scene also needed a pat on the back. Mementos were given away to all the FoC and HJW Foundation volunteers who worked hard to get to these students and appreciate their will to study. Shantamma – the President of FoC did the honours. But the lady didn’t look like a President, nor did any of the volunteers look like they were "working" for someone. It was as if they were all a part of a family that has stood up in arms for a worthy cause. There’s no President, There’s no Volunteer – just one Family sharing the same values and ideals.

The clock was ticking to 2:30 PM and the lunch time was well overdue. The coordinators were getting restless as the schedule slipped by a good hour and a half, at least. But so was I. Witnessing the event had made me feel the urge to talk. I was unsure if and how I should speak up. Finally, I conjured up some confidence and asked Rahul – the HJW Foundation Infoscion if I could be allowed to speak. He pointed towards Sandeep – Host from FoC. Sandeep gave me a weary look. "J… u… s… t… two minutes!" he said to me handing over the mike.

Ok. I won’t go verbatim about what I said; most of it being "Minglish" – Marathi + English. But it was something on the lines:

1. I wish to thank FoC and HJW Foundation for letting me be a part of this wonderful event. First of its kind for me and the experience has been GREAT!

2. I have been clicking you guys from the moment you entered the gates. And as my eyes watched yours, I must tell you that I can starkly see the spark in your eyes and the big smile on your face. Keep that spark ablaze and the smile in tact… always.

3. It’s the festival of Sankranti today. Sankranti implies Tilgul (A sweet made up of Sesame and Jaggery). It also implies talking sweet. But more than that, Sankranti signifies the Sun’s northbound journey (UttarayaN to DakshiNayan). The Sun that appears pale, dull in the winter starts shining high in the sky from the day of Sankranti. The day marks this transition. I hope, the cheque that FoC has given you today is not merely a chit of paper but a trigger to your transition from a dull, dark past to a bright future. I pray to God to let the Sun of your talent shine high in the Sky.

4. And lastly, I don’t think I’ve done anything great in life to advise someone else. But there’s a Sher close to my heart which I want to share with you. It’s clichéd, you might have heard it. Nevertheless, I’ll recite it again:

Khudi ko kar buland itana,
ke har tehrir se pehle,
khuda bandese poochhe,
"Bol Bande, teri razaa kya hai? "

Before Sandeep would force me out, I thanked the audience and bowed out.

All were then taken to B – 7 Canteen for the lunch. It was a funny site to see the queue going round the washroom and where we dump the plates but yes, it was heartening to see at the same time. I got to speak to Sadaanand – a visually challenged guy pursuing B.A. He wanted to learn Computers and do some courses like MS – CIT. (Latest: He has already taken MSCIT and cleared it – he wants to learn C now). Those eyes that can’t see still looked so excited and happy as he talked about what all he wants to achieve in his life.

Priti Budhia introduced us to Shantamma. The look in her eyes was that of a mix of a person who is deeply satisfied with what he/she is doing and that of a caring mother. She spoke about various activities she is involved at her age of 70. But then what kept reverberating in my mind was what she said: "There’s so much work to be done. I’ll run till my last breath to work as much as possible. But we need more hands. I wonder what young guys like you do on weekends other than sit and sleep at home." Yes, I wondered, too.

And it was when we were distributing the cheques to the remaining 140 odd students that I came across many stories and of course, Bhushan.

"He is interested in becoming an IT Professional" I read from the description.

"Why IT?" – me.

"There’s a lot of scope." – him with a dreamy eyes this time around.

"But…" – a skeptical me was about to grill this more. But I refrained – I couldn’t commit the sin of breaking someone’s dream – at least not for someone like him. Ignorance is bliss, they say. This time, the ignorance was rather too blissful to mess up with.

It’s 23rd January today. "The" day of the month is so close when we all receive the grand sms from ICICI – "Your account has been credited with INR XXXXXX"… - Bliss at last!. The Salary slip will follow and as usual, I’ll crib. Why do I pay so many taxes, why the transport deduction when all they make me do is get up at least 1 ½ early in the morning, why the difference between the Gross and the Take home… I’ll crib; I’ll crib right from the bottom of my heart – just as I do every month.

But I hope, this time around when I’ll have a look at the salary slip, those eyes that were so happy to receive the cheque of Rs.2,000, will stare at me. They’ll remind me that in some remote place out there in Narayangaon, there’s one Bhushan who is happier than I am even with an annual income that is much less than my monthly salary.

Yes, he’s happier – at least, his eyes say it out loud…

And eyes – they don’t lie, do they?Regards,

Abhishek

FoCh Bangalore - Zee Kannada

2007-01-12T13:12:00.000+05:30

FoC Updates Jan - Dec 2006

2007-01-12T11:03:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends,

The 2006 has been very eventful for FoC. We have undertaken new projects, grown in numbers and are in the process of tying up with other like minded NGO's to reach out. Since we are reaching the end of the year, we thought it would be right to update you on all the events that filled up our calendar 2006.

January
A stray email attracted the attention of one of our volunteers. A school in Lauki , Ambegaon had very poor attendance thru winter as the children were unable to bear the cold early in the morning and could someone collect sweaters for the children to use ? The FoC core team swung into action and on Shankaranti day, 160 children of Lauki school got new sweaters costing about Rs 25000.

February
The visit to the Lauki school encouraged us to look out for students to sponsor from the neighbouring villages. So we made 3 trips to Manchar, Arvi,and Kalamb to select and shortlist deserving students with the assistance of the school principals. We spoke to the students individually and made a list of 75 from which we decided to sponsor around 25.

March.

With the intention of tying up with the Blind school Koregaon park ( for computer classes ) we took the first step forward and procured JAWS software for the blind boys to use. The software costed around Rs 42000

April
We distributed notebooks to 200 poor students from Sharada Mutt school , Vittalwadi costing about Rs 15000.

May
Vacation computer classes for FoC students were conducted at the blind school with the help of FoC volunteers.The students learnt basic use of computers and followed the MS CIT course syllabus.

Following is the 10th class results of our visually challenged students.

Basavaraj Santhikar, who is from Shirur scored 83 % and wants to become a lawyer.Shivaji Londhe, whose father is a sugar factory worker,wants to become a teacher. He scored 79 % aggregate. Pandurang Patil whose father is a farmer , scored 75 % and aspires to become an IAS officer. Jitendra Shinde whose father is a mason, scored 67 % and aspires to become a teacher.Vikas Waghmare whose father is also a mason scored 63 % and wants to work in a BPO.

June

With the beginning of the new academic year, FOC chose 85 students ( Pune town and rural ) to sponsor for 2006 - 07. Expenses covered for these students were in the lines of college , tuition and exam fees, text and notebooks etc. Total cost to date is Rs. 4.00 lakhs.

July
Seeing the needs of rural schools our team decided to approach corporates to take on the responsibility of a school and address all its needs. The first of the Adopt a school project was for Lauki school Ambegaon. Fujifilm Sericol India Ltd. supplied uniforms, books, rainwear, shoes and playground equipment amounting to Rs 1.4 lakhs. The happiness of the children on the slide, swings and other equipment was worth every penny of it.

August
In the same lines of Lauki, Kanbay Wecare group undertook to supply blackboards and flexboards to Arvi and Kalamb schools amounting to Rs 30000.Notebooks to poor children were also distributed.

September
Ernst and Young showed interest in sponsoring 25 to 50 students and our volunteer began discussions with them . E & Y wanted these students to be located by the year end and promised financial and volunteer support to FoC.

October
With the assistance of a few students, preparations for the Diwali sale were begun. Diyas, candles, greeting cards, bookmarks, Fancy tote bags etc were made for the sale.

We got Rs 39,575 from the Divali sale conducted at Symantec, IBM and thru various volunteers.

November
Two like minded NGO's from Karnataka ( Vidya poshak and Prerna ) approached us for sponsoring 100 students around Pune District. We had more than a couple of meetings with them and set the ball rolling with adertisements in local newspapers and posters in various colleges. The idea was to locate poor deserving students who have scored above 80 % in 10th and 12th and sponsor them for their education.

Infosys Hinjewadi Foundation - SPARSH a Healing Touch joined hands with us on this project. Their volunteers will help us in locating the new deserving students, completing the home visits and raising the funds for this project. Once students were located, fees would be paid to them by Jan 31st 2007. The expected expense is about Rs 5 lakhs.

December
The annual picnic with FoC students took place on Dec 3rd to Shivneri fort . Over 50 students with 10 volunteers had a great day out together.

Sharada Mutt school approached us for sweaters for their students. With the assistance of IBM employees, 200 poor children got sweaters. The cost was around Rs 30000.

The home visits for the Prerna project have begun and will be completed by Jan 15th 2007.

All in all, as you can see , we have had a very fruitful and fulfilling year. We have grown in more than one way and look forward to remaining committed to our cause of "Empowering children through education " with your continued assistance

Thanks

FoC Team

We Invite you all for Students Felicitation Day

2007-01-11T08:47:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends
Friends of Children FoC, Sparsh Hjw foundation, PRERANA & Vidya Poshak invites one and all of you to join us on this momentous occasion when we felicitate 150 young, bright and deserving students on their academic achievement in a small ceremony to be held on

DATE & TIME : Sunday, January 14th, 2007. 10:30 AM to 1:00 PM
VENUE : Infosys campus, Hinjewadi

The total fund of 5:00 Lakhs is provided by PRERANA Vidya Poshak & Sparsh Hjw Foundation.
Pls find some of the sample profiles of the students in the below album
Agenda:
10:00-10:30- Arrival & Ice Breaker
10:30-10:35- Introduction & Welcome by Priti Sparsh Hjw foundation
10:35-10:40- Welcome speech by FOC Students.
10:40-10:50- FOC Introduction by Ramesh & Ujjwala
10:50-11:00- Introduction of PRERANA & Vidya Poshak - Prof Tikot
11:00-11:05- Introduction of Hjw Foundation.
11:05-11:15- Speech by Chief Guest Mrs Priti Rao and Fee distribution.
11:15-12:00- Career Options after Class XII by FOC Students (Interactive session).
12:00-12:30- Interactive Session with 3 FOC volunteers on available career options.
12:30-12:35- Vote of Thanks by FoC/Hjw Foundation Aparna Domini.

This will be followed by lunch

P.S : People interested in attending the function pls give your prior intimation either by an email, latest by Friday morning. Infosys has arranged transportation for the event.

Come cheer them for the achievement they have made,

Please pass on to your friends who might be interested in FoC's activities.

FoC Team

StudentsHome Visit Pictures of Infosys_Prerana Project

2006-12-24T06:24:00.000+05:30

Friends
Check what you are missing, Please join us for Students home visit if you want to get the such kind of experience. Ths count is now 75 and the target is 100.

Nandhini & Appa (FoC senior student) on a special mission crossing a river to reach a student house

Vrushali had claimed many small mountains on her way to reach some of her students houses.

Even after 7PM in the evening Vrushali still wanted to visit the 3 students house which she could not find.

Vani & Venky were in middle of nowhere with 2 punctured tyres in their vehicle.

A prinmary school on our way

Way to others students house

Volunteers for fresh Goat milk chai

And venky carried back lots of lemon, flowerseeds, sugarcanes, kadi pattha and lot of plants back home.

FoC Selected Students Profile for Infosys_Prerana Project

2006-12-22T12:09:00.000+05:30

FoC has joined hands with Infosys Hinjewadi Foundation (Sparsh - A healing Touch), PRERANA & VIDYA POSHAK (two like minded NGOS from Karnataka) and plans to induct 125 more students into their fold.

The funds for this project (5.0Lakhs Approx) and the Books will be provided by Infosys Hinjewadi Foundation (Sparsh - A Healing Touch) , PRERANA & VIDYA POSHAK.

Click the album and check the profiles of the students.

FoC_Prerana_Housevisit

Minutes of the FoC Students meeting held on Dec 10th at SYNYGY

2006-12-10T16:18:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the FoC Students meeting held on Dec 10th at SYNYGY

1. Two gentlemen from Bajaj Steel came and spoke at length to our senior students for over 2 hours. They answered many of their queries regarding various topics and have offered for our students to visit the company and get a feel of working in a corporate. We plan to take our students across in january. The students gained a lot from this session and have asked us to organise more such discussions in the future.

2. We had a very good turnout of students. Two doctors were invited to check the students. Dr. Gandikota ( gynaecologist ) spoke to the girls for about an hour and answered all their queries. She has offered them free consultation for any of their problems at her clinic.

3. Dr. V. Dharmadhikari checked all the students eyes and has made a list of a few students whom she would be meeting for a follow up check up.

2. The boys had a heated one hour debate on whether Greg chapell is responsiblie for the current condition of Indian Cricket team. The winning team was chosen by Sandip based on 7 criterias like (Team participation, Communication, Validity of the point etc) The score was 4-3 in favour of the winning team.

3. One of our volunteers has made 2 teams comprising of 2 boys and 2 girls who have to make a presentation for the next meeting on a chosen topic. This is to hone their soft skills and to overcome ther inability to speak with confidence.

The next student meeting is on Jan 7th at 2.30 pm

Dec 09 Career Guidance & Medical Camp

Thanks
FoC Team
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Minutes of Volunteers Meeting held on 10-Dec-2006

2006-12-10T16:16:00.000+05:30

Following students meeting, the volunteers met up to update the group on the homevisits. Details as follows

1. 20 Home visits have been completed to date . Volunteers who made the visits need to contact the students and tell them to post the copies of documents ( marksheet, income cert., ration card, i.card and fee receipt ) to the address given below. All thse documents have to reach before Dec 25th. For future homevisits please follow the same.

2. Any expenses incurred during the homevisit like rickshaw charge or petrol charge can be refunded to the volunteers when fees are distributed. Volunteers are requested to make a note of the distance covered and amounts paid and keep a record.

3. If any of the students you will be visiting is from class 11 and you feel deserving and if given a chance he can get into professional course and his 11th college fees are low. we could plan to pay 50 % of his CET coaching class fees upto a limit of Rs 7500. Please do not promise this, but you can put this in your recommendation .
This amount will not be paid when fees are given, but will be disbursed later when the student joins the class.

4. The date fixed for disbursement of fees is Jan 7th. So home visits have to be completed in the next 2 weekends. ( jan 16th , 17th and dec 23rd ,24th). Since the last weekend of Dec. is not convienient for most of us, we have to finish this on a war footing.

The first week of Jan will be for getting the cheques in order and records uptodate.

5.We will be sending a draft format of a document to be filled by volunteers after the home visit. Pl. send this document as a soft copy along with the Photo to Venky. The hard copy of the Student application forms and home visit forms would be collected from the volunteers later on. Kindly please preserve them.

6. A team of volunteers plans to visit Junnar during weekend of 23rd and 24th for 2 days. We will be receiving around 50 forms from that area. If anyone is interested in joining in, pl. contact venky for details.

7. Venky will be updating the new details in the excel sheet as and when he receives the new application forms from volunteers or students or from colleges. Volunteers please send the new applications forms from students to venky. If you choose to visit any of the students please update venky.

Address for posting documents

Mrs. V.Subramanyam
16. Atlantis
4th floor, Kalyaninagar
Pune 411006

Thanks
FoC Team

FoC Annual Picnic 2006

2006-12-03T16:22:00.000+05:30

Dear Friends of Children

With the onset of winter, we decided to take our students on a day picnic to Shivneri fort. The rural students joined us too and in all we were about 50 students and 10 volunteers.

We reached Kalamb school at about 9am where Mr. Rokade ( Kalamb schoolmaster ) had kindly arranged for breakfast. We left at 10.30 am for Shivneri fort.

Before we began to climb , the students were divided into 4 teams for the day, for all activities. They had to choose a name for their team and a slogan too. All of us enjoyed the climb thoroughly and enjoyed the short breaks ...also for the oranges and nimbu pani.

We then proceeded to Junnar where we had lunch and returned to Kalamb school where every team put up a 10 min. skit . The best 2 skits were adjudged and prizes were given.

18 students received prizes for academic achievements for the year 2005 -06 also.

Students were also briefed on our latest project and were asked to approach their colleges to get deserving students to apply.

Everyone returned tired but happy at the end of the day.

FoC Shivneri Fort Picnic Dec 2006

Thanks
Vani

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Minutes of Volunteer meeting held on Saturday , Dec.2nd 2006

2006-12-02T16:26:00.000+05:30

15 volunteers were present to take the Vidya poshak, Prerna , Infosys project forward.

The details of the project were explained to the newcomers . Since the response thru the newspapers was quite poor, it was decided to approach college principals directly and elicit their help.

Volunteers have listed out colleges they would visit and try to get poor & deserving students for the project.

Besides this, a few student information forms were handed out for home visits within pune city.

A schedule will be made along with other details for pending home visits ( in 10 days time ) and if you are interested in helping out, you could get in touch with us and assist us.

Colleges listed out are as follows. If you can go to any other colleges besides these, please let us know. Those who have volunteered below, please make sure you meet the principals by Dec 8th as the deadline to collect forms from students is Dec 23rd.

BMCC ......... Aparna Gharpure

FC college / Garware....... Vijay

SP college / Shahu college / VIT ....... Mahesh

Abeda Inamdar / Anjuman Islam ....... Vani

Poona College...... Venky

SNDT / Spicer college ...... Nandini

Modern College......Akash

Wadias....... Sandeep

COEP....... Rodney

Thanks
FoC Team

Times of India News Item on 18th Nov 2006

2006-11-20T07:48:00.001+05:30

2006-11-07T19:55:00.000+05:30

Friends of Children (FoC), is a Pune based NGO sponsoring poor deserving students for higher education after Class X. FoC assists students by providing college fees, books etc. FoC at present supports 85 students.

FoC has joined hands with Infosys Hinjewadi Foundation Pune, PRERANA & VIDYA POSHAK(two like minded NGOS from Karnataka) and plans to induct 125 new students into their fold.

One time financial assistance will be provided for students who have scored 80 % and above in their last public exam (SSC or HSC). Those students whose family income is less than Rs 60,000 per annum may apply. This support is provided to students from Pune district only.

Last Date to Receive Applications is December 23rd 2006.

Eligible students who are studying Class XI / Class XII / Diploma / Degree / Professional courses or any other course may collect the application form from

Sathi
Old Mathru Chaya Building (Anil Complex)
2nd Floor, Plot No.5
Street No. 10-1/7
Dhole Patil Road
Pune
Ph: 020-26129763Mobile: 9890393132

You can also download the form from the following url and fill it and post it to the above address.

http://f1.grp.yahoofs.com/v1/0Px0RUBiCtA583HKcAnUcBvmnPwrdRtq-CpXVz99Qu6iC_UB8_OXeMS6uArf4Jsf9OQpMDFxPURMPrSjhkmBJQ/FoC-%20Onlineform.doc

If you are unable to download & print the form kindly please send your Email-Id as a comment. We will send you the application form.

Friends of Children does not have any salaried employees or office space and is fully managed by volunteers. FOC thus has no overhead costs. This means 100% of the funds raised reaches the children.

FoC Students - Diwali Sale Items

2006-10-08T20:26:00.000+05:30

FoC Diwali Items

Minutes of the meeting held on Oct 1st at Synygy office

2006-10-01T21:53:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held on Oct 1st at Synygy office

1. Two students, Devidas and Harish planned and held a game session with all the students. There were 5 teams along with a volunteer each and games were played in 5 rounds to declare a final winner.

2. The students enjoyed thoroughly , specially when the final round involved eating biscuits and cracking jokes at breakneck speed !! We do plan to involve more students to organise such sessions .

3. After sorting out the regular admin. issues, a consensus was taken on whether we should go for a movie next month ( Nov. 5th ) Since the response was a resounding "yes " we will try to organise for the entire group to go for Lage raho Munnabhai at Adlabs.

4. If any volunteer knows the Manager / owner of Adlabs, pl. assist us in getting a good rate for the same.

5. Class 12 students met Anindya with their marks and exam schedules . The core group met 2 new students and interviewed them.

6. The next meeting will hopefully be at Adlabs for the movie on Nov 5th. Hoping to meet all of you then.

With warm regards
FoC Team

Minutes of the meeting held on Sept 3rd 2006 at Synygy office

2006-09-03T21:51:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held on Sept 3rd 2006 at Synygy office

1. All the rural students came in at 1.00pm with Mr. Rokade. Fees were disbursed and all admin. issues brought upto date. Mr. Rokade is co ordinating with FoC and Wecare ( Kanbay ) for the supply of blackboards and library books to 2 schools at Kalamb and Arvi. This will be done in the coming weekend.

A member of the Earthwatch team ( from HSBC ) came and interacted with the rural students to know more about their activities and future plans.

2. Anindya and Rodney held an interactive session with all the local and rural students which was a great success. Many hidden talents were discovered and many of the volunteers also participated with the teams.

3. 3 more new students were interviewed and added to the FoC list which now has reached 53 in Pune and 24 in the villages.

4. Anindya and Aparna spoke to the Class 12 students and plan to work with them independently towards their final exam.

5. The students left after collecting clothes given by various volunteers and some snacks.

The next meeting is on Oct 1st at Synygy at 2.30 pm

Thanks
FoC Team

FoC Students

2006-09-02T20:25:00.000+05:30

FoC Group Event Sep 2006

“Empowering through Education”

2006-08-15T15:45:00.001+05:30

“Empowering through Education”

While many of us are able to convert our dreams into a promising future for ourselves, there are many more among us and around us who are up against all odds in their endeavors. All of us as children and young men and women aspire to shape rewarding careers and worthy lives, and we unflinchingly devote ourselves towards it. However there are a large number of children for whom this aspiration remains a lost dream and unattained ambition for no fault of theirs.

We friends of children believe that we can bring a difference in their life, and the belief has bought us together to achieve following mission

To facilitate a better future for children from economically backward sections of society, through the medium of education.

To spread awareness, on the necessity for quality life and quality education for children from all walks of life.

As a step towards achieving our mission, we started with a group of 26 deserving children (10th std and 12th std) in 2003. We then formed a Society “Friends of Children” to facilitate our work.

We believe that just financial support is not the panacea but there are other requirements too, thus we started with

1. Providing guidance to children in education on Saturdays and Sundays under the project “TEACH” (To Educate A CHild).
2. Providing career guidance for children

We work in a zero overhead model, this means that the volunteers meet all the administrative expenses.

The three years have seen us move steadily towards our goal

To facilitate the higher education of 100 children by year 2007.

From 26 children in the first year to about 85 children in 2006 our activities have also grown and now we
Provide financial support for education in terms of fees, textbooks, notebooks, general knowledge books, storybooks and other necessary stationery.

Sponsor bus passes.

Provide school uniform for primary school students.

Regular mentoring of the children for academics as well as career guidance.

Prepare them for competitive and professional exams.

Regular training in spoken English and computer classes.

Life-Skill sessions to help in the overall development of the child and to raise their confidence levels.

Take care of their health related matters.

Our success depends upon support from individuals like you in the following forms

1. Financial Support Cash or Cheques/Drafts in favour of “Friends of Children”
2. Providing Books and Stationery
3. Spending Time with the children during weekends

"Great opportunities to help others seldom come, but small ones surround us every day."
--Sally Koch

For details contact : venky @ 9890393132 or info@focindia.org

Sericol News Letter - Adopt a School Project

2006-08-01T15:30:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held at Synygy on 17th July, 4 pm

2006-07-17T21:53:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held at Synygy on 17th July, 4 pm

39 out of 41 students attended the meeting. A cross section of volunteers also were present.

We began with Shriyash explaining the point system under which the students would be graded and monitored through the year. This would enable Friends of children to keep a close eye on the students throughout the academic year. The points would be awarded and deleted against attendance to monthly meetings, social service, good grades, extra curricular activities etc.

Next , Sandeep ( who is a chartered accountant ) gave a detailed run through of what it entails taking CA as a career option.... the hardships, the hurdles and the payoffs. We intend making this a regular feature where professionals from various walks of life come in and talk to the students briefly about the various career options available.

The core group of Friends of Children then addressed all the students on why FoC came into being, how funds are collected, why social service is an integral part of being in FoC and how every student should avail of all the opportunities given to them from time to time.

Anil addressed the students about mentoring and being mentored. The students were then divided off into groups under a couple of mentors each to discuss individual plans of action.

Notebooks and textbooks were distributed, 5 new students were interviewed and clothes collected for the past few months were given to all the students.

The next meeting is due on July 31st at 2.30 pm at Synygy where we plan to hold a medical camp with 3 doctors on call.

FoC-Wekare Kanbay Project

2006-07-12T16:36:00.000+05:30

FoC Students List 2006-07

2006-07-09T21:47:00.000+05:30

Friends

Following is the list of FoC students for the academic year 2006-07. With all your support we are able to assist 80 students for the current academic year.

This year we have started supporting students from the rural villages. We have seleted 24 students from 4 village schools near Ambegaon/Narayangaon/Junnar

All the 80 students will be supported for their Educational fees, Exam Fees, Books, Notebooks, Summar classes , Extra classes (for 12th) , Hostel & Food (For Visually impaired) , Transportation (Special cases). They will be guided and mentored by the FoC Mentors group to give them individual attention.

The total budget for the year 2006-07 is approx 4.00 lakhs. As of july 10th we have raised about 1.50 lakhs. We are waiting for the admission of all the 11th Class students and the 12th Class students.

STUDENT LIST FOR 2006 -2007

No. NAME % / class Plan for 2006 -07
1 Ashwini 77.6 / FY BCS S.Y BCS
2 Deepa 69.4 / FY B.com S Y B.com
3 Kalyani 79 / 12th Sci Trying for a course in medical field.
4 Sadanand 75 / 12th Com FY B.A (Visually Impaired)
5 Shabina Awaiting TY B.com
6 Shobha 55 / TY B.com Looking for job
7 Sucheta 57 / TY B.com DPTM(Naralkar )
8 Devidas /SY draughtsman
9 Akshatha 63 / IT course FY BCS
10 Swapnil pending
11 Trupti 45 / 11th Comm 12th Comm
12 Vaibhav 63 / 11th IT dipl 12th
13 Tejas 58 / 11th Sci 12th Sci
14 Sonu 56 / 11th arts 12th Arts
15 Rupesh 40 / 11th Comm 12th Comm
16 Sandip pending
17 Shashank 48 / 11th Sci 12th Sci
18 Lakindra 66 / 11th Sci 12th Sci
19 Rupali pending
20 Jaythirth 71 / FY dipl.mech engg Diploma
21 Harshad pending 12th Sci
22 Akshay 52 / 11th Sci 12th Sci
23 Deepika 60 /11th Sci 12th Sci
24 Yogita 52 / 11th Sci 12th Sci
25 Dhanashri 74 /12th Sci Trying for engg
26 Harish pending TY BAMS
27 Appa 68 / FY B.sc SY B.sc
28 Ganpat Failed 1 subject TY Bcom
29 Rajguru Failed Diploma
30 Supriya 72 /FY B.sc SY B.sc
31 Swati 60 / 11th Sci 12th Science
32 Ramesh 74 /S Y B.com T Y B.com
33 Rishikesh Higher 2nd class TY LL.b
34 Rukhaiya 82 / SY Civ.engg dipl TY Civ. Engg
35 Poonam 55 / 11th Comm 12th Comm
36 Manisha 58 / 11th Comm 12th Comm
37 Ujwala 78 / SY BCS TY BCS
38 Rushikesh 74 /11th Comm 12th Comm
39 Varsharani 11th
40 Yogesh D.ed
41 Vishal 72 / 12th Sci
42 Swapnil TY B.sc
43 Deepika MCVC
44 Kiran 59 / 11th Sci 12th Sci
45 Sagar 75 /11th Sci 12th Sci
46 Tatya 52 / 11th Sci 12th Sc
47 Ashish 61 / 10th 11th Comm
48 Jyotsna 79 / 10th 11th Science
49 Prafulla 65 /12th Comm FY B.com
50 Ashwini Garud / MLT
51 Pallavi Parekh

Visually impaired
52 Basavaraj 83 / 10th 11th
53 Shivaji 79 / 10th 11th
54 Pandurang 75 / 10th 11th
55 Vikas 63/ 10th 11th
56 Jeetendra 67/ 10th 11th

Rural Students Kalamb High school
1 Rupali 76 / 11th arts 12th Arts
2 Amita 70 /11th arts 12th Arts
3 Sonali 70 /11th arts 12th Arts
4 Sagar 57 /11th arts 12th Arts
5 Vaishali 80 / 12th arts Appl for D.ed
6 Deepali 74 /12th arts BA
7 Jayashree 74 / 12 th arts BA
8 Archana 60 / 12th arts BA

Arvi village
9 Datta 75%(122/104 PC/M ) 11th Sc.
10 Dinesh 75 (98 / 116 ) 11th Sc / IT
11 Girish 82 ( 126 /122 ) 11th Sc
12 Saurav 71 (103 /101 ) 11th Sc

Kalamb village
13 Vaman 84 ( 136 /123 ) 11th Sc /Comp
14 Prasad 76 ( 124 /109 ) 11th Sc
15 Mahesh 72 (130 /100 ) Dipl. Mech GPP
16 Jyotsna 81 ( 135 /106 ) 11th Arts
17 Amol 62 (100 /56 ) 11th Arts
18 Seema 83 ( 140 /108 ) 11th Sc
19 Sonali Waykar 73 (126 / 91 ) 11th Sc

Manchar village
20 Surekha 78 ( 128 /112 ) 11th Sc
21 Farjana 76 ( 128 /109 ) 11th Sc
22 Vishwanath 86 ( 124 /132 ) 11th Sc
23 Karishma Varpe 66% / 10th 11th Sc
24 Mayur Mavkar 77 % / 12th Arts Appl for D.ed

Thanks
FoC Team

FoC Updates

2006-07-08T21:49:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the trip made to Kalamb on 8th July 2006

Five of our volunteers went to the Kalamb school near Narayangaon to meet up with the 25 students shortlisted from Classes 11 , 12 and above.

We explained the guidelines to them and have reimbursed admission and college fees to most of them.Some of them await admission into the D.ed course which is due in early August.

FoC will be funding these students for their college fees, note and transportation.
The students will be mentored by Mr. Rokade who is a teacher of the Kalamb Mahavidyalaya and he in turn will co ordinate with Rodney Martis for any requirements put forth by the students.

We have arranged for the entire group of 25 students to attend our meeting on August 6th at Synygy so that they would be able to meet with the rest of the children from Pune.

There will be an interactive session organised by Anindya and Rodney on August 6th at 2.30 pm at Synygy premises.

Thanks
FoC Team

FoC Sericol Adopt a School Project

2006-07-08T20:24:00.000+05:30

FoC Sericol Adopt a School Project July 2006

Minutes of the meeting held on July 2nd, 2006 at Synygy

2006-07-02T21:46:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held on July 2nd, 2006 at Synygy

Volunteers Anil and Sandeep held an one hour workshop for the students on how to sharpen your learning skills, how to focus on a goal and work towards sorting your problems out.

The students were then asked to change their seating and after a brief chat with their neighbour, relate each other's problems and provide solutions.

Guidelines for the year were handed out . Notebooks for the entire group and rainwear for the new students were given out too.

The next month's workshop will be headed by Anindya and Rodney on August 6th at Synygy.

FoC volunteers will be meeting the shortlisted students from the village schools on July 8th in Lauki. FoC plans to include 25 new students from these schools under FoC sponsorship.

Achievers of Class 10

2006-07-01T21:43:00.000+05:30

Achievers of Class 10

It is with great pride that FoC is able to announce the results of the Class 10 exam. Housed at the Blind School for boys, Koregaon Park since Class 1 , these boys have done both their institution and FoC real proud !!

Basavaraj Santhikar, who is from Shirur scored 83 % and wants to become a lawyer.

Shivaji Londhe, whose father is a sugar factory worker,wants to become a teacher. He scored 79 % aggregate.

Pandurang Patil whose father is a farmer , scored 75 % and aspires to become an IAS officer.

Jitendra Shinde whose father is a mason, scored 67 % and aspires to become a teacher.

Vikas Waghmare whose father is also a mason scored 63 % and wants to work in a BPO.

They have all applied to Fergusson and SP colleges for Class 11 Arts. ( English medium )

They have been trained in spoken English since Class 4 by our volunteer Shanthamma and speak the language fluently and effortlessly. During the vacation they all learnt German and Computers. Now they are ready to take up MSC-IT exam. They have won prizes in many sports events.

All these children will have to leave the blind school and we will have to locate a proper hostel to house them.

We appeal to all of you to come forward and support these students in their endeavours so that they continue to shine and do all of us proud !!

We are looking for Individual sponsors to take care of their Educational expense and their monthly hostel and food expense.

To top this achievement, one of our earliest students Rahul Deshmukh , who is also visually impaired , has been offered a post of Lecturer of Sociology at SP College from July 5th. He is an achiever of the highest merit and has completed his MA in sociology along with a B.ed. Under the umbrella of FoC.

FoC Students HandBook 2006-07

2006-07-01T16:42:00.000+05:30

FRIENDS OF CHILDREN, PUNE

STUDENT HANDBOOK ( RULES AND GUIDELINES )

Schedule for meetings from July 2006 to March 2007

Attendance to all meetings is mandatory. No absence will be granted without prior permission. Failure to attend more than 3 meetings in a year without notification would mean cancellation of sponsorship.

Venue for meetings – SYNYGY, Parmar center, near Pune station

Schedule

July 2nd
August 6th
September 3rd
October 1st (tentative date for picnic)
November 5th
December 3rd
January 7th
February 4th
March 4th

Schedule for fees distribution, collection of booklists and distribution of books

June 24th
July 15th
July 29th
August 5th
August 12h
August 26th

* Fees will be paid only at Nandini and Vani’s houses and will not be paid on any other dates besides dates mentioned .Fees will also not be paid at meetings. Students are requested to not phone and ask for money at their convenience

Documents required to be submitted along with application form

Income proof certificate of all earning members in the family

Unless referred by the school, 1 reference letter by person who introduced the student

Ebc and caste certificate copies

1 recent passport size photograph

Photocopies of marksheets of Classes 10, 11, 12 and other exams attended.

Copies of certificates of any other achievements.

Guidelines to qualify for sponsorship by Friends of Children

1. Students in Class 11 and above qualify for sponsorship. Students who have appeared for Class 10 exam also can apply.

2. Post graduate courses will not be sponsored except in special cases.

3. Courses will be sponsored only in Govt. colleges and if the fees are very high, then the student will be

assisted in getting a student loan from a bank.

4. Only Merit based admissions will be considered for any college admissions.

5. All documents to be submitted to the selection panel. The student qualifies after an interview and a home visit is conducted by the panel.

6. Student should not be sponsored by any other NGO or individual for the same course as FoC.

7. Only 1 student per family will be sponsored.

Fees and documents

1. Students will be sponsored by FoC for the first year only upto Rs.5000.

2. Only college and exam fees will be paid by FoC. Notebooks and textbooks will be provided at the beginning of the year.

3. Hostel, medical and transport fees will not be borne by FoC except in special cases.

4. All receipt originals should be stamped with the FoC stamp. Student can retain originals, but must submit Xerox copies instead. All originals should be submitted by the end of the year.

5. Student must bear 20 % of any fees sponsored by FoC (rounded to the closest figure). i.e., if the fees is Rs 1500, FoC will pay Rs.1200 and the student has to pay Rs.300 .This amount shall be refunded at the end of the year, at the discretion of FoC based on academic progress and mentor feedback.

6. If student fails in more than one subject (in the finals /semester) he will not be sponsored the next year.

7. Student must update mentors on marks obtained at class tests, terminal exams, prelims, test series etc. Student must also provide the final exam schedule to their mentors well ahead of time.

8. No fee amounts will be reimbursed without previous dues and papers being upto date.
It is in the discretion of FoC to choose to sponsor or discontinue sponsorship at any given time if student does not follow guidelines.

Extra classes

Students appearing for CET after Class 12, will be sponsored for either HSC or CET extra classes. FoC will sponsor Rs 5000 at the beginning of the year or 50 % of the class fees (whichever is lesser).

Student has to present the panel with latest marksheets before joining any class for Class 12.

Exam fees for any qualifying exam will be paid by FoC .eg., AIEEE,CET,IIT. FoC will not pay for classes for any other examination.

Any other class requirements of the student will be met on an individual basis. Student must attend classes organized by FoC in any such cases.

Any summer classes or vocational courses organized by FoC for the students requires mandatory attendance. Failure to attend would mean discontinuance of sponsorship.

Student must obtain prior permission before joining any extra class.

Books

All books and notebooks will be supplied by FoC by end of August. Student must provide the booklist (with author’s name) by mid August.

No books can be bought by the student and bill given for refund.

Student must maintain a list of textbooks / material given and return the books/ material at the end of the year in good condition. In case of damage or loss of any books, student must replace the book with a new book at his own cost.

No material of any kind can be bought by the student. (Dissection box, instruments, art supplies). If student requires any of the above, they should put in a request with their mentor. If any such material is bought by the student, bills will not be reimbursed.

All notes and books from extra classes and coaching classes to be returned at the end of the year.

When a student completes studies and leaves FoC, all material supplied should be returned.

All students must attend all meetings, workshops and gatherings organized by FoC. If they have classes, prior permission must be obtained from class to avoid being marked absent from meeting. Failure to attend more than 3 meetings in a year would mean automatic removal of student’s name from sponsored list.

Mentors telephone numbers
Aparna Domini 98900 93187
Venkatesan 98903 93132
Vani Subramanyam 26696069
Nandini Madhan 25896806
Rodney Martis 98906 91472
Anindya Banerjee 98220 71261

Lauki Trip

2006-06-20T21:42:00.000+05:30

As planned 6 volunteers went to the ZP school Lauki and distributed uniforms, raincoats, schoolbags with books and stationery.The school was provided with sports equipment like volleyballs, footballs, cricket kit, net etc. They will also be provided with playground equipment like a slide, jungle gym, swings and see saws.

After that, we proceeded to Kalamb high school and met up with 9 students of Classes 11 and 12. One girl plans to go for her D.ed and has applied for the same. She has scored 80 % in her Class 12.

We spoke to the students about our guidelines, rules regarding payment of fees and books. All the students plan to take admission in the Kalamb college . Mr. Rokade who is a teacher at the school has agreed to co ordinate with Rodney for the requirements of the students.

We will be meeting these students on July 8th for disbursement of fees and books. On the same date, we will be meeting 39 shortlisted Class 10 students. We plan to take them based on their results due on June 26th.

We also have promised to give 50 poor students notebooks as they do not have the funds to purchase it though college has begun already. We will be supplying 400 notebooks in all.

FoC Class 12 Results 2006

2006-06-13T21:39:00.000+05:30

Friends

Following is our 12th Results for this year

1. Sadanand ( arts ) 75 % (He is visually impaired and he works full time 6 days a week to support his family and managed his study)
2. Dhanashri ( science ) 74 % PCM 84%
3. Kalyani ( science ) 79 % PCM 81%
4. Sameer ( science ) failed
5. Wasim ( science ) 57 %
6. Rishikesh ( Commerce ) 72 %
7. Bela ( Commerce ) 71 %
8. Tulsi (Commerce) 69%
9 Reshma (Commerce) 73%

Thanks & Regards
Venky

Venkatesan Namasivayam
IBM Global Services Pvt Ltd.@HERTZ ,
Pune
Tel : +91 9890393132

Beginning of New Year.

2006-06-12T21:37:00.001+05:30

The Beginning of a new year

As we write this today, our family has grown to 85 children in all. From various courses and streams, we have made a huge jump and extended our reach to many more students in the past year. As per plan, we interacted with Principals of 4 municipal schools and located 25 deserving students of Class 10 moving to Class 11. After completion of home visits by our volunteers, these students were absorbed into FoC.

We have stuck to our ideal that every child must be given a chance, so not every student we chose has scored high percentages or has topped his or her class. The zeal to better one’s own self and future was all that we looked for.

Our efforts have paid off this year with 7 out of 9 students being placed after completion of their respective courses. Looking forward to June , towards the new academic year, we have decided to maintain the number of students at 60 in Pune and not increase the number. Parallelly, we propose to tap closeby rural schools for deserving students and locate at least 40 at Classes 11 and above.

We have initiated the process and have a list in hand of 70 students whom we will be meeting in June and shortlisting to 40. The schools are from villages around Narayangaon . We have made 3 trips so far and with the assistance of the school Principals and teachers have begun working on the same.

These students will be monitored by one of the schoolmasters locally as they would attend college in Kalamb. If any of them propose to move to Pune, we would be monitoring them personally . We will be sponsoring their college fees, books and any other requirement that arises .

Locally, in Pune, we have undertaken the responsibility of educating 5 blind boys who have done exceedingly well till their Class 10. We propose to locate part time jobs for them, a hostel where they could stay and the right courses to continue their education.

We have begun computer classes in the Blind school both for their boys and our students and intend equipping our children with the syllabus of MS –CIT to start with.

We intend assisting rural schools with corporate sponsorship in improving the quality of education provided. We have already located one corporate who will take on the Zilla Parishad school, Lauki, Kalamb dist., and provide, notebooks, playgound and sports equipment, rainwear, footwear and science lab equipment. FoC will play only the part of a facilitator and bring the school and corporate together. Our volunteers will help in assisting in the project if required.

FoC also plans to change into a registered trust as we are unable to apply for 80 G as a society. The process is already in place and we are working with a CA to get the papers in order. We will continue to have a Board of 7 trustees and will keep you updated on the proceedings.

With all these changes in hand, and with almost 100 students to be sponsored this year, we are looking at a huge leap forward in terms of growth. Our proposed budget for this year is Rs 4-5 lakhs. Our expenses last year amounted to Rs 3.5 lakhs

We have undertaken Friends of Children 3 years back and have grown from strength to strength. We need your assistance and trust in our commitment . Our team looks forward to your contributions and can assure you that “ Empowering children through education “ shall continue to be our motto .

With warm regards,

FoC team

Friends of Children Introduction

2006-05-01T15:17:00.001+05:30

FRIENDS OF CHILDREN

Friends of Children (FoC) is a group of individuals who have an urge to contribute their share to society.
The main objective of FoC is to sponsor deserving students for higher education (above Class 10), guide them and assist them to earn their own living.

We try to ensure that not only the best student is supported, but also a committed and talented student is encouraged as well.

“FoC does not have any office space or salaried employee; hence every rupee which is raised from donors reaches the students. All funds are used only for educational purposes. All admin. expenses are taken up by the core members of FoC. “

At present, FoC is sponsoring 85 students in Pune for academic year 2006-07. (60 Students in Pune and 25 students from the villages near Narayangaon). The approximate expense for these students is expected to be around 5.0 Lakh.

FoC has spent over Rs 3.5 lakhs for Educational purpose for 64 students during the academic year 2005-2006.
FoC has spent around 2.3 Lakhs for the Educational purposes during the academic year 2004-05.
FoC has spent over 1.2 lakh for Educational Purpose of 25 students in the year 2003-2004.

FoC has also taken up other activities like Sweater distribution for 200 students for the Ambegaon School. Adopt a school project in villages around Pune with the help of corporates. Providing computer training for visually impaired students at Poona Blind School. Providing notebooks, materials to students in different schools.

FoC raises funds on a regular basis. We encourage our friends to form a group of 5 to 10 persons and donate as little as Rs 100 per month (100 x 12 x 5= Rs 6000 per year) which is sufficient for the yearly educational expenses for one student. FoC is registered as a Society under Maharashtra Charity Commission (Mh/115/2004/Pune).

How you can help?

By volunteering your time and making your friends aware of Friends of Children.
You can become a Mentor for a student, give him/her career guidance and help the student to achieve his/her DREAMS.
You can conduct workshops or seminars or give lectures on any general topic, which will be useful for the students.
You can donate material... (Calculators, Drafters, Dissection Boxes, Cassettes {For blind boys}, Geometry boxes, Notebooks), Clothes ( Good clothes which can be used by college Boys/Girls), Books - Academic books of any class or subject, General books, Dictionaries, books on Aptitude and Management.
Providing monetary help by giving cheques in favor of "Friends of Children".

We look forward to your continuous support and we have got all the original expense receipts in place and files for each student will be kept for display in all our volunteer meetings.

FoC SaradaMath Notebook Project

2006-04-22T17:04:00.000+05:30

We distributed notebooks to 200 poor students from Sharada Mutt school , Vittalwadi costing about Rs 15000.

FoC Updates March 2006

2006-03-07T22:35:00.000+05:30

Friends,

FoC (Friends of Children) has taken the initiative to start a computer lab at Blind School , Koregaon Park , Pune for the use of Students from Blind school (100 Students) and FoC students (65 students).

The children from the Blind School will be trained from May onwards by Rahul Deshmukh ( a visually impaired, but trained teacher ) during the week. Over weekends ( May onwards ), the students of FoC will utilize the computer lab for sessions to learn computers, training towards the MS –CIT exam , learn and practice Tally, programming languages and any other specific requirements that crop up.

During the past year, the boys of Class 9, from the Blind School, have been taught by Rahul, at his house, and have learnt Ms Word, Excel , Powerpoint, emailing etc. They are now able to operate and work on the computers independently . We found that the commute of over an hour was tiresome during the week for the students. With this in mind, we plan to teach the boys of Classes 7 and 8 this year alongside at the school premises itself.

The Blind School has provided us the classroom along with 5 working computers. We have checked the configurations of all the computers and all of them are functional. The software's specially required to be installed for the blind boys ( JAWS ) needs to be procured. We also need to get software for the computers, computer text books and material for the syllabus of MS –CIT .

Besides this, we would look forward to volunteers coming forward to teach / supervise classes for our own (FoC ) students during the month of May and June when we plan to hold summer classes during the vacation.The schedule for this will be ready by late April. We look forward to your assistance both in kind and timewise.

In return FoC promises the unstinted commitment of all its volunteers towards making this project succeed.

We need to buy original versions of the following software's.

1. JAWS software (Special software which enables visually impaired to learn computers) costs 43,000 for 3 user licence.
2. MS Office bundle (Word/Excel/Power point/ Access) - for 5 computers (9k for each copy / MS Office prof - 27k)
3. Tally latest version - for 3 computers (Rs 5500 per copy)
4. DTP software - for 2 computers (Around 20k per copy)
5. Visual studio - 1 copy
6. Java , J2EE, JDK - 1 copy
7. Symantec antivirus software - 5 copies 2000 per copy
8. Any computer related books & materials , Educational CD's , Cupboards for storing the books
10. Volunteers who can assist the students to learn Basics and other programming languages and packages.

If you want to donate us a copy of any of the above software, materials, books or give donations in cheque or cash please contact venky (9890393132) or Anindya (9822071261). We need to procure the same by this month end

We would be having a volunteers meet at blind school on 18th of march at 2:30 PM for further discussion. Please join us if you are willing to contribute for this specific activity.

With warm regards.
FoC team

Minutes of the meeting held at SYNYGY on 26th Feb at 4 pm

2006-03-01T22:33:00.000+05:30

Friends

16 volunteers and newcomers interested in FoC attended the meeting.The task list sent by Venky earlier was used as an agenda and the following was decided.

1. Focus on Spoken english classes and Chanakya classes besides the computer sessions for the summer. Shriyash and Aparna will do the required for the above.

2. Venky and Anindya will meet on March 4th at Blind school and check the configuration of the computers and the requirements from our side. Nilesh will assist them also. Based on this, we will list out the software and the course material and fix up with the students on April 23rd ( during the meeting ) for classes.

3. The Rural school project is going to be handled independent of the regular running of FoC. We plan to meet on March 11th at Vani's house and decide how to go about handling the various schools, their requirements and who will approach corporates for the same. An email will be sent before the meeting with the agenda . Interested members are requested to attend. We will need as many hands as possible to assist for this project, so please make it convienient to attend.

4. March 26th is tentatively scheduled for a trip to the village schools again to talk seperately to the shortlisted students. Based on their final exam results , we will examine options for them in
the coming year.

5. The consultation for the 80 G is scheduled for March 11th morning. Sandeep will coordinate with Aparna,Venky and Uday.

6. Praveen, Rajoshi and Unmana have promised to help out with the website management. Venky will co ordinate with them.

7. Interested volunteers have to give in their names on April 23rd to handle a workshop / seminar / group session with our students monthwise from Aug 2006 to Dec 2006. Every session will be around 2
hours or so.

8. Details for the BPO training for the blind boys have to be organised from BLR and mumbai. Venky will co ordinate with the volunteers for the same. Aparna will check with SWA about hostel accomodation.

9. Shriyash will handle collection of old books and purchase of new textbooks this year along with some student volunteers

10.The next student meeting is scheduled for April 23rd at SYNYGY at 2.30 pm

Thanks
Vani

FoC Students

2006-02-08T21:23:00.000+05:30

FoC Student Awards Feb06

Minutes of the meeting held on Feb 5th 2006 ,at SYNYGY at 2.30 pm

2006-02-05T22:30:00.000+05:30

Minutes of the meeting held on Feb 5th 2006 ,at SYNYGY at 2.30 pm

1. Listed out the various exam schedules of the students, to check possibilities of vocational classes in summer.

2. Listed out students interested in specific vocational courses. Some are interested in doing Tally, Pro E and Autocad.

3.Listed out interested students fo computer classes to be held through summer . A minimum fees will be charged and two levels of classes will be held ( beginners and advanced )

4. Last social service for this term will be on Feb 12th at blind school, Koregaon park. All students who have a balance to be completed will be given 2 days in March to do so.

5. A seperate meeting for Class 11 students to decide what they plan to do in summer will be arranged on April 16th. Plans for Class 12 will be discussed and if required classes organised for subjects as required.

6. Outgoing students met Anil to discuss their plans and prospects. They would take his assistance to make a CV etc to apply for jobs.

7. Missing and pending receipts were collected from students and exam fees disbursed for some of them.

8. Ganpat, Sucheta and Harish were selected to collect text books and take charge of them at the end of this year and for the beginning of next year.

9. Prizes were distributed to the students as follows....

Watches
1. Rishikesh Gaikwad ...helped Nalini( our senior volunteer ) to climb up and down Tikona fort and was with her throughout the day
2. Jaytheerth Sanglikar...helped Sadanand ( visually impaired student ) for the same picnic for the whole day.
3. Ramesh Girme....postponed his return to the village for holidays and manned our divali stalls at MBT, Infosys and Veritas

Transistors
1. Deepa Navaghane...assisted in decorating 2500 diyas for the divali sale
2. Aarti Choudhuri....asssisted in decorating 2500 diyas for the divali sale

Books for academic achievements
1. Ashwini Shahapurkar... Maths 97 %, Chemistry 89 %, Physics 87 % , Biology 93 % ( Class 12 )
2. Sucheta Sonje.....Banking and Finance 75 % ( SY B.com )
3. Deepa Navaghane ....Accounts 90 % , Org. commerce 81 % ( Class 12 )
4. Shobha Manore ....Banking and Finance 71 % , Org. commerce 70 % ( SY B.com )
5. Kalyani Mirajkar ....Biology 81 % , IT 83 % ( class 11 )
6. Appa Amrule ....Biology 81 % ( Class 12 )
7. Harish Patankar ... 69 % overall in BAMS course second year .
8. Dhanashri .....Maths 84 %, Chemistry 82 % ( Class 11 )

A piece of good news from FOC

2006-01-16T22:25:00.000+05:30

Hello everybody,

FOC has started the new year with a lot of reason to cheer about !!!

Three of our students, passing out in June 2006 have been placed through campus interviews.

1> Datta doing this Diploma in Paint technology has been placed with a company in Mumbai.

2> Gokul Pawar doing this Diploma in Paint technology has been placed with a company in Goa.

3> Giridhar doing his last year mechanical engineering from COEP has been placed with Tata Technologies.

Along with the above three students two more of our students who passed out last year have got jobs in September last year.

1> Kavita Navghane who did her BCom got a job with a firm in Wagholi.

2> Sagar who did his Arts teacher course got a job as a teacher with a school in Dighi.

FOC wishes all these students a very bright future ahead.

Regards
FOC team,
Pune